Director, Public Affairs

Job Description Position Title: Director, State and Local Public Affairs, Central Region Location: Austin, TX About The Role As Director, State and Local Public Affairs for the Central Region, you will partner with external consultants to lead Digital Realty’s government and community relations strategy across key markets, including Texas and Illinois. You will represent Digital Realty at the local, city, and state levels, managing relationships with elected officials, government agencies, community organizations, trade associations, and business leaders. Your work will be critical in advancing the company’s public policy objectives, facilitating new development, and ensuring that Digital Realty is recognized as a responsible, engaged corporate partner. This role combines strategic government affairs leadership with community engagement and reputation management. You will develop and implement advocacy strategies that support data center growth and infrastructure expansion while ensuring Digital Realty remains a partner in the communities where Digital Realty operates. Working closely with internal partners across development, sustainability, energy, operations, communications, and legal, you will ensure policy, community, and business objectives are fully aligned throughout the Central Region. What You Will Do Lead Digital Realty’s public affairs and community relations strategy across the Central Region (Texas and Illinois). Build and maintain strong relationships with local, city, and state government officials, regulatory agencies, and community stakeholders. Develop and execute advocacy and engagement strategies that support business objectives and long‑term growth. Serve as the company’s representative in public hearings, community meetings, and with industry and business organizations. Collaborate on land use, zoning, permitting, and development efforts, engaging with government and community leaders to facilitate project success. Partner with the communications team to manage media relations and strengthen Digital Realty’s brand and reputation in local markets. Manage local sponsorships and community partnerships, ensuring alignment with company values and regional priorities. Monitor legislative, regulatory, and political developments and provide strategic insights to company leadership. Build coalitions and work with industry associations on policies related to energy, tax, infrastructure and technology. Travel 35% as needed across the Central Region. What You Will Need Bachelor’s degree or equivalent practical experience. 10+ years of experience working within government, corporate public affairs or public policy organizations. Preferred Qualifications Experience with or within state and local governments, particularly involving real estate, tax, economic development, data centers, information technology, critical infrastructure or energy policy. Knowledge of land acquisition, zoning laws, permitting, energy, electricity, utility policy and real‑estate development is a strong plus. Experience in campaign strategy or political communications, including stakeholder engagement and grassroots organizing. Experience in media relations, including proactive communications and issue management. Experience managing local sponsorships and community partnerships to support corporate reputation and engagement. A Bit About Us Digital Realty brings companies and data together by delivering the full spectrum of data center, colocation and interconnection solutions. PlatformDIGITAL®, the company’s global data center platform, provides customers with a secure data meeting place and a proven Pervasive Datacenter Architecture (PDx®) solution methodology for powering innovation and efficiently managing Data Gravity challenges. Digital Realty gives its customers access to the connected data communities that matter to them with a global data center footprint of 300+ facilities in 50+ metros across 25+ countries on six continents. Legal Our Legal team works in a highly complex global business sector with a diverse range of local, regional and international organizations. From ensuring compliance in different jurisdictions to supporting business teams with customer and supplier contracts, we’re involved in a variety of projects. Working in a dynamic commercial environment, we collaborate with colleagues across different departments and always have a new challenge waiting for us. What We Can Offer You Our rapidly evolving business sector offers the opportunity to be part of a courageous and passionate team who work together to understand and meet the changing needs of our global customers. Join us and you’ll be part of a supportive and inclusive environment where you can bring your whole self to work. As part of our team, you’ll get to work with people from different business areas, challenge the way we do things and put your ideas into action. We’ll also give you plenty of development opportunities so you can build a rewarding and successful career with us. Health and Safety Safety isn’t just a priority here at Digital; it’s critical to everything we do. Safeguarding lives, protecting assets, and securing data aren’t just ideals – they’re essential pillars of our commitment to excellence for our people, our partners and our customers. We have a culture of care where every member of Team Digital embraces a relentless pursuit of working safely across Digital Realty. Together we are Safely Powering Progress. Our Compensation Philosophy Digital Realty offers its employees a highly competitive compensation package, excellent benefits, and an environment that recognizes and rewards your contributions. Central to our compensation philosophy is rewarding our employees for achieving the values and objectives aligned to the company’s overall goals and values. Seniority level Director Employment type Full-time Job function Marketing, Public Relations, and Writing/Editing Industries IT Services and IT Consulting #J-18808-Ljbffr