Foremen in the Utility Industry Leadership Foundations for Foremen in the Utility Industry Foreman Skills Profile Project Update Nov. 8, 2018 “A Centralia College Partnership”

Why is industry interested? Digital transformation Advancing technology Competency based Validated by industry I would like to take a moment and share a short story that will set the stage for why our conversation this morning is so important. For the past 12 years, I have been involved with the Center of Excellence for Clean Energy. Over this time, I and my peers have invested our time in growing the clean energy effort through visioning and collaborating with the COE. This has resulted in three federal workforce grants to move forward clean energy jobs and training programs. All three grants exceeded expectations and outcomes in the energy sector. While past performance is great, where does that leave us today? We face continuing challenges in the energy sector. The recent Washington Jobs Project report published May of 2017 highlighted the creation of jobs for the grid modernization effort. We are interested in skills panels as we face digital transformation and advancing technology demanded by our customers to address grid reliability. But we need the jobs of the future to be informed by the competencies required of the roles as we face digitization as well as validated by industry as meeting our perceived needs and expectations.

The Grid In the past, the energy industry was pretty straight forward, there was a one-way flow of power to the end users; industry and consumers. Water spins the turbines, creates electricity at a low cost and our industries and communities flourished. But there were coal fired plants, natural gas fired plants that also spin the turbines. As we get smarter about environmental stewardship, we have begun to make the grid smarter, cleaner and more reliable. Source: The Washington Jobs Project, May 2017

The Smarter Grid The smarter grid has come with far more digitalization, expectations and requirements. The complexity has added competencies to occupational roles that were not envisioned when most apprenticeships and training programs for the energy industry began, let alone all the new roles that have been and continue to be created as this industry sector evolves. Cleaner energy requires more integration and communication to provide for seamless power. The blurring of lines between job roles and functions continues to tax the learning and development functions for industry, the educational and workforce systems. The challenge lies in how we come together to solve these issues and vision for the future. I would posit that we need to strengthen the center of excellence concept that has proven successful in the State of Washington and expand the funding and collaboration to support workforce and economic development. Source: The Washington Jobs Project, May 2017

Industry Sector Involvement Advisory Panels Regional Approach-one stop shops Consistency across the skills providers Cleaner energy is needed for economic growth The energy sector is an example of where industry has stepped up to the challenge. Industry is a full partner on the advisory panels for the COE and many 2 year and 4 year college programs. This needs to be expanded to reach into K-12 and the 4 Year colleges as a continuum and not a stop gap. The regional approach taken by the COE for Clean Energy is a model of leveraging the industry of the region to come together to solve common problems and vision for the future. COE’s live local, but serve the state and the region. The programs of research sponsored by the COE including workforce studies, skills panels and visioning forums provide for the sharing of information and programs that build consistency across the skills providers and have been a national model for success. We are all keenly aware that cleaner energy is a necessary driver for economic success, environmental stewardship and underpins our states’ ability to be competitive in the global markets.

Foreman Skill Profile-Industry Partners Avista Corp. Bonneville Power Administration Centralia City Light Chelan Public Utility District Clark Public Utilities Energy Northwest IBEW Tacoma Power Puget Sound Energy Seattle City Light

Building and Using Profiles 1. Background Research 2. Industry Focus Group 3. Draft Skill Profiles 4. Verify Draft or Revise To build the Profiles we created a common, systematic process. This allows us to build skill profiles that are consistent and ‘look’ the same from project to project That way, programs can be more portable across the education system and for use by industry. Research: Identify high-demand industry sectors, and existing standards, so we don’t re-invent the wheel Focus Groups: Partnerships between industry/education. Focus groups of employees who do the job-they know. Draft Profiles: for review by participants and SMEs. Verify/Revise: Survey of industry partners, same jobs and SMEs. Confirm and promote the Profiles New Programs/Revisions: In education and industry—keep pace with industry, technology and labor market change. 5. New Programs/Revisions

Research Gaps What we DON’T know or have: Recent analyses of common functions, activities, skill needs Employer expectations and sense of urgency Foundational competencies, as a basis for training and best practices It’s not clear how well various training that’s out there is based on current, foundational knowledge and skill needs—the basis for all training We don’t know what the current expectations are, not in any systematic way, and while individual utilities may have their own criteria, understanding what’s common across companies, related sectors, and foreman job classes would provide a useful foundation for training and career development by utilities, educators, programs and best practices.

