Stuart Mitchell

Following the WUN - Womens Utilities Network survey published last month I was interviewed by Ben at Utility Week For those of you who have not read the survey you can get a from the WUN website (link in the comments) You can also find out more about some of the findings and broader topic at Utility Week Live next week, where I am charing a panel in the topic of Intentional Allyship - is it the game changer? Thanks as alway to The Marketing Pod

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In my conversations with industry colleagues I hear tidbits of wisdom and advice from time to time, some useful, some coarse, some that just sound nice. The scrap of paper on my desk currently contains these... 📝 When selecting a TPI. "TPIs are only as good as their staff." 💷 In traded markets. "Picking bottoms is a smelly business." ❓ Do I chose a flex or fixed product? "You can fix a flex but you can't flex a fix." ⏰ When awaiting approvals. "Many a slip between cup and lip." 🍄 Mushroom management. "Keep people in the dark and occasionally feed them some sh1t." 🖊 In negotiations. "Don't try to bullsh1t a bullsh1tter." Here endeth the wisdom.

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🏛 UK #utilities businesses, and #energy businesses in particular, are in a crisis of extremely poor #customerservice. ❌ How did it get this bad? 💷 High energy prices - Customers have become more discerning and diligent with energy spend, and more customers have been pushed into fuel poverty. This has generated more queries for energy businesses and customers have been better at identifying problems exacerbated by prices increases. 📈 Better customer service in other industries - As other industries improve automation and provide better standards of service, the same is expected of energy suppliers. Unfortunately they’re not even close, with the exception of a few that are making progress. Customer frustration increases as they see energy companies’ service drifting further from the overall market trend. 📜 #Regulation and intervention - The introduction and withdrawal of government schemes makes energy bills confusing and creates another line item for the energy company to get wrong. Schemes have to be withdrawn just as well as they are introduced. Additional pressures of new regulation on industry expertise means those skills are drawn away from serving customers and into implementing new schemes and regulations. 👋 Skills drain - Following the pandemic energy business employees found that they had invaluable skills that could be deployed remotely for businesses with better systems and processes, in roles that were better paid. Why stay and face the pain and aggravation of the energy sector when you could be working in a sector where the customer might actually like talking to you? Even the regulator itself has had a “brain drain’ according to Energy UK. 🇿🇦 #Outsourcing and #offshoring - Years ago we saw a rapid offshoring on energy customer services to reduce costs. It wasn’t widely successful and the activities were then reshored a few years later. The trend is here again with customer services for some companies offshored to South Africa. Reduces costs yes but the standardisation of scripting and issue resolution means anything non-standard doesn’t get resolved. 💻 #Automation - There’s an increasing use of chatbots, but again only the basic and standard stuff gets resolved. The UKCSI finds that 50% of chatbot queries have to go to a human eventually anyway. #AI and machine learning isn’t currently good enough to resolve complex industry issues. 👨‍💻 Systems replacement - As a response to much of the above energy retailers are looking towards new systems to resolve their issues, improve service, and reduce costs. That process is long, costly and disruptive, and customers end up with additional errors, slow resolution, and nobody to turn to. 45% of customers say poor use of technology has made them stop using an organisation. In the case of your energy supplier though, as you’re already registered, you don’t have much choice. You have to deal with your #supplier until you go through the potentially painful process of #switching.

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At Mansion House for a fascinating first look at the new Plain Numbers report, which outlines their transformative approach for communicating financial information to customers. Now energy bills occupy more of everyone’s time and attention, it's never been so important for our industry's often unique account management processes to be understandable by its customers (solidarity to anyone who's tried to explain a monthly Direct Debit in a quick couple of lines!). As panelist Sheryl Steele (PayCaptain) pointed out, it's tempting to rush towards explainers and glossaries as a solution when transformation of language at the UI/system stage would save customers *and* companies a ton of time. And for anyone feeling as if the complete transformation of a huge body of existing comms feels like a Bit Much: PN's experts recommend starting with a few pieces that matter the most, and building on learnings over time.

