What It Takes

Helping customers, growing Nebraska

Anyone who builds a home, opens a business, or hires a contractor in OPPD’s service territory has a well-connected ally who makes it all possible.

Eastern Nebraska is growing fast, and OPPD’s electrical service designers (ESDs) are the quiet professionals facilitating a lot of the development.

ESDs tackle the planning and design work to connect customers to OPPD’s distribution grid. They answer questions, power through problems and help keep projects moving within their assigned regions of OPPD’s service territory. Ask any electrician or contractor if they have a trusted professional contact at OPPD, and odds are they’ll name an ESD.

“ESDs build relationships within their territories,” said Jason Laferriere, supervisor of Customer Sales & Services. “If you’ve ever been talking to your buddies and you say, ‘I need a bank loan,’ one of your friends might respond, ‘Oh yeah, I know a guy.’ That’s what ESDs are. They’re ‘The guy.’”

Supporting customers

ESDs come from all backgrounds within OPPD: former line technicians, meter technicians, splicers, records specialists and many others. They work directly with nearly every department in the utility, making them a go-to source to solve customer problems.

“The ESD position is basically the customer advocate within the company,” Laferriere said. “Because of what we handle as a group, we touch every department. It’s imperative we bring in experience from many areas to have a well-rounded team.”

Nicholas Thies, a former OPPD line technician, traded his climbing hooks for an ESD position assigned to Elkhorn and west Omaha, but he still uses his line experience.

“I wanted to get into the design aspect of the work and customer care, and to be a mediator between customers and our crews,” Thies said.

That background comes in handy. Anytime he receives a new project, ESD and former line technician Keith Smith knows exactly which switches, cables and transformers crews will need to finish the job.

“If somebody wants to build a strip mall or a building or a pivot half a mile down the road in an area with no power, we’ll design the overhead or underground primary system to feed that project,” Smith said. “You can kind of design it in your head before you even get to the office.”

ESDs talk constantly with engineers, electricians and contractors, collectively working on hundreds of projects. Restaurants. Schools. Homes. Office buildings. Maybe a farmer wants to add an industrial-grade light to his property, or a neighborhood developer needs underground power lines installed.

“Every customer is important. It’s not who they know or what they know. It’s just the right thing to do,” ” Laferriere said.

No shortage of work

Requesting special services from OPPD does cost money beyond OPPD’s usual billing, and the work is sometimes more complex than it seems.

Because some projects have many moving parts and involve multiple OPPD departments, ESDs serve as the main contact from start to finish.

Building developers often want to know the best place to install transformers or other equipment, sometimes months in advance.

“You have to be pretty flexible,” said Cody Woodworth, an ESD and former line technician. “Sometimes the answer isn’t straightforward. You’ve got to think outside the box. That’s when I lean on my experience.”

Woodworth answers 10-15 calls and 30-40 emails a day from within OPPD and outside partners and keeps detailed notes.

“We’re in that position to make sure the customer’s voice is heard within OPPD,” Laferriere said. “At the end of the day for each project, ESDs are the customer service point of contact. They’re the engineer, the scheduler, the project manager, and the bill collector. They’re absolutely everything, all in one for each individual job.”

ESDs tend to work alone but also collaborate, relying on their different expertise. Their territories – divided sections of OPPD’s larger service area – drive their workloads and schedules.

“It’s never repetitive,” Smith said. “There’s no house built the same, no infrastructure built the same. You never know what you’re going to get.”

Responding to storms

During storms, ESDs jump into action. Some assess damage, helping OPPD determine where crews need to go to restore power to the most customers fastest and most efficiently. They communicate with customers so that OPPD crews can work uninterrupted. Others serve as “bird dogs,” guiding outside mutual aid crews who arrive to help.

Long after storms end, ESDs help restore power to damaged homes that were rebuilt and confirm that those with irreparable damage are safely disconnected.

“The variety is probably the best part of the job,” said ESD Mark Krepela, a former records specialist. “During storms, I enjoy that you get to go out and help people.”

Behind the ESDs are clerks who field calls, pass messages to the right recipients, plug information into OPPD’s systems and help coordinate the overall work. They also help schedule planned customer outages for maintenance and upgrades.

“All of us in this department are customer-service driven,” Laferriere said. “We want to make sure we create a win-win situation for the customer and OPPD.”

Juggling projects

The best ESDs are creative thinkers who can bend and negotiate on ideas, and those who want to see projects come to fruition with minimal hiccups, Laferriere said. With permits and checklists and multiple stakeholders on any one project, staying organized and focused is a must.

“It does take that special someone who can be outgoing and have the drive to get things done,” Laferriere said.

It also requires a lot of juggling.

“You may be working three or four jobs at once, and then somebody calls and you may have to hop over there,” Krepela said.

OPPD usually hires ESDs from within the company, given the need for in-depth expertise.

“It’s easier to hire for attitude and train for the technical side,” Laferriere said. “We deal a lot with computer software that’s teachable. But the empathy you show to customers, the seriousness you bring in carrying a project through – not everybody has that.”