Focus Group ‘Focus’ Industry/Occupational Trends Critical Work Functions (CWF) Key Activities (KA) Technical Knowledge and Skills Workplace Competencies These are the topics we covered during the one-day focus group

Industry/Occupational Trends - Input Now and in the Future: Impact of technology, policy, markets on Foremen roles and skill requirements Regulation-Related Workload Knowledge and Skills Diversification Age and Generational Issues SEE P. 22 OF THE REPORT FOR DETAILS AND EXAMPLES PROVIDED BY FOCUS GROUP Keep in mind these are working foremen, not policy wonks or futurists. Their input is based on what’s happening in the job, right now, that they observe and have to deal with in the work world.

Critical Work Functions Lead and Direct Employees Communicate Construct/Install, Maintain and Repair Systems and Components Coordinate Work Perform Planning and Scheduling Ensure a Safe Work Environment Perform Administrative Duties Maintain Quality Control and Quality Assurance Customer Service A key outcome of the meeting was to identify the really critical work functions that foremen have to do every day. From that, we identified the specific tasks associated with each of these functions. (next)

Critical Work Functions Key Activities A. Lead and Direct Employees A1 Identify skill sets A2 Provide skill gap training and ensure mandatory training A3 Assign and oversee personnel A4 Enforce industry standard compliance A5 Review direct reports’ performance, and conduct and identify recognition and/or corrective actions and note performance issues A6 Develop and support career enhancement of direct reports A7 Lead by example B. Communicate   B1 Communicate with management and direct reports B2 Communicate with internal and external customers B3 Communicate with vendors and contractors C. Construct/Install, Maintain and Repair Systems and Components C1 Perform preventive maintenance programs C2 Construct/Install and maintain systems and components C3 Respond to troubleshooting and system emergencies C4 Perform system and component repairs C5 Document equipment maintenance and repairs C6 Perform inspections D. Coordinate Work D1 Manage materials, tools, Equipment, emergency (EMS) stock levels D2 Ensure availability of materials, tools, equipment, prints and personnel D3 Order special needs equipment as required D4 Inspect tools and equipment D5 Reserve equipment as required D6 Coordinate work activity of crafts and crews There are 9 CWF’s, so this is just 4, but it shows how the key activities, or tasks, are related to each CWF. They are not in any particular order, on purposes.

Technical Knowledge and Skills For each Critical Work Function: Identify Technical Knowledge/Skills (5-10) Prioritize each list of skills Confirm The group then identified what they determined was the important technical knowledge and skills for each Function. They prioritized the knowledge and skills in smaller groups, then confirmed all items with the full group, following a lot of discussion.

Technical Knowledge and Skills Here’s an example, for CWF D., Coordinate Work. All the knowledge and skill areas are important, but when they ranked each knowledge/skill area, ehre’s what emerged: The ability to plan and form a strategy for coordinating work rose to the top. The blue bar shows a high level of agreement among the focus group members in their rankings on that skill—little variation or deviation among the scores. This is very helpful to trainers and educators, who can use this input to also emphasize certain topics or skills as part of the curriculum they use…so it’s optimally aligned with what Industry and front-line workers--say is important.

Workplace Competencies Survey Basic Skills Thinking Skills Personal Qualities Worksite Competencies Reading Creative Thinking Responsibility Utilizing Resources Writing Decision Making Self-worth Interpersonal Skills Arithmetic Problem Solving Sociability Utilizing Information Listening Visualization Self-management Using Systems Speaking Knows/Learns Integrity/Honesty Using Technology Reasoning  

Verify, Distribute, Evaluate Next Steps Verification by Industry Final Report and Dissemination Review Uses and Impact, Potential http://cleanenergyexcellence.org/industry/skill-standards/