Senior Strategic Business Planner

Minimum Pay Rate: $132,080.00

Maximum Pay Rate: $174,928.00

Civil Service Status: Civil Service

Apply by Date: 01/12/2024 

Posting Type: Open 

 

SMUD has set the most ambitious carbon reduction goal of any utility in the United States with it's 2030 Zero Carbon Plan. As part of the plan, customer sited distributed generation, customer renewables, and microgrids will play a significant role in accelerating grid decarbonization, delivering customer value, resilience, and providing grid benefits. The Distributed Energy Strategy team within SMUD is responsible for developing business models and new programs around customer renewable, distributed generation, and microgrids, along with scaling virtual power plants, and electrification of buildings and transport in the region. Our team works to help all parts of the utility adapt to fully incorporate DERs into our business, planning, and operations. This position will develop strategies, design new customer program offerings and work with grid planning, policy, and pricing among other roles to enable a smooth transition to a future of abundant distributed resources delivering regional cost savings and resilience benefits. 

 

NOTE: This position will be hired at either the Journey or Senior level. To be considered for the Journey level, you must apply to requisition number 1058. 

Purpose

To lead in the performance of both short and long term strategic business planning balancing the experiences and needs of customers while also focusing on internal priorities, resources and objectives. Oversee long term strategies while also delivering value to the business through short term, actionable efforts. In doing so, clearly identifies SMUD current state, desired state, key steps required to reach the desired state, and the benefits to our customers and SMUD. Maintains a focus on customer experience excellence; ensures achievement of department results and goals that support SMUD strategic objectives

Nature and Scope

Serves as a technical or functional expert or consultant providing expertise and/or direction in one or more areas of a professional discipline and assumes responsibility for resolving complex problems and projects; may serve in a Lead role and assist in planning, coordinating, prioritizing, monitoring and evaluating the work results in assigned area and in selecting, training, motivating, evaluating and developing lower-level personnel.

Duties and Responsibilities

• Leads and supports key business initiatives by overseeing the development of short and long term strategic and operational plans to drive and support implementation of customer programs, operational enhancements, product solutions, or other services to meet SMUDs strategic business objectives.
• Oversees the establishment of 3-year strategic and/or operating plan for assigned unit. Coordinate the monthly forecast process, ensure line of sight between project outline and delivery.
• Use existing financial models and/or develop new models, spreadsheets or other techniques to analyze financial and business planning issues. Including researching and analyzing data to identify major drivers of performance, customer experience and interpret trends to develop, present, and implement value-added solutions to optimize resources and processes.
• Define, review and monitor operational/program metrics; support requests for project maintenance and creation to ensure business alignment; collaborate with stakeholders to determine measures of success to ensure program/project changes benefits are realized; serves as a liaison between workgroup/business units to facilitate business needs.
• Develop and support recommendations with accurate financial analysis and rigorous financial or economic theory. Review analyses, reports or other decision documents prepared by other contributors or stakeholders and provide comments or additional analyses to improve the overall quality of information provided to management.
• Develop, prioritize and evaluate strategic customer initiatives including technology, energy technology and capital projects. Incorporate primary and secondary customer research to ensure that the voice of the customer is considered.
• Oversee contract management for assigned area, ensure vendors are meeting SLA, evaluate contracts and determine if extensions or a new RFP is necessary to sustain business processes/needs.Establish delivery tactics, budgets, key performance indicators and metrics within the planning framework for all initiatives to guide the implementation process.
• Work closely with implementation teams to track and adjust plans on an on-going basis to ensure a positive customer experience and ongoing success.
• Partner with applicable stakeholders within and across business units and departments to ensure coordination, consistency,