Business Specialist, IT

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National Grid is hiring a Business Specialist, IT to support our Customer Connections group in Waltham, MA
This is a Hybrid Role - Must live within a commutable distance

Job Purpose

National Grid maintains a highly-customized, Salesforce-based web-portal, "ConnectNow", that is linked to a back-end workflow and data management system known as Gridforce. This position provides front-line User Support for Gridforce (and other related key IT systems that interface with Gridforce). The position will act as a primary point of contact for internal and customer users (particularly those submitting connection applications and performing engineering tasks) to translate user needs into actionable requests to enhance user experience and data accuracy.

This position will report to the Customer Connections Process & Systems team (within the Customer Organization), will work collaboratively with the Gridforce IT team, and will be expected to support all ConnectNow users from engineering and application processing teams (with the opportunity to expand support to additional users and/or systems based on personal development as National Grid continues to along its digital experience journey).

Key Accountabilities

• Enable operational safety, efficient engineering processes, and accurate system impact & planning study results by collaborating with engineers, data scientists, IT, and Architecture team members to maintain data integrity and alignment to/from other IT systems at National Grid to ensure that key records (e.g. National Grid Infrastructure, Customer DER Assets, and the DER Product Catalog) are accurately maintained and updated
• Project manage 1-2 major feature implementations each fiscal year including creating business process maps & defining and executing a communication and change management plan in alignment with stakeholder management best practices
• Act as the primary point of contact and setup regular stakeholder meetings with leaders and subject matter experts at National Grid to keep them informed of recent enhancements and gain feedback on upcoming roadmap plans that impact their teams
• Develop a detailed understanding of key business processes, customer needs, engineering standards, and utility regulations affecting the customer and business users of ConnectNow in order to help identify where potential enhancement requests may break fundamental aspects of the user experience and/or conflict with utility best practices or regulatory requirements
• Collaborate with business leaders, subject matter experts, customers, and other team members to identify potential enhancements to improve the user experience or data accuracy
• Provide feedback to business users about how potential process changes or improvements would impact or be impacted by ConnectNow functionality
• Provide front-line troubleshooting for user issues to determine if the root cause is the result of a defect, a user error, a business process gap, or another cause
• Submit bugs and user stories in JIRA to the ConnectNow product management team for prioritization
• Participate in strategic planning, backlog refinement, sprint planning, reviews, and user acceptance testing kickoff sessions on a regular schedule in alignment with the IT release schedule
• Communicate status changes of bug fixes and enhancement requests to business users
• Coordinate with subject matter experts from the supported team(s) to complete User Acceptance Testing (UAT) for user stories and defects that impact the team
• Other tasks and special projects as assigned
• Perform routine administrative tasks to ensure appropriate levels of user access and permissions, data integrity, and a positive user experience overall
• Develop and present seminar & training materials about how to use ConnectNow
• Assist other team members as needed with ad hoc process improvement, automation, and IT enhancement projects

Qualifications

Experience:

• Alternative 1: Master’s degree (received or expected within 6 months) with at least 1 year of professional work experience OR
• Alternative 2: Bachelor’s degree (received or expected within 6 months) with at least 1-3 years of professional work experience OR
• Alternative 3: At least 3+ years of relevant professional work experience

Required (regardless of alternative above):

• At least 1 year of previous work experience in electrical engineering, physics, data science, computer science, IT user support, or process improvement

Preferred (regardless of alternative above):

• Previous work experience in an agile IT work environment (other experience in the relevant business units that this position is supporting will be considered if a candidate is otherwise qualified)
• Desirable (additional) experience in any of the following fields: change management, customer service, graphic design, user experience (UX) research or design, website design, data management, agile project management, utility connections management, electrician, solar, EV or other DER installation

Skills:

• All applicants must be able to read and accurately interpret electrical line diagrams (preferably with experience designing or reviewing line diagrams for solar, DER, and/or utility power systems)
• Demonstrated ability to quickly learn, understand, and effectively communicate complicated processes, programs, or policies to a variety of audiences (including a strong preference for candidates that can identify when stakeholders are misunderstanding each other in a conversation and help to “translate” between stakeholders from different disciplines or levels of experience)
• Demonstrated ability to remain calm when communicating with customers (or other team members) during high stress situations when things are not working as expected and set clear expectations about the path toward a resolution
• Ability to write clear, detailed, and precise process instructions that include technical jargon
• Preference for candidates with demonstrated ability to manage a project team that is working toward multiple, parallel deadlines simultaneously (including interim milestone adherence)

Software:

• Proficiency with Microsoft Office 365 tools is required
• Experience or familiarity with Salesforce is preferred (other web-based user platforms and/or IT systems will also be considered)
• Experience or familiarity with JIRA is preferred (other project management software will also be considered)
• Experience with database management and/or coding languages is preferred
• Enthusiasm for sustainability, renewable energy, electric vehicles, heat electrification, energy efficiency, and/or other clean energy technologies is preferred (work experience in these areas is also a plus)

More Information

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