A power and utility contractor builds and maintains lines, substations and networks for utilities, often at height and under live conditions. Here is how to run the crews.
Not sure what you need? Tell us about your business in six short steps and we will come to the first meeting prepared.
Share your requirementsA power and utility contractor works for utilities and developers on overhead lines, underground cables, substations, street lighting and metering work, and sometimes on emergency restoration after storms. Teams are crews of linemen, electricians, fitters and helpers under a supervisor, working at height or near live equipment. Work is awarded in packages with fixed durations, so crews are mobilised to a district, work for months and then move on or stand down. Skilled linemen are hard to find, and much of the safety of the work depends on how well each crew leader plans the day. See also HR for energy and utilities.
These are the places the people side of this kind of business tends to give way. The rest of this page works through them.
HR here has to work for each of these groups, not only the office. The set-up below is written with all of them in mind.
People are gathered for a project and released at its end, so teams rarely build habits, and good workers drift to the next contractor.
Experienced linemen and jointers are few, and different contractors compete for the same names when projects overlap.
Work at height and near live lines is safe only if each foreman plans, checks and stops work when needed, and standards vary by person.
Teams stay in camps or rented rooms in the district, with long stretches away, and attendance and morale suffer.
After storms or faults, crews are called out at short notice for long hours, and nobody has agreed how it is recorded or paid.
Helpers do hard physical work but have no structured route to becoming a lineman, so they leave or stay stuck.
Each crew keeps its own attendance and tool records, and the head office assembles payroll and billing from loose sheets.
Start with the topics that matter most here: Health, Safety and Wellbeing; Recruitment and Talent Acquisition; Employee Administration. Then work through the rest. Each topic is written for energy and utilities, not in general.
Induction, records, incident reporting and follow-through.
Requisition to joining, the same way every time.
Records, attendance, leave and the day-to-day HR that must simply work.
How many people, in which roles, by when — and what they will cost.
Structure, reporting lines and who is allowed to decide what.
A first day that is the same for the fifth joiner as the first.
Salary structure, payroll inputs and a month that closes on time.
Goals, reviews and ratings that hold up in a conversation.
Training planned from need rather than from the calendar.
Named backups for the roles that cannot be vacant.
Communication, recognition and the conditions people actually work in.
Two routes — one for complaints, one for conduct — kept separate.
Policies a manager can apply, and obligations with owners and dates.
Who leaves, when, why — and which of them mattered.
Resignation to relieving letter, in a defined order.
Records that survive people, and approvals that do not queue.
A short monthly pack management actually reads.
An HR function that runs the same way every month.
The pieces a power and utility contractors business puts in place, in an order that makes each easier. Open any card for the detail.
A maintained list of linemen, jointers and foremen with their skills and availability, so the next package starts with a named team.
What this coversHideA maintained list of linemen, jointers and foremen with their skills and availability, so the next package starts with a named team. The recruitment process keeps it current.
A daily briefing, a short list of checks before work at height or near live equipment, and the authority to stop work, with refresher sessions through the health and safety programme.
What this coversHideA daily briefing, a short list of checks before work at height or near live equipment, and the authority to stop work, with refresher sessions through the health and safety programme.
Rotation of home leave, basic standards for accommodation and food and a regular manager visit.
What this coversHideRotation of home leave, basic standards for accommodation and food and a regular manager visit. The attendance and leave process records it.
How crews are called, how hours are counted and how extra work is paid or compensated, written before the first storm, not after.
What this coversHideHow crews are called, how hours are counted and how extra work is paid or compensated, written before the first storm, not after.
Defined stages of supervised work and assessment, with pay steps.
What this coversHideDefined stages of supervised work and assessment, with pay steps. Role design helps set the levels.
Before changing anything, find out what is true today. These checks take an afternoon and tell you which of the topics above to start with.
Share your requirementsConfirm with a qualified professional. What applies to you depends on your business, your state and your arrangements, and it changes. This page describes practice. It does not state a legal position.
The services below fit this kind of business best. Each starts by recording where you stand, and every later report compares against that. We do not promise outcomes.
Safety routines for crew leaders and a record of who has been trained for what.
A maintained roster and a hiring route for linemen and foremen ahead of each package.
A standard attendance and leave record for dispersed crews, ready for payroll and client billing.
Clear levels from helper to foreman, with the skills and pay for each step.
Start with a free conversation, or see the paid HR Diagnostic.
Understand the business, its workforce, current processes and HR challenges.
Find the missing, weak, inconsistent or person-dependent processes.
Create the structure, processes, policies, SOPs, dashboards and systems needed.
Help HR and department managers actually adopt the new system.
Digitise repetitive and approval-based workflows where it is worth doing.
Track hiring, attendance, employee cost, performance, training and attrition.
Strengthen the people-management system continuously, not once.
From the GullyHR blog: one on HR in energy and utilities, and one on each of the topics this page points to.
Engineers, technicians and operators leave energy and utilities firms for reasons that differ by project and plant. How to listen, ask better questions and act.
6 min readRead article
A laminated notice, an annual drill, and an incident register with three entries in two years. What workplace health and safety looks like when it is real.
7 min readRead article
Candidates who accept and never arrive are usually lost in the silence between offer and joining. What actually causes it, and a contact plan that closes the gap.
8 min readRead article
Payroll says one joining date, the personal file says another and the manager remembers a third. How to establish a single trustworthy employee record and keep it that way.
7 min readRead articleMore on the GullyHR blog.
Plan work ahead where you can, keep a core crew on payroll through gaps, and tell the others early when the next package starts. People stay with contractors who give them clear dates.
Give every crew leader the same briefing and checklist, refresh it regularly and back a foreman who stops work. Review incidents and near misses without blame, so the next team learns.
Write down the rule before it is needed: who is called, how hours are recorded and what compensation applies. Confirm with a qualified professional what the law requires for such work.
Set stages of supervised work with a simple assessment at each stage and a pay step on passing. Anyone can then see what to do next, and you build your own skilled people.
Use one attendance format, one weekly report and a scheduled visit from a manager. Differences between districts should be exceptions that are written down.
The first conversation would look at how crews are formed for each package, what crew leaders check before work at height, and how long people spend away from home. From there a sensible first piece of work might be a crew roster and a short safety routine for foremen. Scope is agreed in writing afterwards, so you know exactly what is covered and what is not.
All 5 business types in energy and utilities · Find another business type
See all HR topics for energy and utilities, or another industry.
Identify payroll leaks, record gaps and hiring bottlenecks in a free first conversation, and leave knowing what to fix first.
Know what you need? Share your requirements in four short steps.
Want the full picture? See the paid HR Diagnostic.
Prefer a quick message? Chat on WhatsApp
