About Husk Power Systems

Husk is one of the world’s leading rural energy service companies with operations in Asia and sub-Saharan Africa. We provide low-cost and reliable power to rural households and businesses, entirely from renewable energy sources. Powering economic possibilities in every village is at the heart of everything we do.

We design, build and operate the lowest cost hybrid (solar and biomass) power plant and distribution network in India and Africa. To date, Husk has provided electricity to over 15,000 homes and business, reducing 95,000 tonnes of CO2. Our aim is to provide 30MW of power to 225,000 customers by 2025, and save 350,000 tonnes of CO2 each year.

Role Summary

The Manager, Operations & Maintenance is a leadership position responsible for organizing, motivating, and leading the operations team within the country. This role is ultimately responsible for the projects and operation, safety, quality, efficiency, and customer experience of solar and biomass installation projects. Required to drive continuous improvement through operations in alignment with functional leadership. The candidate will have a track record of proven leadership abilities (communication, relationship building, training & development, employee relations, performance management, etc.) as well as biomass/ solar installation knowledge. The role presents a pathway to grow into the Head of Operations for the Nigeria business.

The individual should also be passionate about contributing to solve one of Nigeria’s most critical challenges – energy access deficit. This position provides the opportunity to join a growing team that is changing the face of rural electrification in many countries in Asia and Africa, including India, Tanzania, Nigeria etc.

Key Responsibilities

General

• Play a key role as a member of the Management Team in crafting a robust Operations & Maintenance Strategy.
• Work closely with the Country Manager and other members of the Nigerian Management Team to deliver on business objectives.
• Support the optimization of various Husk NG activities to ensure best practices are entrenched towards more efficient processes.
• Support in driving “Best Practices” across the business. Once a “Best Practice” has been identified, ensure that the practice is visible nationally and to another subsidiary.
• Support in negotiating solutions, resolve conflicts and provide solutions in the best interest of Husk Power Systems, and our clients and employees across potential mini grid (and other) locations.
• Understand the priorities of the country operations and support the Country Team when necessary
• Provide requisite support and inputs on building and aligning various company processes and policies according to global best practices.
• Manage, motivate, and mentor Supervisors along with a variety of personnel involved in the installation and maintenance of solar projects to create a positive, constructive, and performance driven dynamic, while driving efficiencies.
• Evaluate and manage the resources and processes required for the successful completion of solar and Bio Mass projects in Nigeria with relevant teams. 
• Ensures the focus on Safety, Quality, Customers Service, and Profitability
• Uphold the importance of adhering to all safety practices, ensuring that each team member receives the proper safety training and equipment applicable to their position.
• Other duties as may be assigned from time to time.

Plant Operations

• Work closely with the HO Operations team at India to provide accurate installation forecasts, set performance targets, deliver branch performance reporting, and create action plans as needed.
• Plan and monitor the day to day running of the plants to ensure smooth progress.
• Lead the Nigeria O&M Team in managing a portfolio of Solar PV/biomass plants, ensuring that all O&M works are undertaken in accordance with the contractual scope, efficiently and effectively.
• Utilize data to drive decision making, process improvement, and uncover performance, cost or quality opportunities.
• Understand and manage sites’ performance to key performance metrics.
• Responsible for the day-to-day supervision of Operations & Maintenance activities of all locations.

Asset Management

• Ensures completion of Technical documents; grid outages, onsite equipment problems, log entries, site visitation; safety and environmental inspections.
• Prepare and share monthly plant status’ reports for the Business Planning team with a focus on targets, plant performance management and highlighting key needs for each rolling quarter.
• Maintain daily, weekly, monthly and yearly equipment healthiness checklist; Preventive maintenance planning; Shutdown planning; Daily reading logbook etc
• Responsible for smooth functioning of Solar PV/ Biomass Power Plants and implementing effective techniques to ensure plants’ efficient performance.

Business Growth and Support

• Ensure support for other Business Units to ensure alignment with operational outlook.
• Co-accountability with Business Unit Heads for the financial performance of sites and locations.
• Work closely with the Business Unit Heads to understand sales performance trending and position resources as required by sales volume.
• Support business growth and continuous cost & quality improvements in the business.
• Work to ensure that we are delivering an excellent customer experience and resolve escalated installation issues and customer concerns with all necessary internal departments and stakeholders.

Stakeholder Management

• Coordinate, maintain regular communication, and develop positive and productive relationships with various community groups/stakeholders, internal stakeholders, customer/client groups etc.

Organizational Strategy

• Actively contribute to the development of company's Business plan, ensuring alignment with global directions.
• Contribute towards long-term organizational strategic goals, build key relationships, identify business opportunities, negotiate and support the end-to-end process for business deals.

General Skills & Attributes

• Ability to develop and update professional knowledge and skills quickly and efficiently. Ability to apply professional knowledge and skills in the advancement of business objectives.
• Proven proactive approach to systems integration and management.
• Quickly and successfully implements changes and improvements in operational activities and services. Effectively carries out tasks that are required by the Global Leadership and Nigeria Management team in addition to carrying out own role.
• Adapts to changes in company strategy whilst developing own strategy to achieve personal goals of competently owning and managing processes.
• Has a collaborative attitude and the ability to drive that through across other business units and work functions.
• Understands company strategy and vision and is able to drive that through across to other employees across the organization.
• Assesses own development needs and develops self to improve job performance and fulfil future potential. Contributes to the team ethos and instilling the values of Company.
• The ability to evaluate and convey complex information to others in an effective manner through concise communication skills and clear presentation skills in both verbal and written contexts.
• Should possess requisite skill sets- active listening, speaking, reading, comprehension, critical thinking, performance monitoring, time management, people management, material resource management, effective time management, judgment and decision making, teaching, coaching, and social awareness.
• Should possess knowledge of applicable regulations and standards, customer and personal service, administration and management.

Physical Demands

• Could work in outdoor weather conditions at certain times
• Have adequate visual and hearing acuity to follow instructions; and determine accuracy of the work assigned
• Ability to work in rural, peri-urban locations as required
• Ability to drive a vehicle during the normal course of business. Must possess a driver’s licence, maintain a clean driving record with the ability to pass a driving background check.

Does this sound like you?

• Graduate from a leading institution with a related degree in Engineering, Sciences or Social Sciences. Postgraduate degree and/or related professional qualifications, a plus.
• 3 – 5 years of work experience in Infra/telecom/energy/solar/ renewable energy etc where last 3 years working as Ops or project management.
• A clearly defined strategic thought process and a continuous improvement mindset with excellent problem-solving skills.
• Must have experience managing and coordinating large multi-cultural teams towards achieving common goal and objectives.
• This position requires risk analysis, critical thinking and the ability to provide time-bound solutions to the benefit of the company, and projects.
• Lead by example and offer support/co-ordination to company workflow as required.
• Operationally focused; detailed oriented but able to grasp big picture
• Excellent skills with MS Excel, MS Word, MS PowerPoint and project management tools (MS Project, Asana, Slack etc)
• Business level fluency in major Nigerian languages, a plus
• Dependability, attention to detail, cooperation, stress tolerance, concern for others, initiative, leadership, self-control, and independence are the desired pre-requisites.

Also, 

• You are driven to support the delivery of business growth in a new market.
• You have a robust industry network and understand effective client engagement practices.
• You are an effective planner and have a strong orientation to process
• You building strong relationship built on trust, and are a strong verbal communicator
• You pride your communication skills.