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A really interesting day yesterday at the Future of utilities summit. It seems the main messages are -think customer, think outside the box and do everything faster! Great to hear how new entrants to the utility world are ripping up the rule book which is exactly what’s needed to achieve the net zero targets. It is clear from my world that planning is playing a part as a major blocker to the UK goals so let’s hope whoever gets the keys to number 10 has planning reform at the top of their agenda! Looking forward to day 2. #futureofutilitiessummit #dalcourmaclaren #netzero #planning

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Whenever I tell people that I work in utilities the first thing they ask me is if they should go for x or y fixed deal and they are never very happy when I answer "it depends". In this article Charlotte Warman breaks down some of the complexities consumers have to consider when selecting a tariff and why the increase in EV uptake combined with potentially new and innovative tariffs on the horizon thanks to #MHHS could make this decision even harder. The suppliers that really understand customer needs and can simplify and tailor their products, backed up with excellent communication will have the advantage

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Heading to Bristol today to hopefully add the final Green- Tech as a Solution component to our suite of partners. *Methane monitoring from space with applied satellite tech. Having started in waste management it seems we could be heading back there next year. And we are really excited. 1) Chemical Energence Profiling SaaS Hazard Evaluation Ltd 2) Satellite 🛰️ derived asset audit for dams / TSF’s and rail/real estate Value.Space 3) Whole catchment active water quality motoring hardware. AquaWatch (partnered with hazEL*) To condense these brilliant tech innovations into a single source of underwriting insight has been a process by design. To see that design coming to fruition is just the beginning. If any of my insurer / broker clients have a bursary this year do give us shout and we can show you how applied “greentech” can reduce costs and risks. Supply chain chems, asset integrity audit, exposure mapping of entire cities and full catchment water quality data sourcing provides the data streams upon which insurers can hang products. (ART / Captive / Parametric/ Risk Financing) Our focus has always been within the specialty arena of risk management and transfer and it will remain so. M&A due diligence activity is up this year and we are grateful to all of our clients in UK, Nordics, USA, Australia and New Zealand. And finally, Motorsport and Live Event Sustainability Advisory services - Science based MVR to deliver accelerated outcomes. We appreciate your trust. Meliora ESG Ltd James Lyon

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Whoa! Morning all. So my post yesterday certainly generated opinion and highlighted the differences between people in how they approach aiming to get to the same outcome: Bringing stakeholders into a collaborative space. The details of the friend's scenario I won't divulge, but it took multiple attempts to bring the stakeholder into the collaborative space.... ultimately by focusing on the educational piece it would deliver to the pupils after a number of 'pretending' scenarios were presented by the customer. The good news is, it was a successful outcome in the end. Stakeholder management is complex and with multiple different personalities and sometimes hostility to change in play, the difficulties and what can feel like personal attacks make collaboration hard. You should be armed with a key set of principles (these are mine and so you may have your own!): 🧠 1. Maintain integrity. If you make a mistake in a conversation, own it. If you believe in the things you are saying, stick to it. Being open paves the way for the behaviours you're seeking. 🧠 2. Behave ethically - By this I mean in an ethically positive way. Don't pretend or lie in order to get what you want, this is the very definition of uncollaborative. 👂 3. Listen. If that means having the other person / group explain things, sometimes repeatedly, then facilitate that. 👀 4. Recognise the Egos in the room. Everyone has one, some need to express it more than others. Maintain your integrity and ethical behaviour, but listening and enabling them to come round to believing they have driven a solution / idea sometimes wins the day. The goal is the focus, not the ego (that's yours!) Working in Data Protection and Compliance requires you to interact and deal with multiple stakeholders, across a myriad departments, which incorporate a wide spectrum of personalities, beliefs and approaches. Maintain your principles, be human-focused and always approach every scenario with a positive and collaborative mindset. What other principles do you work to? Have a great day peeps and thank you to everyone who contributed to a really fascinating discussion yesterday. 😊 🙏 👍 #StakeHolderManagement #Collaboration #HumanFocused #BeKind #DataProtection

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read how the #uprn is being integrated as the golden thread to help manage customer data and provide users with a more efficient service.

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The integration with SME Professional is proving to be highly effective for agents managing both new and vacating tenancies!

