Director Power Generation

The Director Power Generation has primary responsibility for the Hydro, Thermal, Renewable, Gas Pipeline, and Rancho Seco Assets. In collaboration with the Chief Generation and Grid Operations Officer and peer senior management team members, the Director designs and implements the processes necessary to ensure the safe, reliable, available, and efficient operation of generation assets, while maintaining compliance with applicable licenses and regulatory requirements.

This is a department level senior management position. It is distinguished from other director positions by its emphasis on the Power Generation Department. This position provides ongoing direction and management to ensure the safe, compliant, reliable, and efficient operations of the following functional areas: Hydro, Thermal, Renewable, Gas Pipeline, and Rancho Seco. The role is required to attend, present, and/or lead at Board, executive, team, customer, community, and one-on-one meetings; in person, as needed.

• Provides leadership for the following work groups: Hydro Generation, Thermal Generation, Renewable Generation, Gas Pipeline Operations, Engineering, Regulatory Compliance, and Rancho Seco. Oversees business performance, resource planning, budget, and overall project portfolio.
• Ensures the safe operation of generation assets maximizing efficiency, reliability, availability, and full compliance with regulatory requirements.
• Instills a culture of zero safety incidents by developing and maintaining a safety culture that is accountable for actions and open to feedback. Promotes the safety of SMUD employees, contractors, and customers through adherence to established SMUD policies and goals.
• Creates, communicates and implements department vision in alignment with SMUD strategy and in collaboration with subordinate managers to drive alignment and engagement of Power Generation workgroups.
• Partners with Enterprise Strategy to develop Enterprise Performance Goals. Has accountability for execution and oversight of goal achievement.
• Presents to Chief Executive Officer/General Manager, Executive Team, and SMUD's Board of Directors on Power Generation business unit activities including asset condition and performance, FERC Licenses, regulatory conditions, budget and resource considerations.
• Provides timely information to executive management on significant events, major milestones, impacts to the public, matters that could have a potentially significant impact on SMUD's employees and/or customers' safety, financial position, compliance, reputation, or relationships with SMUD's customers and/or other agencies.
• Represents SMUD's position before regulatory/legislative commissions in public meetings and hearings, and with other external stakeholder entities.
• Promotes a OneSMUD collaborative relationship with all SMUD work groups. Participates and collaborates with other leaders on cross-functional steering committees for the successful accomplishment of SMUD initiatives.
• Ensures Power Generation maintains open communication and harmonious relationships with represented employees and union officials and works collaboratively with Labor Relations.
• Perform other related duties as needed; schedules, hours and locations may fluctuate based on business needs.

• Bachelor's degree in a relevant discipline from an accredited college or university.

• Seven or more (7+) years of experience in the design, construction, maintenance, and/or operations of utility assets with at least 5 of those years specific to power generation, including five or more (5+) years in a management role. Experience in modern electric utility business and management practices, managing and scheduling major projects, and interfacing with executive management, Board of Directors, regulatory agencies, and the public.

• Fundamentals and practices of complex planning, management, organizing, staffing, and monitoring at a department level;
• Business and political acumen;
• Budget development and administration;
• Project management;
• Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Belonging (DEIB) and organizational culture change;
• Community engagement;
• Comprehension of applicable employment laws and practices

Specific to Director Power Generation

• Different types of generation such as hydro, thermal (combustion gas/steam), wind, photovoltaic and energy storage;
• Power plant construction, maintenance, and operation;
• Natural gas pipeline operations and maintenance;
• NRC regulated independent spent fuel storage;
• Commercially available and emerging power generation technologies;
• Asset and work management skills include lifecycle asset management, risk & reliability engineering, work order optimization, resource and labor scheduling, maintenance strategies, outage management, etc;
• Incident Command System

• Oversee, influence, persuade, and motivate;
• Establish policies, set goals, and manage the implementation of strategic and operational plans for area(s) of responsibility;
• Direct activities through management staff;
• Manage and drive change across cross-functional teams;
• Demonstrate commitment to valuing diversity and contributing to an inclusive working and learning environment;
• Interface effectively with SMUD's executive team, the Board of Directors, regulatory and/or public agencies, customers, industry groups, and SMUD staffns and new business; deal with and implement changes; recognize sensitive issues and act accordingly; perform under pressure; and, recognize and admit when one is wrong.

Specific to Director Power Generation

• Lead, plan, manage, and review the work of multi-disciplinary professional, technical and represented personnel in the performance of complex engineering and operating assignments under significant time constraints;
• Effectively communicate highly technical information and recommendations to a variety of audiences and explain complex or controversial policies, regulations, procedures, and activities, both internally and externally orally or in writing;
• Interpret and apply SMUD policies, procedures, applicable IBEW MOUs, and/or other special agreements;
• Respond quickly and effectively to changing priorities;
• Proactively anticipate problems and apply innovative, creative, logical techniques in their resolution;
• Manage emergency events such as a generation outage, storm event, safety or environmental incident, etc;
• Perform post-event root cause analysis and continuous improvement initiatives

The ideal candidate will possess many of the following qualifications:

• Registration as a Professional Engineer (PE) in the State of California.
• Experience working with regulatory and governmental agencies.
• Experience managing large capital budgets and operations and maintenance (O&M) budgets.
• Project management experience involving large, complex, utility-scale hydroelectric, thermal, renewable, and gas pipeline projects.
• Experience developing, negotiating, and administering Engineering, Procurement, and Construction (EPC) contracts.
• Experience developing goals, objectives, and priorities aligned with asset management industry best practices and standards.
• Experience supporting or leading emergency operations, including response to natural disasters or other major operational events.
• Experience building, supporting, and sustaining a strong safety culture across teams and operations.
• Bachelor of Science degree in Engineering
• PMP Certification - Experience overseeing large-scale capital projects, construction management, and procurement
• Asset Management Certification
• FEMA Incident Command System - ICS-100, 200, 300, and 400