In today’s world we are increasingly driven to build a career with a strong sense of purpose. We want to be incentivised to give our work our all — not just by the prospect of earnings or promotions, but by a mission that serves society on a wider level. How we reverse the impact of climate change is one of the most pressing problems facing mankind, so it’s not surprising that a tech career in the sustainability and renewable energy space is so appealing.
But where to start? The scale of the sector and its available pathways are vast, which makes the opportunity both wonderful and overwhelming to a newcomer. Three experts from leading renewable energy company SSE share their insight into why tech is so important to this burgeoning sector, and how best to kick-start a career, whatever your skills and background.
Find practical ways to demonstrate your passion for the cause, says Angus Murray, CIO for Renewables, Thermal and EPMI
At SSE, we need to do something extreme and ambitious to reach our goal of reaching net zero by 2050, and new technology plays a fundamental role in that. For instance, there’s some great work being done [here] around using AI to better understand the impact of wind farms on local ecology. From an operation and maintenance perspective, tech helps us understand how we improve the workforce, how we optimise and how we balance energy networks.
We bring in people with diverse experience from different industries with skills that are transferable from a broad range of tech ability. We look particularly at behavioural attributes; we want to see passion and drive about making a difference, as that is infectious, and there is a big focus on inclusion and diversity to ensure we’re delivering the best we can.
If you’re looking to move into the sector and not sure how to build up your experience, remember we’re all in this together and you can start doing your bit to drive the net zero agenda, such as running initiatives within your current company to reduce paper use. There are always opportunities to build up your experience and show your passion for the cause.
If you want to transition from a different industry, you could look at companies that support you through that. There are programmes where if you decide, for instance, that you want to become a business analyst, you can sign up and get involved and gain placements in companies. That’s one route at SSE that gives us people that have had completely diverse careers. And don’t forget to reach out, look for mentors and get help from others. There’s a lot of resources out there.
Seek out open source intelligence and use it to upskill, says Lorraine Lacey, Group Data Analytics Manager
Analytics play an integral role in enabling SSE to achieve its net zero target. We have access to some of the best-in-class advance analytic tooling and advanced visualisation tools out there, and my role is to help the business leverage these as best they can.
My advice for those interested in transitioning to a data analytics career is to give [the tech] a go; [it] is out there and accessible to all. You can download Microsoft’s Power BI software to your laptop and start to create amazing visualisations, then journey from there. Or if you’re in a job creating management packs on a weekly basis, think about how you can automate that. For instance, one thing I always say to my team is, ‘Okay, you’ve created a dashboard, but is it meaningful? Are there actionable insights from it? What action can be taken from it?’
And if you come from a science background, learning some foundational languages is fundamental. For me it was SUL or SEQUEL, but it’s moved on quite significantly now, with people talking about Python and Spark. There’s a lot of training material you can get your hands on and a lot of advice out there.
Ultimately tech is in the hands of everyone now and it’s interchangeable. I’ve people in my team that have come from all sorts of places, there’s no one-size-fits-all. In my own career I’ve started then stopped, started then stopped again, but I enjoy data and the impact it can have: it’s a passion for me.
Get clear about your soft skills, says Kate Wallace Lockhart, Head of Sustainability for Renewables
One of my favourite tech projects going on at SSE at the moment is our partnership with Microsoft and Avanade, where the proposal is to use sonar and AI at a wind farm to create a digital tool to better understand what’s going on underneath the water. It opens up huge possibilities when thinking about not just sea life but aspects like plastics in the water.
Over the next 30 years there needs to be 150 trillion dollars invested in reaching net zero and an unbelievable transition is going to be required. But the flip-side of every challenge is the opportunity it brings, and the sheer scale of this investment means there’s going to be a lot of jobs generated, all dedicated to doing things differently and better than before. On our own career website right now, we have 237 jobs listed and we’ve committed to creating 1,000 jobs every year for the next five years.
In terms of the experience you need to have for a career in this sector, it’s not really about your hard skills but your strengths, so even if you don’t think you have the exact background for a certain job, or come from a different industry, my advice would be to still apply. After all, if you’re working for a company like SSE that is pioneering new ways of doing things and working in new tech spaces, those ‘hard’ skills don’t exist yet. But the people I see doing really well at SSE have three things: intelligence, hard work and kindness. So if you identify with those then definitely think about SSE as a potential career option.
Ultimately, the next 10 years is arguably the most important in human life. So aren’t we so lucky to be able to work for organisations that can help find solutions to the massive challenges we’re all facing?
To find out more about the jobs available at SSE, head to careers.sse.com
