Protection & Control Design Supervisor

Department: Power Delivery
Reports To: Senior Program Manager, Power Delivery
Supervisory Responsibility: No direct reports initially; anticipated supervision of up to three Protection & Control Design Technicians
Work Environment: Primarily office-based with project-related field travel
Travel: Up to 15%

Position Summary

The Protection & Control Design Supervisor is a working supervisor responsible for performing, coordinating, and overseeing protection and control engineering and design activities for transmission, distribution, substation, and generation interconnection projects.

This position combines hands-on technical design responsibilities with team leadership, quality oversight, workload coordination, and employee development. The Protection & Control Design Supervisor works closely with engineering, design, project management, field services, commissioning, operations, telecommunications, SCADA, and client personnel to deliver safe, reliable, constructible, and standards-compliant protection and control solutions.

As the Protection & Control design team grows, this position will provide direct supervision, technical direction, coaching, and performance management for up to three design technicians.

Essential Duties and Responsibilities

Protection and Control Design

• Perform and oversee protection and control design activities for transmission, distribution, substation, and generation interconnection projects.
• Develop and review protection and control drawings, including:
  • Single-line and three-line diagrams
  • AC and DC schematics
  • Protection logic diagrams
  • Elementary and wiring diagrams
  • Control panel layouts
  • Cable schedules
  • Interconnection diagrams
  • Communications and SCADA interface drawings
  • Equipment connection and termination details
• Develop, review, and coordinate protection schemes for transformers, transmission lines, distribution feeders, buses, generators, capacitor banks, reactors, and other substation equipment.
• Support the preparation and review of relay settings, protection coordination studies, logic equations, settings calculations, and associated design documentation.
• Evaluate and apply appropriate protective relay, control, automation, metering, communications, and monitoring technologies.
• Support designs involving microprocessor-based relays, remote terminal units, SCADA systems, substation automation, communications-assisted protection, and digital substation technologies.
• Coordinate protection and control requirements with physical substation, civil, structural, electrical, telecommunications, SCADA, and system planning disciplines.
• Review vendor drawings, equipment data, technical specifications, and submittals for compliance with project requirements.
• Develop bills of material, equipment specifications, design packages, construction documents, and technical procurement information.
• Perform field walkdowns, site investigations, data collection, and existing-condition assessments as required.
• Support brownfield modifications by identifying existing system interfaces, outage constraints, constructability considerations, and cutover requirements.
• Provide technical support during construction, testing, commissioning, energization, and project closeout.
• Assist with troubleshooting protection system issues, equipment failures, relay operations, and system events.
• Participate in the analysis of relay misoperations and recommend corrective actions or design improvements.

Design Leadership and Quality Control

• Serve as the primary technical resource for assigned protection and control design work.
• Establish design approaches, technical expectations, work priorities, and deliverable requirements for assigned projects.
• Perform independent technical reviews of drawings, calculations, relay applications, design packages, and other engineering deliverables.
• Verify that designs are accurate, complete, constructible, coordinated, and compliant with applicable codes, standards, client requirements, and internal procedures.
• Maintain consistency in protection and control design practices across projects.
• Develop, implement, and maintain design standards, templates, checklists, procedures, and quality-control practices.
• Identify technical risks, design conflicts, scope gaps, and constructability issues early in the project lifecycle.
• Provide technical guidance and resolve complex design issues in coordination with project and engineering leadership.
• Promote lessons learned, standardization, continuous improvement, and effective use of design technology.
• Maintain awareness of developments in protective relaying, substation automation, communications, cybersecurity, and power delivery design practices.

Supervisory Responsibilities

• Provide day-to-day technical direction and oversight for assigned design technicians as the team grows.
• Plan, assign, coordinate, and monitor work to support project schedules, priorities, and quality requirements.
• Balance supervisory responsibilities with the performance of hands-on protection and control design work.
• Review employee work products and provide timely, constructive technical feedback.
• Coach and mentor employees in protection and control design practices, software tools, standards, and project execution.
• Support employee onboarding, training, development planning, and career progression.
• Establish performance expectations and participate in performance evaluations, recognition, corrective action, and other personnel processes.
• Assess team workload and resource requirements and communicate staffing needs to the Senior Program Manager.
• Support the recruitment, interviewing, and selection of future design team members.
• Promote a collaborative, accountable, safety-focused, and quality-driven work environment.

Project Execution and Coordination

• Coordinate protection and control design activities with project managers, engineers, designers, clients, contractors, vendors, utilities, and field personnel.
• Assist in developing project scopes, schedules, staffing plans, budgets, estimates, and design-hour forecasts.
• Monitor assigned work for compliance with project scope, schedule, budget, and quality expectations.
• Communicate project status, technical risks, resource needs, and potential schedule or budget impacts to project leadership.
• Participate in project kickoff meetings, design reviews, client meetings, coordination meetings, and construction support discussions.
• Review client standards, utility requirements, interconnection requirements, and project-specific design criteria.
• Support proposal development, level-of-effort estimates, technical approaches, and project planning activities.
• Assist with contractor and consultant coordination and review third-party design deliverables when required.
• Maintain organized project records, calculations, design decisions, correspondence, and revision documentation.
• Support multiple concurrent projects and adjust priorities in response to changing business and project needs.

