MY JOURNEY AS A PLANNER.
Q&A WITH BOLA AYORINDE – FROM PLANNER TRAINEE TO DIRECTOR AT SCE
Adebola ‘Bola’ Ayorinde is Southern California Edison’s director of Distribution Construction and Maintenance. He is responsible for the planning, construction and maintenance of electrical assets that span nearly half of SCE’s distribution service territory.
Tell us about your background and how you started your career at SCE?
I was born and raised in Nigeria. It was there that I first started pursuing a degree in engineering. I landed at SCE about 21 years ago as a planner trainee. After spending several years as a service planner I moved on to planning supervisor, project manager, district manager and other leadership positions in the company.
How did the planner training program help you in your career?
It gave me the opportunity to learn and apply new skills in electric distribution technical knowledge, utility industry knowledge and general management skills. My current position allows me to influence the execution of the company’s core business.
In your opinion, what is exciting about the planner job?
I really appreciate that the job is dynamic. You learn about utility rates, how to design power systems, how to work directly with customers. You are at the forefront of designing power systems. You’re helping to implement the company’s strategic plan and the things that impact our customers on a daily basis. So whether it’s a new McDonald’s, a new city community center, a recreation center—you get to look at it and say, ‘That’s part of what I did.’
And the best part—you don’t need to be an engineer to be a planner. SCE trains new people from many different backgrounds to learn the planning career.
We see safety as an area of focus for SCE and even Planning. Why is that??
Nothing is more important than the safety of our employees and the public. Nothing. For our employees, it’s not just about physical safety, but also psychological safety. We are constantly looking for ways to improve with respect to psychological safety and wellness. We want employees to feel valued, respected and rewarded. Above all else, we want everyone to go home to their family and friends safe.
What does it take to be successful as a service planner at SCE?
You have to be dynamic in how you look at things. You might spend Monday at multiple job sites with construction workers. Tuesday you might find yourself at City Hall meeting with city engineers and members of the community about a city improvement project. And then on Wednesday morning you could be at our corporate offices meeting with senior officers about a strategy initiative.
One of our core values is continuous improvement. The ability to come up with new ideas is important. One critical skill is the ability to partner and collaborate with others. It’s important that you’re able to learn things on your own and be able to produce work, but you really cannot get work done without relying on other members of the team. Being able to work with customers is also very important.
