Curriculum

Innovative strategically designed curriculum

Continuously updated to reflect the evolving business environment and latest information on critical issues shaping the future, the well-integrated hybrid schedule is delivered using online, virtual and in-person formats, culminating in a two-week, in-person immersive learning and networking experience.

Course objectives

The Energy Executive Course is designed and tailored for energy leaders to:

Broaden understanding of the evolving industry and its changing business environment. This understanding includes customer requirements, new priorities and issues, developing technologies and the dynamics of the changing business and regulatory environment.
Enhance the ability to lead and make decisions confidently. This ability focuses on meeting the challenges of leadership and decision-making in a climate of increasing customer choice, rising expectations, fluctuating prices, shifting strategies and global competition in the marketplace.
Create a rewarding environment that fosters building personal and professional networks that serve as career-long resources.

A group of people sitting around a desk, while one of them is writing on a whiteboard.

Competency based curriculum

Industry knowledge. Adaptability. Strategic thinking. Global perspective.

In an era of unprecedented industry challenges, these are just some of the competencies today's energy company managers must master to meet the growing demands of leadership. The competency-based curriculum ensures a well-rounded learning experience, allowing leaders to increase knowledge and skills while finding new ways to enhance professional effectiveness. The program is committed to developing the capabilities of all its participants in five major areas of competency:

Building in-depth knowledge of the complex energy industry.
Developing leadership skills, specifically related to successful management in the energy industry.
Building a strategic mindset to lead your workforce in today's dynamic marketplace.
Developing a global vision of what your work group, company and industry can become.
Building professional networks for sharing best practices with a wide array of individuals throughout the industry.

The Energy Executive Course not only provided relevant technical content and training, but its exercises on effective leadership, change management and collaboration made this the most valuable development opportunity I've attended. The EEC is an excellent all-around program which taught skills I can call upon often to enhance my leadership and the work I perform.

Stuart Reilly

General manager, Austin Energy

Course topics

Fundamentals

Electric power generation, transmission and distribution

Basics of generation, transmission and distribution, including electrical terminology, equipment, construction and operating theory

Natural gas production, transmission and delivery

Basics of natural gas production, transmission and distribution, including essential equipment and its operation
Current issues in the natural gas industry

Utility accounting and financial reporting — How utilities make money

Basic accounting concepts
What financial statements communicate and how they are used
Cost management and how to know when you are making money

Financial management and capital markets

Value creation and the cost of capital/money
Financial policy development and accessing capital
Financial quality and credit ratings
Perspective of a utility sector investment manager

Regulation and rate making

Rate making process including revenue requirements, cost allocation and rate design
How rate mechanisms are used in general rate cases

Fuel diversity: Integrated resource planning

Trends in generation and the changing fuel mix
How to manage fuel diversity
Integrated resource planning process

Leadership

Strategic leadership in the natural gas industry

Utility industry perspective on improving safety, managing risk and driving continuous improvement
How current events affect natural gas operations, business strategy and practices

Strategic human resources

Energy industry challenges and the impact on the workforce
Culture, engagement and employee experience
Workforce of the future

Leading inclusively: Creating a culture of belonging

Creating personal learning and practical leadership skills to manage, lead and contribute to a diverse and inclusive environment

Mini-versity

Cohort led exchange of ideas, experiences, best practices and perspectives

Customer experience

Customer experience design and management
Integrate the customer experience into product and service design
Identify and communicate the customer experience ROI

Experience change: Accelerate and realize strategies, initiatives and solutions

Quickly turn powerful ideas and solutions into reality
Speak and act with a common language
Align and engage stakeholders around new ways of doing things
Build a highly engaged culture of execution

Trends

Managing advanced grid planning and operations

Challenges of operating and coordinating supply and demand in a dynamic and complex system
Enabling more flexibility, adaptability and responsiveness
Integrating renewables, advanced AMI, distributed generation and storage

Next generation technologies

Zero carbon sources of energy
Connected home devices and the next wave of demand responses
Enabling new capabilities with automation

Trends in energy security

Areas of greatest vulnerability and who oversees physical protections of the grid
Strategies to detect and deflect attacks on critical utility infrastructure systems
Building up the resiliency of our infrastructure to withstand disruptions

Strategic trends in consumer engagement

How technology advances are powering new ways to engage
Managing information for competitive advantage
How nontraditional players are challenging the utility business model

Regulatory strategy

How the regulatory model impacts the changing industry
How regulatory strategy supports corporate strategy
Current issues

Environmental collaboration

Removing unintended regulatory barriers to increase utilities' capacity to invest in environmental solutions
Making energy efficiency and renewable energy a profit center
Creating diversified, environmentally responsible electric and gas resource portfolios to ensure more reliable and affordable service for customers

Future

Energy industry and the environment — Shaping the future

How public policy, emerging technologies and changing customer needs and expectations are transforming the energy industry
Major trends reshaping the utility industry

Effective stakeholder engagement

Understanding the needs and issues of your stakeholders
Aligning business objectives across diverse stakeholders
Best practices in effective outreach and engagement to build collaboration

Strategic communication

Communicating about an energy future so that what you intend to say is heard by your stakeholders
Building awareness, understanding and support for your organization in the industry

Experience innovation: Design thinking simulation

Human centered design and balancing analysis with intuition
Terms, techniques and thought patterns of successful innovators

Strategic sustainability: Integrating policy, climate science and resilience

Understanding the impact of climate risk on investors, consumers and regulation
How utilities are managing the impacts of climate risk and positioning themselves for a future of increased load on a weather dependent system

Climate impact: Extreme weather

Why extreme weather events matter to customers, communities, states and utilities
What companies are doing to address this growing and complex problem and what is on the horizon

CEO panel: Pathways to the future

Leading in a time of transformational change
Aligning corporate strategy across diverse stakeholder interests

The Energy Executive Course is perfectly curated to enhance the energy business acumen of long-standing professionals across this industry and even more so for those who are new. I feel equipped to accelerate my company’s business goals and partner better; and the networking is priceless.

Angela Henderson

Vice president, supply chain, Consumers Energy

Measured learning results

The diversity and talent of our program participants, coupled with a world-class faculty of industry and academic experts, create dynamic and focused learning. Formal assessments show unparalleled knowledge gain every year in every course module.