Focusing on the front lines of the water workforce

We may be halfway through the calendar, but the year is just beginning for David Rager, the American Water Works Association’s incoming president. He accepted the gavel at the association’s annual conference last month in Las Vegas where I had an opportunity to chat with him about his objectives during his term.

“The most important thing that I would like to try to focus on is infrastructure investment,” he said. “Many of our systems are aging systems and we need to be investing in our infrastructure because we’ve got to operate, we’ve got to serve the community.”

Another important focus, Rager said, is to remember the folks on the front lines. “We have plant operators and field crews that are out there every day, mostly connected with the customer.” These individuals are a central part of a utility’s service, he noted. “We need to remember them and make sure we’re listening to them.”

Rager knows well the value of water utility employees. Before his current gig as a utility management consultant, he served as CEO of two water utilities: SD1 in Kentucky and Greater Cincinnati Water Works in Ohio.

In fact, building a strong water workforce is something Rager views as an important initiative across the water industry. “We’re a stable, reliable employer so a lot of people come [into the industry] and stay.” As a result, he noted, the average workforce age is in the vicinity of 52. “So we’re going to start to see a significant exodus of workers in the next few years.” Finding the people to follow behind them is going to be an important focus, one that will require developing an interest among young people in the industry, he said.

“We’ve [also] got a pretty aggressive program to recruit veterans in the industry who are looking for positions,” he added. “We find that there are a lot of veterans who are very well suited for this business. We just need to make connections to start to help utilities develop that workforce.”

To that end, AWWA is working with the Department of Defense and other organizations to establish veteran liaisons within each state. “So if a veteran is looking for a job, our liaisons can connect them with utilities,” he explained. “We’re hopeful that it’s going to work out to be a great program.”

A common, recurring theme in the water industry is that of “smart water” and the Internet of Things. I asked Rager his thoughts on the role of these kinds of technologies in today’s utility. “A lot of what we do is manage resources, and in the course of managing resources you need information,” he said. “And that’s what technology [is] capable of doing — providing you with information (whether it’s instantaneous or trends over a period of time) to be smarter about how your systems are functioning or how your customers are behaving, or what your customers’ needs are.”

Data — or more importantly, the analysis of that data — can help utilities be smarter about operations, which in turn can save money, make utilities more efficient, and ultimately help utilities provide a better quality of service. “So using technology through smart water is very valuable,” he said, if it helps us “do a better job serving our communities.”