Job Description

About Silicon Valley Clean Energy

Formed in 2016, Silicon Valley Clean Energy (SVCE) is a public Community Choice Energy service provider serving approximately 270,000 residential and commercial customer accounts in thirteen Santa Clara County communities. SVCE’s mission is to provide customers with renewable and carbon-free electricity at competitive rates, and further accelerate decarbonization through deployment of innovative local programs. Key program areas include: building electrification, electric vehicles and charging infrastructure, battery storage and demand management programs. Since the organization’s service launch in 2017, SVCE has provided clean to all residential and commercial energy customers in SVCE’s member communities, carbon-free electricity. SVCE has saved its customers more than $90M and dedicated $84M to customer offers, programs and services. SVCE is a joint-powers agency governed by a Board of Directors comprised of an elected official from each of SVCE’s thirteen member communities.

By providing reliable and responsive carbon-free electricity service at competitive rates, SVCE maintains a 96+% customer participation rate and a strong financial foundation. Access to carbon-free electricity has helped our communities take a major step in fighting climate change, reducing local emissions by more than 30% from a 2015 baseline. Yet supplying clean electricity is just the start. It is essential that SVCE continues to proactively engage with our customers and community stakeholders in the electrification journey - helping to inspire, educate, and enable action in transitioning from fossil fuels to clean electricity – in homes, buildings, and transportation.

The SVCE Culture

Achieving SVCE’s ambitious and urgent mission requires a team capable of meeting the tremendous challenges embedded in these goals. SVCE develops and fosters a diverse and talented team that thrives in a dynamic and fast-changing environment. As such, at SVCE we recruit and retain smart, passionate, innovative, and collaborative employees. Company employees contribute, as a team and as individuals, to continuously building and supporting a culture of collaboration and trust. SVCE employees encourage creativity and the free flow of ideas to spur innovation. The workplace environment is adaptable, and technology enabled to drive innovative solutions. SVCE emphasizes focus and prioritization across departments to achieve quality, rather than simply quantity of output. SVCE provides a rewarding workplace experience where productivity can be maintained across a variety of work environments. SVCE provides opportunities for growth, engagement, and support professional and personal development. SVCE offers opportunities that position their people, as well as SVCE, for success.

More information can be found at: www.svcleanenergy.org

About the role

SUMMARY DESCRIPTION

The Energy Services Specialist or Senior Energy Services Specialist position (Senior / Energy Services Specialist) works under the general supervision of the Energy Services Manager and has responsibility for a wide range of customer service, program management and community development, business development, and technical support matters. Responsibilities include general customer service, responding to customer inquiries, billing analysis, and providing presentations to business and community groups related to SVCE offers and services. This role may be hired at the journey or senior level.

The Senior / Energy Services Specialist works directly with residential and/or business customers, community stakeholders and solution providers via email and telephone, and through in-person meetings and interactions. They are expected to highly knowledgeable in SVCE service offerings, providing customers or other staff with technical explanations of electricity rates, energy programs, and related organizational and operational mechanisms. They work effectively in a highly cross- functional organization, acting as both a customer advocate and advisor..

To be effective, the Senior / Energy Services Specialist will also need to develop expertise with PG&E programs and billing mechanisms to help customers optimize electric usage and electrification activities and analyze and explain usage and billing data. Energy Services Specialists will be assigned with tasks related to the development, implementation, and/or administration of various SVCE customer-focused activities and offerings.

The Energy Services Specialist position is the journey level in the Energy Services Specialist series. It requires a moderate degree of responsibility for handling general customer accounts, a broad, general depth of industry and energy-related expertise, customer service experience, program delivery and exposure to operational procedure best practices. The Senior Energy Services Specialist position is differentiated from the Energy Services Specialist position based upon a higher degree of responsibility for handling complex or strategically valuable accounts, organizational and program management skills and expertise, depth of industry and energy-related expertise, customer service experience, program delivery and operational experience

SUPERVISION RECEIVED AND EXERCISED

The Senior / Energy Services Specialist position reports to the Energy Services Manager and includes some supervision of consultants and contractors.

