We Don't Need Data Center Electricians. We Need Electricians. | Concetta Defa
With Concetta Defa · Executive Director, Utah Building Trades Council
Hosted by Andrew Brown · October 13, 2026
Concetta Defa, executive director of the Utah Building Trades Council, on why data center training has to build real electricians, not one-job installers.
Concetta Defa, executive director of the Utah Building Trades Council, on why data center training has to build real electricians, not one-job installers. Tech companies are pouring money into training workers to build data centers, and electricians on those jobs can make over $200,000 a year with overtime.
Concetta has seen this before. When she was an apprentice, crews were putting up cell towers, and people who only ever learned cell towers struggled to pass journeyman exams and many left the trade once that build-out ended.
Her question for every workforce program today: when the data center boom is over, what happens to the people you trained to do one thing? Concetta started as an IBEW Local 354 apprentice in 1996, after her father died and she needed to help support her family.
She worked as a journey-level electrician, foreperson, estimator, project manager and assistant business manager before leading the Utah Building Trades Council. In this conversation she covers how to get into the IBEW when there's a waitlist, how apprentice pay climbs to journeyman scale, what job site conditions are really like, and why the money war over experienced workers is hurting the contractors building everything else.
This episode is for anyone thinking about an electrical apprenticeship, career changers trying to get into a union, and the apprenticeship programs, contractors and workforce leaders deciding how the next generation gets trained.
Key Takeaways.
01
Training someone to build one kind of facility isn't the same as training an electrician.
02
When that build-out ends, people without broad skills struggle to pass journeyman exams and move to other kinds of work.
03
If you can't get into the IBEW right away, keep working in the industry, track your hours, and try to get on with a union contractor.
04
A year of real job site experience tells an apprenticeship committee more than an interview can.
05
Apprentices typically start at 50 to 60 percent of journeyman pay and get regular step raises over three to five years.
06
Union retirement and benefits only pay off if you stay long enough to build them.
07
The fix isn't more money.
08
Apprentices need an experienced journeyman beside them in the field, because the tips and tricks of the trade aren't in any book.
09
As Andrew puts it, apprenticeship teaches a trade, mentorship builds the tradesperson.
Meet Concetta Defa.
Concetta Defa is executive director of the Utah Building and Construction Trades Council. She began as an apprentice electrician with IBEW Local 354 in 1996 and has worked as a journey-level electrician, foreperson, estimator, project manager and union steward.
She also served as assistant business manager for IBEW Local 354, a trustee for the Utah Electrical Training Alliance, and president of Utah Women in Trades. Concetta hosts a podcast with the Center for Energy Workforce Development's Hire PowHER initiative, which helps women find careers in energy and the skilled trades.
She's passionate about mentoring apprentices and making sure the next generation is trained for a whole career, not just the current boom.
