AEIC work does not start with a committee. It starts with one member who sees a gap, puts language on paper, and pulls peers around it. The Champion Leader Guide is how that happens, and staff carry the rest.
A champion leader is a self-motivated utility professional who sees a gap or an opportunity and is willing to own the effort required to address it. Not a volunteer waiting for an assignment. The catalyst.
The single most important first action is putting language on paper. It does not need to be a formal charter or a polished document. It needs to exist, because language on paper is what other people can react to, join, and improve.
The guide is a template for the thinking, not paperwork. Most champions draft the whole thing in an afternoon.
Two to four sentences: the topic area, why it matters to member utilities today, and what kind of progress the effort will pursue. This is the recruitment tool.
Themes give the effort structure without locking it down. They signal to prospective peers where the work is headed and where they might fit.
One near-term deliverable, one workstream product, and one longer-horizon capability. Nine objectives in total, spread across three horizons.
That three-horizon structure is deliberate. It keeps a group from front-loading all the work, and it keeps momentum from dying once the early tasks are finished.
Once you have draft language and an initial sense of who might join, AEIC staff take on the logistics: scheduling, coordination, materials, and the operating cadence.
Staff support frees you to lead. It does not replace your leadership. What stays with the champion leader is the part only a practitioner can do.
An effort does not need a formal committee to matter. Three to five committed leaders can generate real impact, because a cohort creates peer accountability that a single champion cannot create alone.
That is the whole reason the first step is writing something down: the foundational language you draft becomes the thing that attracts everyone who comes next.
The members who showed up, in person and on the work, across committees, workshops, and the Annual Meeting.
Helps lead the Electric Power Apparatus Committee, was in the room at both the 2024 and 2025 Annual Meetings, traveled to the Washington and Chicago workshops and the NextGen Control Center session, and completed all six Advanced Executive Leadership sessions.
Chairs the Distribution System Operations subcommittee and co-chairs the Data Framework Working Group, building the shared data foundation the whole membership can use. The kind of member who turns a working group into actual work.
Senior operating leadership in the room at both the 2024 and 2025 Annual Meetings, at the Washington workshop, and through all six Advanced Executive Leadership sessions.
Ask for the Champion Leader Guide and draft your scope statement. If the topic already has a home inside AEIC, we will point you to it. If it does not, that is exactly the point.
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