Take your pulse and refresh your training program

Written by Douglas Nunez, Sr. Infrastructure and Utilities Marketing Manager, AVEVA

In past blogs, we have talked about the importance of training in achieving operational excellence in the power industry. Operation and Training managers often need to navigate amongst the latest industry buzzwords such as Digital Twin, Connected Worker, and many others. But what does this mean to you?

COVID-19 brought some unexpected and sudden changes in the way companies performed their daily operations. As a result, instructor-led training programs were no longer effective during a pandemic. Social distancing led to a limited number of people in classrooms, and in some cases the instructor could not even be in the same room with the trainees. Specifically, AVEVA helped clients transition from on-premises courses into mainly self-led/cloud-based courses to reduce the number of large class settings. This way trainees could receive most of the instruction on their own time, allowing the instructors more time to focus on common mistakes or major plant issues.

Chances are that you have some form of training and knowledge capture program. In some cases, the training program was established when your plant was first commissioned. In other cases, the program may have been delivered as part of a large retrofit project such as FGD or SCR installations. You may even feel your training program is adequate for you, but how do you make sure you are fulfilling your plant’s and employee’s need?

Consider AVEVA’s Training Pulse Study to answer some of these questions. An experienced operations training consultant and technologist will spend time either on-site or remotely to help your organization evaluate your current training solution and requirements. We will collect data to analyze your existing Training Program and we will propose a Training Roadmap to help you achieve your operational and maintenance goals.

Every organization requires a training solution that fits its goals as well as budgetary and scheduling constraints. A generic solution may be enough and desired. A plant-specific solution may be required at other times. Together, we can design a training program that fits your desired goals, by offering you a team of experienced power industry experts and training specialists.

Technology for technology’s sake is not a wise solution to the different problems faced by power plants today. Developing a roadmap will give you the confidence that you will spend your training budget wisely. Furthermore, you don’t have to be an existing AVEVA user. Our training portfolio has many services that can be used with any plant controls or existing training software, maximizing a return on your investment by making use of what you already have and augmenting your capabilities.

Learn by Doing

AVEVA’s learning methodology focuses on “learn by doing,” with real-life exercises tailored to your training goals. Programs and courses are designed to complement the knowledge and skills of a new generation of workers. Power utilities realize that a continuous learning program helps them achieve their goals, and this benefits customers by keeping electricity affordable.

This type of learning environment will become even more important as utilities and power producers add more renewable energy resources to their portfolios. The lessons learned from workforce training at fossil fuel-powered facilities will still be relevant when operating renewable energy facilities.

AVEVA creates flexible simulation models that can be combined with a DCS simulation for engineering validations, control system checkout, and operator training, and it can be accessed both on-premises, and from a secure cloud platform.