Emerging power and utilities workforce challenges and how to overcome them

Originally published in the August 2024 Workforce Edition of the Northwest Public Power Association monthly bulletin.

The power and utilities industry is undergoing a significant shift towards renewable and sustainable energy sources — such as wind, hydro, electric, solar, and nuclear — due to global, economical, and regulatory demands.

This shift requires a workforce with new skills, capabilities, and experience to advance the effort towards cleaner and greener sources of power as well as being adaptable and innovative.

Having insight into the industry’s current workforce concerns and emerging challenges can improve decision-making, inform hiring practices, and help you build an agile, future-focused team.

Current workforce concerns

One of the most significant trends in the industry is the growing focus on integrating renewable energy sources into the grid, which requires workers with expertise in renewable energy technologies and grid management.

For example, the rise of distributed energy resources (DERs), like rooftop solar and battery storage, requires new workforce skills for managing decentralized networks and integrating them into the main grid.

There’s also an increased focus on customer experience and personalized services, with utilities employing more customer service representatives and investing in customer relationship management systems (CRM) to meet customer-centric service demands.

Finally, a significant portion of the current workforce is nearing retirement age, creating an intellectual property and experience gap, increasing the need for actionable succession planning and knowledge transfer to the younger talent.

Emerging workforce challenges

Sourcing effective talent is an ongoing business struggle across industries, especially with the ongoing talent shortage. Below are workforce hurdles specific to the power and utilities industry.

Attracting and retaining talent

As power and utility organization transitions towards renewable and sustainable energy sources, one of the most significant challenges is the talent shortage. Many organizations have predominantly focused on recruiting talent within the industry. Historically, this has been adequate, however, it’s not meeting current needs.