Mgr, Interconnections Planning & Policy

Southern Company•Atlanta, GA

20h

About The Position

The Manager, Interconnections Planning & Policy is a strategic leadership role at Georgia Power responsible for the end-to-end integration of generation onto the Georgia Power system, including distribution- and transmission-connected resources across technologies such as gas, renewables, and battery storage. The role leads strategy and develops solutions to enable safe, reliable, affordable, and timely grid interconnections while supporting the system’s growth. For transmission work, the manager is directly responsible for project origination and partnerships with other Transmission teams, including capital budget approvals, scoping through commercial operation, final design, construction support, and closeout accounting. The position leads people-managers and technical subject matter experts, and serves as the single point of accountability for Georgia Power’s interconnection policies, processes, and execution. It ensures compliance with federal and state regulatory policies and coordinates with regulators, developers, and stakeholders. The manager works across Southern Company functions—including Transmission, Distribution, Generation, Renewables, Resource Planning, Policy & Services, Compliance, Operations, Legal, and Customer organizations—to support Georgia’s capacity needs and customer growth. The role’s four focus areas are interconnection strategy and governance; transmission interconnections; distribution interconnections; and policy leadership and stakeholder engagement. It sets processes and readiness criteria, coordinates project solutions from inception through execution, supports transmission capacity procurement and large-load coordination, develops approaches for increasingly complex distributed energy resource (DER) requests, and represents Georgia Power and Southern Company in regulatory and stakeholder matters. It also drives continuous improvement and grid readiness while balancing safety, reliability, affordability, and customer satisfaction.

Requirements

Bachelor’s degree in Engineering, Business, or a related field.
10+ years of experience in the energy sector, utilities, infrastructure, or large-scale project delivery.
3+ years of people leadership or team management experience.
Demonstrated experience coordinating complex enterprise and cross-functional initiatives with significant safety and reliability implications.
Strong understanding of transmission and distribution systems, grid operations, and generation interconnection processes and requirements.
Proven ability to lead teams, develop strategy, and execute in a highly regulated, safety-critical environment while balancing customer growth, grid reliability, and compliance.
Excellent written and verbal communication skills, including the ability to engage executives, technical teams, and external stakeholders.
Ability to build consensus, manage conflict, and drive decisions across organizational boundaries.
High judgment, accountability, and comfort operating with ambiguity during rapid growth.

Nice To Haves

2+ years as a leader-of-leaders.
Experience with regulatory policies in the energy industry.
Field experience in transmission and distribution.
Knowledge of control and communication schemes, legal/contracts, DER capabilities, and regulatory policy.
Creativity and strategy development; ability to lead evolving requirements and build a learning culture that learns quickly from mistakes.
Comfort working in a fast-changing environment.

Responsibilities

Own generation interconnections strategy, governance, and enterprise accountability, including escalation paths and readiness criteria.
Lead cross-functional alignment and communication across Southern Company organizations and external stakeholders for end-to-end generation interconnection solutions.
Set interconnections policy and process strategy to support compliance and the interconnection of all types of generation assets, including opportunities to incorporate technologies and analytics into work practices.
Identify and execute opportunities to improve the timeliness, reliability, and accuracy of project solutions and reduce delays and scope-change risks.
Provide strategy and direction for transmission interconnections in coordination with partner organizations, keeping senior leaders and executives informed and seeking their input as needed.
Oversee transmission-connected generation interconnection projects through project and interconnection lifecycle processes, including work associated with capacity procurement RFPs.
Coordinate with the large-load interconnections process to ensure consistency with transmission interconnection policies, project engineering, and cost allocation methodologies.
Provide strategy and direction for distribution interconnections in coordination with partner organizations, keeping senior leaders and executives informed and seeking their input as needed.
Lead strategy to address the increasing complexity of distribution interconnections, including DER technology, battery storage, DERMS, inverters, and customer controls.
Support implementation of behind-the-meter and customer DER programs while protecting safety, affordability, and reliability.
Represent Georgia Power and Southern Company professionally with customers, regulators, industry groups, and external stakeholders.
Own compliance and governance for interconnection projects, ensuring applicable company, regulatory, industry, planning, and operational requirements are met before energization.
Provide ongoing regulatory support and build relationships with the Georgia Public Service Commission, Commissioners, and Commission Staff.
Participate in stakeholder requests, including the Distributed Generation Working Group, and represent interconnection issues and requirements.
Serve as an interconnections subject matter expert in regulatory proceedings and legislative matters, including IRP and Rate Case filings when needed.
Drive continuous improvement by identifying systemic gaps, lessons learned, and opportunities to strengthen grid readiness and support Georgia’s growth.