Good insight. Software, AI, tech etc can only help if the input is there. Its not magic. That being said, here's a fun thought experiment. Imagine the bizzarro dimension where the industry was ready, now. What would that look like? on a day to day, ground level view, what does it look like? Now work backward to how you got there.
2. Start hiring hungry Zoomers by 1) increasing pay 150% minimum, 2) getting them in college/trade school, 3) promising to train them in-house instead of expecting entry-level staff to be qualified.
3. Develop IT/IS/data strategic plan--why are we using AI, really? Do we know what AI is? Do we have people on staff who are interested in doing this? Do we trust that an AI-enabled utility will really motivate changed outputs?
4. Tighten and clean of cybersecurity infrastructure--increase IT staff by 50%, run an immediate pen test, because _by God the PLA has already compromised the intranet_
5. Completely re-architecture and streamline data collection & management--every piece of data is tagged with a timestamp (by hour if not 15 min) and a GIS tag, including meter data, SCADA system reports, substation meter data, ISO/RTO data, customer calls, outage reports
6. Feed all that data into an AI system, either as context window, training data, or searchable data
7. ID remaining holes that can be solved by new sensors
8. Integrate those sensors
Something like that? There's probably a Step 0: nightmare crisis that (unlikely) changes people's minds or (more likely) obliterates and shames the old guard so totally that everything they do is rejected whole-cloth, a la Khrushchev denouncing Stalin
lol, fair enough. Some of this is doable. I'd say take down even more granular. What's a brain numbing task that's keeping you away from actually working on theses plans. Like I've spend HOURs in a week working on the staff schedule. the schedule. like, why?( according to the state at least) I'm and expert in water treatment why am I stuck on a staff schedule. And the ptsd from it... I'm starting to think about the cascading positive effects we can make.
The report you generate that takes 5 hours a week and no one reads, automate it. Now you have 5 hours to do what you do best, think. And what do those thoughts lead to? Idk but im try to convince myself to not to leap off the water tower and this is how i do that lol.
In my experience, the challenge hasn't been mind-numbing tasks so much as scope creep overloading everyone--I have historically seen General Managers get distracted by shiny projects and Director-level leadership get too overloaded to sign off on things, much less manage people.
On top of that, electric utilities involve so many disciplines (engineering, construction, facilities management, portfolio management, marcom, customer service) that people don’t know what goes on in other parts of the building
meaning “that’s pretty doable to implement, right?”
I take the view it's possible because I have to. But also because it's happened before. I mean I'm its a different world now, but we have different tools too.
you're actively engaging in examining processes, it's really encouraging to me.
Idk, I don't get a lot to be encouraged by but the check still cash, for now lol
Good insight. Software, AI, tech etc can only help if the input is there. Its not magic. That being said, here's a fun thought experiment. Imagine the bizzarro dimension where the industry was ready, now. What would that look like? on a day to day, ground level view, what does it look like? Now work backward to how you got there.
In my industry's case--
1. Retire the Boomers, probably half the Xers too
2. Start hiring hungry Zoomers by 1) increasing pay 150% minimum, 2) getting them in college/trade school, 3) promising to train them in-house instead of expecting entry-level staff to be qualified.
3. Develop IT/IS/data strategic plan--why are we using AI, really? Do we know what AI is? Do we have people on staff who are interested in doing this? Do we trust that an AI-enabled utility will really motivate changed outputs?
4. Tighten and clean of cybersecurity infrastructure--increase IT staff by 50%, run an immediate pen test, because _by God the PLA has already compromised the intranet_
5. Completely re-architecture and streamline data collection & management--every piece of data is tagged with a timestamp (by hour if not 15 min) and a GIS tag, including meter data, SCADA system reports, substation meter data, ISO/RTO data, customer calls, outage reports
6. Feed all that data into an AI system, either as context window, training data, or searchable data
7. ID remaining holes that can be solved by new sensors
8. Integrate those sensors
Something like that? There's probably a Step 0: nightmare crisis that (unlikely) changes people's minds or (more likely) obliterates and shames the old guard so totally that everything they do is rejected whole-cloth, a la Khrushchev denouncing Stalin
lol, fair enough. Some of this is doable. I'd say take down even more granular. What's a brain numbing task that's keeping you away from actually working on theses plans. Like I've spend HOURs in a week working on the staff schedule. the schedule. like, why?( according to the state at least) I'm and expert in water treatment why am I stuck on a staff schedule. And the ptsd from it... I'm starting to think about the cascading positive effects we can make.
The report you generate that takes 5 hours a week and no one reads, automate it. Now you have 5 hours to do what you do best, think. And what do those thoughts lead to? Idk but im try to convince myself to not to leap off the water tower and this is how i do that lol.
In my experience, the challenge hasn't been mind-numbing tasks so much as scope creep overloading everyone--I have historically seen General Managers get distracted by shiny projects and Director-level leadership get too overloaded to sign off on things, much less manage people.
Yeah,the incentives are all off, you get credit for starting a project not seeing it succeed
On top of that, electric utilities involve so many disciplines (engineering, construction, facilities management, portfolio management, marcom, customer service) that people don’t know what goes on in other parts of the building
meaning “that’s pretty doable to implement, right?”
I take the view it's possible because I have to. But also because it's happened before. I mean I'm its a different world now, but we have different tools too.
you're actively engaging in examining processes, it's really encouraging to me.
Idk, I don't get a lot to be encouraged by but the check still cash, for now lol