Industrial Automation Technologist

Job Information

Salary Range: $85,000 - $114,660

The base salary range represents a good faith salary range for this position. This position is eligible for annual incentive pay and has the opportunity for continued salary growth. If you are hired at American Water your base salary compensation will be determined based on factors such as market, geography, skills, education and/or experience. At American Water, we are committed to pay equity. In addition to compensation, you will be offered a comprehensive benefits package including 401(k), Defined Contribution Plan, Employee Stock Purchase Plan, medical, prescription, dental and vision coverage, plus disability, paid time off, life insurance, voluntary benefits, health and wellness programs and much more!

American Water is also proud to offer employees learning opportunities and work experiences to grow professionally!

Primary Role

• Work as a corporate team member in designing and standardizing the various Operational Technologies utilized to support the delivery of water and wastewater services.
• Ensure automation and controls projects adhere to standards.
• Help establish the architecture and strategies that support the lifecycle management of industrial control systems, approach for replacing or upgrading systems, flow and management of data, enterprise standards, and disaster recovery of operational technology systems.
• Interface with automation engineers, external consulting firms, and business leadership.
• Support the development and execution of the strategic Operational Technology plan to achieve short- and long-term business objectives.
• Support the Enterprise Portal and HMI SCADA Template rollout projects. Provide oversight and guidance for supporting vendor community activities.

Key Accountabilities

• Maintaining the AW standards for Operational Technology.
• Design, architecture, and engineering of systems and solutions.
• Development and governance of enterprise-wide standards and programs (HMI/SCADA, PLC, lifecycle management, engineering standards).
• Collaboration with other departments and core functional areas.
• Maintain strong, effective Team partnerships with integrators, manufacturers to help promote industry leadership.

Knowledge/Skills

• Good presentation and communication skills. Ability to influence your peers.
• Good project management skills, with the ability to manage multiple projects simultaneously.
• Established knowledge of operational technologies and applicability for the water and wastewater industries.
• Established working knowledge of modern process control systems and technology.
• Strong and working knowledge of modern and High-Performance HMI design.
• ISA standards & IT/OT convergence fundamentals.
• Foster a collaborative team environment.
• Leading assigned projects throughout the project lifecycle.
• Strong analytic work methodology and problem-solving skills.

Experience/Education

• Bachelor’s degree or equivalent work experience.
• Over 3+ years of experience / knowledge in Operational Technology with an emphasis on system architecture, infrastructure, industrial control systems, and/or cyber security.
• PLC Controllers; Allen-Bradley/Rockwell required.
• HMI/SCADA systems; Ignition - Perspective required.
• DB Integration; MSSQL preferred.
• Experience with programming languages, Python/Jython preferred.
• Good understanding of structured data, Unified Namespace and performance metrics.
• Familiarity with containerization, virtualization, DevOps.
• Understanding of cyber security for the utility industry.
• Public Utility experience a plus.
• Position is designated as a position-of-trust; therefore, candidate must submit to and successfully pass a background investigation.

Travel Requirements

• As necessary, up to 10%

Work Environment

• Standard office environment.

Key Interfaces

• IT Team Leads
• OT Team Leads
• Engineering Leads
• Production/Operations Leads
• Business Process Consultants
• System Integration Partners
• Vendors/Manufacturers

#LI-LKO

Competencies