Safety and Compliance

• Perform work in accordance with applicable company safety policies, client requirements, and regulatory standards.
• Incorporate safety, operability, maintainability, and constructability considerations into protection and control designs.
• Follow applicable engineering and design standards, including relevant IEEE, ANSI, NERC, FERC, NEC, NESC, OSHA, utility, client, and company requirements.
• Support compliance activities associated with protection system maintenance, relay performance, documentation, and reliability requirements when applicable.
• Participate in field activities in accordance with substation access, personal protective equipment, job briefing, and energized-facility requirements.
• Promote a culture in which safety, quality, ethical conduct, and regulatory compliance are integral to project execution.

Required Qualifications

• Bachelor of Science degree in Engineering, Engineering Technology, or a closely related technical discipline from an accredited institution.
• Minimum of five years of progressively responsible experience in protection and control engineering or design within the electric utility, power delivery, consulting engineering, or related industry.
• Demonstrated experience supporting transmission, distribution, substation, or generation interconnection projects.
• Working knowledge of protection and control design principles, protective relay applications, control systems, and substation equipment.
• Experience developing or reviewing protection and control drawings and design packages.
• Ability to interpret electrical drawings, equipment specifications, relay documentation, utility standards, and technical requirements.
• Experience coordinating work across engineering, design, project management, construction, commissioning, and operations functions.
• Strong technical judgment and the ability to identify and resolve design issues.
• Effective written and verbal communication skills.
• Strong organizational skills and the ability to manage priorities across multiple projects.
• Ability to provide technical direction, coaching, and constructive feedback to design personnel.
• Proficiency with standard office productivity and document-management applications.
• Ability to travel up to 15% to project sites, client offices, utility facilities, and other business locations.

Preferred Qualifications

• Degree concentration in Electrical Engineering, Electrical Engineering Technology, Power Systems, or a related discipline.
• Experience serving as a technical lead, discipline lead, project lead, or working supervisor.
• Experience supervising, mentoring, or reviewing the work of engineering or design personnel.
• Experience with transmission, distribution, substation, and generation interconnection projects across multiple voltage classes.
• Experience with protective relay settings, short-circuit analysis, coordination studies, and event analysis.
• Familiarity with relay and protection platforms produced by SEL or other major protection equipment manufacturers.
• Experience with protection analysis and design software such as ASPEN OneLiner, ETAP, CAPE, AcSELerator, or comparable applications.
• Experience with AutoCAD, MicroStation, or other electrical design and drafting platforms.
• Familiarity with SCADA, RTUs, substation communications, IEC 61850, sequence-of-events recording, automation, and utility cybersecurity requirements.
• Experience supporting brownfield substation modifications, outages, cutovers, testing, commissioning, or energization activities.
• Professional Engineer licensure or the ability to pursue professional licensure, where applicable to the position.

Knowledge, Skills, and Competencies

• Strong knowledge of power system protection and control concepts.
• Understanding of protection schemes for lines, transformers, buses, feeders, generators, and other electrical equipment.
• Ability to translate engineering requirements into complete, accurate, and constructible design documents.
• Knowledge of utility design practices, substation equipment, control power systems, and protection system interfaces.
• Strong attention to detail and commitment to technical quality.
• Ability to lead through influence while maintaining hands-on responsibility for project deliverables.
• Ability to delegate work appropriately and hold team members accountable for results.
• Sound decision-making and problem-solving skills.
• Ability to communicate technical information clearly to technical and nontechnical stakeholders.
• Client-focused approach and ability to build effective working relationships.
• Commitment to employee development, collaboration, continuous improvement, and operational excellence.
• Ability to work independently while contributing effectively within a multidisciplinary team environment.

Work Environment and Physical Requirements

This position is primarily performed in an office environment. The employee may periodically work at substations, generation facilities, utility properties, construction sites, client offices, and other project locations.

The position may require:

• Travel of up to 15%, depending on project requirements.
• Walking or standing on uneven terrain at project sites.
• Climbing stairs or accessing elevated equipment areas.
• Wearing required personal protective equipment.
• Working near energized electrical facilities under established safety controls.
• Occasional work outside normal business hours to support outages, commissioning, energization, or urgent project needs.
• Use of a computer and other standard office equipment for extended periods.

Reasonable accommodations may be made to enable qualified individuals with disabilities to perform the essential functions of the position.

Performance Expectations

Success in this position will be measured through:

• Safe execution of office and field activities.
• Accuracy, completeness, and quality of protection and control deliverables.
• Timely completion of work within established project budgets and schedules.
• Effective coordination with clients, project teams, field personnel, and other disciplines.
• Identification and resolution of technical and project risks.
• Consistent application of design standards and quality-control practices.
• Development, engagement, and performance of assigned design personnel.
• Responsiveness to project needs and changing priorities.
• Contribution to standardization, efficiency, continuous improvement, and client satisfaction.

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