Qualifications

ESSENTIAL FUNCTIONS

Customer and Community Relations

Establish relevant key account contacts and maintain relationships
Provide direct support for inquiries from key accounts
Identify customer needs through direct meetings, surveys, events
Match customers with SVCE services and programs based on needs
Measure and communicate results with communities, key accounts
Participate in relevant industry and working groups, advisory boards

Project Management

Engage in operational design, deployment and administration of key projects
Communicate with customers
Vendor negotiations, contracting and management
Provide knowledge and expertise in (some combination of):
Electric vehicle and EV charging systems
Building systems, e.g. HVAC/mechanical, electrical, controls
Solar, NEM and storage
Demand management programs
Building codes
Facilities management

Customer Rates and Offerings

Assist with development and maintenance of SVCE electricity rates and rate programs
Implement new PG&E /CPUC-initiated programs and rate structures
Assist with development of competitive customized energy service offerings for large commercial/industrial (C&I) customers
Support customer-specific analytics and modeling for custom offerings
Identify, document and support new business development opportunities

Customer Operations

Support detailed utility bill inquiries, including complex NEM, storage, commercial and EV rates

Support call center operations, and customer escalations
Perform rate and cost comparisons for residential and commercial customers
Support general bill- and energy-related inquiries from customers and other stakeholders
Effectively utilize SVCE CRM and customer data analytics systems in support of customer interactions
Deliver effective customer correspondence
Support regulatory notices, e.g. JRM, PCL, Move-ins
Support NEM cash-outs
Manage customer metrics, e.g. opt outs, load statistics, forecast info
Engage effectively with SVCE billing services provider (Calpine), PG&E rep(s)

KNOWLEDGE, SKILLS AND ABILITIES

Knowledge and experience with:

Electrification and decarbonization principles, programs, and best practices
Renewable vs. carbon-free vs. fossil fuel-based electricity
Utility billing structures, bill presentment, and program operations
Investor-owned utility Community Choice Aggregation (CCA) programs, the interaction between CCAs and investor-owned utilities, and SVCE services
Principles of effective account management, marketing and salesmanship
Microsoft Excel, including some familiarity with functions and advanced features
Knowledge of database querying languages considered a plus
Microsoft Office Suite, including Power Point and Word
Use of CRM systems and customer data analytics
Appropriate telephone and e-mail etiquette

Ability to:

Establish and maintain effective working relationships with industrial, commercial and residential customers
Communicate effectively with customers and co-workers at varying responsibility levels from junior level to decision-maker
Take responsibility and work independently, as well as coordinate or participate in team efforts
Develop effective and compelling presentations
Effectively utilize data, estimation, heuristics, and reporting
Demonstrate creative problem solving and commercial awareness
Communicate effectively both verbally (by phone and in-person) and in written form
Manage projects and time efficiently
Represent SVCE with confidence and enthusiasm
Manage multiple priorities and quickly adapt to changing priorities in a fast paced, dynamic environment

Willingness to:

Work occasional overtime or on weekends and evenings

REQUIRED QUALIFICATIONS

Experience and Training Guidelines: Any combination of experience and training that would likely provide the required knowledge and abilities is qualifying. A typical way to obtain the knowledge and abilities would be:

EDUCATION. A Bachelor’s Degree from an accredited university or college is required in engineering, environmental science, operations management, business/economics or closely related field, or other degrees with demonstrable and commensurate work experience that are directly relevant for this position. A Master’s Degree or building trades experience is highly desirable.

EXPERIENCE: Some number of years, depending on level, of progressively responsible customer-facing experience with clean energy-related products or services at: an energy services company, corporate/commercial facilities engineering, design, management or consulting company, electric utility, energy or buildings-related department of a public agency, energy products company, or a related organization.

Energy Services Specialist: 2-4 years of experience
Sr Energy Services Specialist: 3-6 years of experience

LICENSES/CERTIFICATES: One or more professional certifications, including, but not limited to Certified Energy Manager (CEM), Business Energy Professional (BEP), Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) preferred but not required.

Physical and Working Conditions

The physical and mental demands described here are representative of those that must be met by an employee to successfully perform the essential functions of this job. Reasonable accommodations may be made to enable individuals with disabilities to perform the essential job functions.

Environment: Work is performed in a typical office setting with exposure to computer screens and at public events (fairs, meeting rooms, farmers’ markets, etc.) with moderate noise and will require some evening and weekend work. The noise level in the work environment is usually typical of an office environment and public events.

Physical: While performing the duties of this class, employees are regularly required to sit, walk, and stand; talk or hear, in person and by telephone; reach with hands and arms. Employees are occasionally required to walk, and stand for prolonged periods; stoop, bend, kneel and twist; and may lift up to twenty pounds. Employees must be able to communicate in person, in writing, and by telephone with Board members, management, co-workers, vendors, consultants, and with the public in face-to-face, one-onone, and group settings.

Vision: See in the normal visual range with or without correction; vision sufficient to read computer screens and printed documents; and operate assigned equipment.

Hearing: Hear in the normal audio range with or without correction.