Organisational Change Management for IT Applications

In the previous sections we have described some of the successful IT initiatives taken by a few power distribution utilities. You may like to know:How were these brought about? What kind of organisational changes were needed to facilitate these changes in the ways of working? We address these questions in this section.

The pre-requisites that need to be taken care for IT-enabled business tosucceed are as follows:

• Business process re-engineering to make the processes suitable for electronic work flow;

• Top Management Commitment; and

• Step by step implementation and capacity building.

We now discuss these prerequisites, in brief.

Business Process Re-Engineering

Let us first consider the prevailing situation. After independence, we adopted the British system and improvements in the system were carried out from time to time to take care of the changing needs. The systems are elaborate and suitable for centralized, manual, ledger-based record keeping in paper form.

As the utilities sector opens up to competition, there is an increasingly felt need to revamp traditional business processes to deliver much higher efficiency and effectiveness. The traditional business processes need to be transformed radically to create new innovative and robust models of business in the new environment.

Standalone IT systems for Individual Functions

Business processes need to be rationalised and re-engineered so that data can flow seamlessly across functions and information may be created to aid fact-based management of utilities.In order to make the business process IT- enabled, we need to re-look at the CRM, ERP, Data Management System (DMS) and other generic systems so that even while all departments are working simultaneously in their area they can work with the same database. Further, with technology adoption, the traditional system or administrative powers need to be re-looked, e.g., the practice of manual meter reading needs to be dispensed with when AMR is adopted. Similarly, many more systems for trouble call management, new connections, stores management, bill modifications, etc. need to be changed.

As parameterized software products have gradually gained precedence over custom-built legacy systems, the focus has shifted to integrated information systems, which are more process-centric than traditional approaches towards software development. An integrated IT approach to distribution business management is shown in Fig..

An Integrated IT Approach

Integration in the entire business chain is the key to successful IT deployment as this will lead to:

• holistic, structured approach for deployment of IT;

• enterprise wide application integration and single point once-only data entry for all the processes; and

• cost-effective and fast deployment of constrained resources.

For this purpose, the organisational and administrative hierarchy, delegation of responsibilities and other interface areas with customers, etc., need to be re-looked into. Any such change would require some time for smooth transition to the new system. Provision for transient support and seamless transition needs to be contemplated and provided.

Top Management Commitment
Any change brings additional efforts to make it acceptable or to ensure minimum comfort level to the people who have got embedded into the prevailing systems and procedures. By nature, human beings are averse to change. Therefore, proper dissemination of information and commitment of top management to push IT initiatives is required. At present, different utilities in the country are at different level of reforms. IT based interventions vary significantly from utility to utility. While many utilities have clear understanding about the issues involved and have a clear IT roadmap, many other Indian distribution utilities are still trying to implement solutions without any clear road map. In view of the extremely complex web of the activities and their linkages, it is extremely important that IT based interventions are made in a way so that these may later on be integrated with the software being used for other activities in the utility. It is high time that the distribution utilities follow a clear IT roadmap within a definite time schedule.A proper understanding of various issues involved and the commitment of the top management to this exercise has to be there to have any meaningful IT interventions. Many distribution utilities are trying to cut and paste solutions from western experiences without taking into account the realities at ground and have failed in the process. It is, therefore, important that ground realities be taken into account.

Step by Step Implementation and Capacity Building
Traditionally, the distribution sector worked only in hard wired systems. It had not seen much technological improvement in the work area. The distribution engineers did not have an opportunity to get exposure to technology and, in particular, the Information Technology as they had been bogged down by running day-to-day business in a resource-constrained environment. The expansions in the sector have mostly taken place in the radial mode instead of ring/duplication/alternate route of supply. This has also become a limitation to adopt automation such as SCADA on an immediate basis in majority of our towns.

Considering the current state of health of the distribution network and exposure of distribution personnel to IT, utilities may like to adopt a modular phased approach so that capacity building of the workforce takes place simultaneously to take on the next phase of IT implementation.

In this unit, we have provided you with an overview of the need, scope and potential of IT in the power distribution business, the IT infrastructure required and the organisational changes that need to be managed for successful deployment of IT. W