Utility Week

18 | 8TH - 14TH JUNE 2018 | UTILITY WEEK Operations & Assets Market view How to attract digital talent How do utilities ensure they have the talent needed to survive in the digital world? James Sutherland looks at how the sector can attract the right talent. A cross the utilities value chain, we're seeing stratospheric leaps in data measurement and processing, automation and robotics, connectivity and the Internet of Things, and how we commun icate with technology and each other. These are accelerating and disrupting the traditional, stable utilities business model. In response, utility companies must learn how to adapt their operating models, and be prepared to adapt again at more frequent interval. They also need to assess the skills and capabilities required to support and sustain the change. The challenge is finding, attracting, growing, and retaining the skills in a digitalising world competing for the same resources. For most computer and data scientists, working for a power or water utility is probably not high on their list of preferred employers, so utilities have to be innovative in developing talent models, and building a workforce strategy that uses some or all of the four following considerations. Increase your appeal as an employer to attract new talent Utility companies already struggle more than most to attract talent with the right skills and expertise. The UKCES Employer Skills Survey 2015 found that electricity, gas, and water companies had some of the highest rates of vacancies in skilled jobs, with 35 per cent of these roles vacant – over 50 per cent higher than the national average. Becoming as appealing as possible as an employer requires an understanding of what techsavvy, predominantly young people entering the workforce are looking for: Bright Network's Research Report 2017/18 found that 36 per cent of graduates cited a good worklife balance as the primary indicator of career success, compared with 16 per cent who quoted earning a lot of money. So it is not as simple as buying the right talent with bigger pay packets, which would likely be unsustainable for many regulated utilities in any case. It is more about the whole employee value proposition. It is important to take an honest look at whether you can give new recruits what they want, and work out how to improve your offering and profile in the market. This doesn't have to be ball pits and sleep pods in the office, but should include more flexible working, autonomy, and empowerment to make strides in what is an underdigitalised sector. Develop what you already have It's said that people are a company's most important resource, so the existing workforce is a logical place to discover and develop the new skills required. Fiynine per cent of energy respondents to the World Economic Forum's Future of Jobs survey stated that investing in reskilling was their top priority for closing the skills gap. To develop the talent from within, utilities need to rethink learning and development approaches. First, identify the skills gaps and career paths leading to critical jobs. Consider how to reduce the time it takes to bring individuals up to speed, using stretch goals, mentoring, and transferring of skills from those already in place. Second, deploy multi channel and digital learning techniques for existing employees, focusing on the technical, agile, and cognitive skills required to thrive in digitalisation. Reskilling your current workforce may seem a daunting task, but it can be done. For example, in 2013, US telecoms giant AT&T made a decision to modernise and digitalise its business, which meant thousands of roles were at risk. AT&T launched an initiative called Workforce 2020 to retrain 100,000 field engineers, technicians, and call centre operatives. According to the Harvard Business Review, by the middle of 2016, half of all AT&T's technology management jobs were occupied by people who had been retrained, and product development times had been cut by 40 per cent. Review outsourcing options In some cases, talent gaps can be filled by outsourcing. The demand for technological skills in the utilities market has led to the rise of new, oen specialist, techcentric companies focused on specific elements of the value chain. Similar to the role of oil field service companies in the upstream oil and gas industry, these businesses step in to provide skills and services. In the short term, outsourcing allows for flexibility and the ability to ramp up or down based on demand, or – in cases where you don't have the economies of scale – to pro v ide a highquality, ongoing service. For the long term, outsourcing requires a strategic decision on whether to ever build the capa bility inhouse or always rely on external partners. As a longterm solution for digital capabilities, outsourcing can be expensive and perhaps that money would be better invested in training the existing workforce. A comprehensive review on how to minimise contractor spending, forecast demand for it, and identify the bestquality agencies or third parties to work with will make the most effective use of this type of rented labour. Crowdsourcing A more recent version of outsourcing is crowdsourcing, and utilities should ask themselves what role it can play to bring in fresh ideas. For example, Danish utility Aarhus Water ran an opensource competi tion to crowdsource ideas to improve biogas production, energy efficiency, and carbon harvesting at one of its wastewater treatment plants. It received multiple responses from nonutility players and entrepreneurs, and the solutions implemented improved the net energy consumptiongeneration ratio to 150 per cent, double the theoretical best of 75 per cent then on offer. In exchange for scale, funding and mentorship, crowdsourcing can allow other utilities to tackle innovation from a new angle and keep pace with rapid changes in both technology and the market. Increased digitalisation across all sectors is intensifying the competition for technology skills. By identifying early what you want your future workforce to look like you can develop a strategy to both build internal talent and source it externally. James Sutherland, management consultant, Oliver Wyman

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