About us

National Grid is hiring a Director, Electric Connections, New York, supporting the three UNY Divisions. Successful candidate’s primary office location could be either Buffalo, Syracuse or Albany.

Every day we deliver safe and secure energy to homes, communities, and businesses. We are there when people need us the most. We connect people to the energy they need for the lives they live. The pace of change in society and our industry is accelerating and our expertise and track record put us in an unparalleled position to shape the sustainable future of our industry.

To be successful, we must anticipate the needs of our customers, reducing the cost of energy delivery today and pioneering the flexible energy systems of tomorrow. This requires us to deliver on our promises and always look for new opportunities to grow ourselves and our business.

Job Purpose

Lead a team of managers and full-time employees to support electric customer connections projects. This team is responsible for the connection of non-standard commercial and residential service requests. The director, managers, and individuals on the team will seek to engage with external customers upon receipt of a work request, explaining the connections process, costs, and associated timelines. The director will lead teams collaboratively with data and process as foundational tools to deliver a superior customer experience.

The director will establish strong peer relationships across National Grid to build a customer centric culture. As applicable, the director will represent National Grid on the key organizational boards that strategically enhance relationships and advocacy for developers and customers, to advance regional economic development initiatives and/or are positioned to advocate in partnership with National Grid.

Key Accountabilities

• Lead a team of managers responsible for Electric Connections (currently 4 managers, 1 supervisor):

• Actively pace projects and customer connections.

• Leverage data and tools to understand process inconsistencies.

• Track and monitor projects to ensure timelines are adhered to and processes are reviewed when timelines are inconsistent.

• Engage and collaborate with stakeholders from across National Grid to support in process improvement initiatives.

• Support determination and communication of contributions in aid of construction (CIAC).

• Engage with teams to create customer centric materials to explain costs associated with infrastructure development.

• Engage with National Grid teams to develop unified customer facing connections materials to explain National Grid processes, timelines, and associated costs.

• Champion customers service needs and wants throughout the organization.

• Management team will lead Connections Representatives and Consumer Reps who will engage directly with customers to advance their projects through the connections process, delineate timelines, and share any customer commitments required throughout the process.

• Drive attainment of key departmental and process related metrics (eg. customer satisfaction, cycle times, etc.).

• Collectively, the team will collaborate with customers to deeply understand their business, project strategy, critical project milestones.

• When possible, the team will provide options for customers to consider as they review the project connection strategy, assessing costs and timelines associated with the work.

Leadership Accountabilities

• Develop and implement proactive strategies to ensure visibility to connections pipeline of projects in both electric and gas through the use of digital tools to drive continuous improvement for the benefit of our customers, developers, and internal stakeholders.

• Work with National Grid stakeholders to develop collateral and long-term portal enhancements to ensure a unified customer experience for out electric and gas customers.

• Support customers as they have escalated concerns regarding connections processes alongside manager and individual contributor teams, seeking to identify and rectify root cause in parallel.

• As applicable, contribute to regulatory engagements – working groups, rate cases, providing relevant updates to regulators.

• Implement strategies to build, maintain and protect ensure a solid reputation for National Grid’s reputation as an industry leader in energy and the environment by managing the interests of industry and business associations, trade allies, and other stakeholders.

• Supporting Account Management and their relationship with key stakeholders to ensure the success of critical new projects for our territories, growth in clean energy projects and the attainment of high levels of customer satisfaction.

• Initiate and cultivate strong working relationships with internal National Grid departments to build and promote National Grid’s standing with business leaders.

• Provide leadership to a large team by coaching and mentoring colleagues to facilitate individual growth and development; champion a team environment in which diverse backgrounds are respected and valued.

• Execute communications and engagement programs to advance the mission and enhance market visibility and messaging with large managed accounts.

• Proactively lead inter-departmental collaborative efforts for timely and effective external developer and customer resolutions.

• Mobilize and lead external engagement in key internal operational, regulatory and strategic company initiatives, including efforts to advance the clean energy transition.

• Identify trends, issues and opportunities as strategic input to influence senior Executives to integrate change management and culture transformation initiatives.

• Proactively identify areas of opportunity or risk.

• Support the Corporate Affairs leaders in the external coordination and execution of the Company’s emergency management response plans, during events where electric delivery service interruptions/incidents have occurred.

• Provide direction and leadership on the organization’s strategy action plans to assist in hitting key milestones in order to accomplish goals and impact growth.

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree or higher with 10 years’ of experience in business, marketing, public administration, government affairs, public and or community relations.

• Energy utility experienced preferred.

• Project management and technical aptitude a plus.

• Must possess superior business skills to interact with senior management level executives of external developers, customers and community leaders in settings to build strong partnerships with stakeholders.

• Must possess strong management skills, excellent verbal, and written communication skills along with the ability to write reports and develop presentations for senior management as required.

• Experience in crisis or external emergency management.

• Must possess exceptional interpersonal skills and the ability to provide positive influence in customer matters, as well as facilitate the resolution of internal and external issues/conflicts.

• In depth experience of working and influencing in a large complex organization, working in a collaborative manner to address and plan stakeholder engagement.

• Understanding of the environment and key external industry and non-industry stakeholders which relate to and have an impact on the utilities sector (governmental, regulatory, communities, agencies, industry bodies).

• Able to manage and explain complex, competing issues working with and through others - maintaining alignment with National Grid strategic direction and aims.

• High levels of networking, influencing and negotiation with a range of external stakeholders (individuals, agencies and groups).

• Actively build and maintain a network of internal relationships at senior levels in the business.

• A strategic and proactive leader and influencer.

More Information

Salary: $154,000 - $181,000

National Grid is an equal opportunity employer that values a broad diversity of talent, knowledge, experience and expertise.  We foster a culture of inclusion that drives employee engagement to deliver superior performance to the communities we serve.  National Grid is proud to be an affirmative action employer. We encourage minorities, women, individuals with disabilities and protected veterans to join the National Grid team.