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The UK may have received 'nil points' 🙁 from the European public votes at the weekend, but it's still a tourist hotspot! 😎 After the last few years of Covid, energy crises, and rising costs of living, every penny counts. For seasonal businesses, it's crucial to explore every cost-cutting avenue to ensure that summer numbers see you through the winter. With that in mind, we've designed a webinar just for you. Check it out and make sure you're ready for the busy season! https://lnkd.in/exK_DDb5  

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19 years ago today the first YouTube video was uploaded. Today over 500 hours of content are uploaded every minute from 2bn people. What I love about the story is just how lean the team was behind it before exit. It’s possibly one of the best data engineering story’s of all time. Here is a good summary if you don’t know: https://lnkd.in/etbJ3ecF #data #processing #objectstorage #api

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Is anyone worried about the cost and effort of tracking local activity? It's brilliant to see the rise of #placemaking and #activation tactics in the last few years, but so many Councils are uncertain of the best way to quantify their performance. I often speak to Local Governments who looking at the cost-benefit of investing in hardware to understand visitation patterns. I hear: "We got the quote, but I'd rather put that money in placemaking activities", or "We're just about to install sensors in our park, but I'm not sure where we should put them", or "Traders want to know more about visitation, but I'm worried the cost of sensors isn't worth it" When I ran placemaking projects we dabbled with sensors and counters too - when we had the time and budget we would use on-site methods to try to count the 'before-during-after' of our interventions. But it became obvious pretty quickly that - if you're just measuring your own space - it's very hard to know whether an 'up' or 'down' was specific to my project, or a factor of changing activity levels across the whole suburb. When we created the Neighbourlytics 'activity hotspots' tool we calibrated our analytics to address this issue. Using our online tools you can see the activity levels of your location in the context of the street, suburb or LGA. Powered by mobile phone movement data (we get 10 million unique mobile devices every month), we compute activity levels across Australia every month. And what's best, you can even see it for FREE with our Starter accounts: https://bit.ly/48h2cLf So, whether you have budget for hardware or not, check out our activity hotspots data sets before you make any decisions. Neighbourlytics

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Did you know there are immediate, large-scale opportunities for companies in Scotland in the growing Scottish, UK and global clean heat market? Governments across the world have realised that this is a huge area that needs to be tackled for net zero. Moving from fossil fuel reliance to clean heat provides opportunities to use river sources, air source heat pumps and geothermal - there are many different ways that we can provide heat for homes and businesses, whether individually or through heat networks. Right now, there are opportunities for companies to take advantage of across: 👨‍🏭 Manufacturing 👷 Assembly ✏️ Design 🛠️ Consultancy and installation And whether you are already in the energy sector or not, our experts are ready to support your business to understand exactly where the opportunities lie, and how you can best take advantage of them. Your business can power tomorrow. Find out how 👉 https://ow.ly/9Z9X50S9pXY #EnergyTransition #CleanHeat

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🚀 UK Climate Tech Investment Soars! 🌍 The latest climate tech investment report from PwC backs up what many of us in the sector are seeing: 💷 🌱 UK climate tech investment surged 24% in 2024, hitting £4.5 billion 🤖💡AI-powered solutions saw a 128% boost, totaling £1.01 billion, making the UK a global leader in AI climate tech.

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📣 Scottish Enterprise and The Scottish Government have jointly published "Waste Heat Recovery - An Introductory Guide". This was produced by Arup with the support of a wider public sector steering group 📣 This guide will encourage knowledge and support engagement between organisations such as local authorities, heat network operators and heat producers to use #wasteheat The guidance is directed at non-technical specialists. The guide covers: ➡ types of waste heat and options for reuse ➡ technologies to capture waste heat ➡cheat supply agreements, ownership and procurement ➡ a summary of waste heat producing sectors Please share this guide with other interested parties. #LHEES #wasteheatrecovery #processheat #heatnetworks #districtheat

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Check out this DfT seminar next month on carbon in transport appraisal. Thur 10 Oct, all day, online, free of charge. Bringing carbon into appraisal and business cases is increasingly important. The guidance has changed and expectations are increasing, but there are lots of useful tools and benchmarks out there to help. This online seminar is aimed at people working on appraisals, and looks really useful for keeping yourself up to date with this changing topic. Register at https://lnkd.in/eZHRkzaj

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