Oliver Campbell · Chief Technology Officer · Canada

What a grid engineer would ask from the board table

My contribution to a board

My contribution to a board would be a working engineer's view of physical infrastructure under stress. I have run control rooms, metering programmes and automation projects, and I have written the papers that boards read about them. I can tell a board which numbers in a technology or resilience proposal carry the case, which have been estimated rather than measured, and which questions management has not yet been asked.

Three areas are specific. On cyber security for operational systems, I can help a board move from maturity scores to evidence of how long the organisation can operate without its business network, and what supplier access exists into its control systems. On storm and climate resilience, I can test whether a proposal is ranked by customer impact avoided per dollar, or by visibility. On carbon capture and similar decarbonisation investments, I can read the engineering assumptions behind a cost per tonne and ask whether the figure is captured or avoided, at what hours, and with what credit price.

I would not present myself as a financial expert for audit committee purposes, and I am not a lawyer on regulatory matters. I would expect to serve as a committee member for a year before chairing, and I would be most useful on audit and risk, technology or environment and safety committees.

Committee contribution

Chair and member readiness
Capacity	Committees
Ready to chair	Technology, cyber security or operational risk committee, after one year as a member · Capital projects committee of a not-for-profit or public-sector board
Ready to join	Audit and risk committee · Environment, health and safety committee · Technology and cyber security committee

Capacity and preferences

Time available: 25 days per year
Current directorships: 2
Sectors: Water and wastewater utilities · Gas distribution and transmission outside Ontario electricity distribution · Industrial companies appraising carbon capture or electrification · Critical infrastructure such as ports, airports and transit · Indigenous-owned or jointly owned energy businesses, where invited
Company type: A listed mid-cap company, a crown or municipal corporation, or a large not-for-profit that runs physical infrastructure and has an established audit and risk committee
Company stage: An organisation where operational technology, climate exposure or a large capital programme has recently become a board-level question

The seat I am pursuing

I am looking for one non-executive seat on the board of an organisation that runs physical infrastructure where technology, cyber or climate risk is now a board-level question: a water utility, a gas business outside Ontario electricity distribution, an industrial company appraising capture or electrification, a port or transit authority, or an Indigenous-owned energy business if its owners wanted my experience. I would like to join the audit and risk committee or a technology committee, and after a year to chair a technology or operational risk committee if the board wished. I am not interested in a seat chosen because a board wants a technologist's name on its list without a committee role, and I would not join a board whose management could not tell me how long its operations could run without its business network. Before taking a conversation further, I would want to understand what the chair believes the board lacks.

Governance learning and readiness

IICA Independent Directors’ Databank: Not yet registered

The IICA databank exists for those who want to serve as independent directors on Indian boards. That register does not apply to the Canadian appointments I am considering, and I have not registered. Independence for a Canadian board would be assessed under that board's own governing rules.

A directors' education programme run by a Canadian business school, completed in 2024
Board of governors service at Tillbrook College since 2021, including audit and finance committee work
Annual board briefings on cyber security governance and incident disclosure, attended as presenter and observer since 2019
Training on Indigenous relations and the history of treaties in Ontario, completed with Quillmere's senior team in 2023

Judgement in practice

Showing a board a customer-minute analysis against a shareholder's request

After the 2022 storm our largest shareholder's council asked publicly for C$138 million of undergrounding in two town centres. Presenting an alternative risked looking as if management was overriding an owner. I gave the board the shareholder's letter and my analysis side by side: the centres accounted for 9% of customer-minutes lost, and long rural feeders for 61%. I proposed C$44 million of automation and covered conductor, with some undergrounding where it was the cheapest fix per customer-minute. The board chose the analysis and asked the chair to explain the decision to the council. On a board I would want management to bring owner pressure into the room with the evidence beside it, and I would expect directors to explain a decision to the owner rather than let management absorb it.

Reporting a failed drill to an audit and risk committee

Our first isolation drill in May 2022 was planned for seven days and broke down after nine hours. It would have been easy to describe it as a successful test that identified improvements. I told the audit and risk committee that it had failed, explained the hidden dependency on the corporate identity service and set out what we would fix before the next drill. One director asked whether we should stop drilling until the fixes were complete. I argued that the drill was the only way to find what our diagrams missed. The committee agreed and made the drill an annual agenda item. As a director I would want failures reported in those words and would make it safe for management to do so.

Advising a college board against a technology purchase

At Tillbrook College in 2023 the administration proposed C$2.6 million for a virtual-reality training suite for powerline technician students, partly funded by a grant. I asked how many training hours on real poles it would replace and how its value would be measured. The answers were thin. I suggested the board fund a one-term trial with a single cohort and compare its results with the existing yard training. The trial showed value for hazard recognition and none for climbing skills, and the college bought a smaller suite for C$0.7 million. I try to ask what a technology will replace and how we will know, not whether it is modern.

My first year on a board

I would start by learning how the organisation actually operates, not how its papers describe it. In the first three months I would read two years of board and committee minutes and the most recent risk register, then ask to visit a control room, a plant or a field depot and speak with the people who run them on a bad night. I would meet the chair, the chief executive, the chief financial officer, the head of internal audit and the most senior technology and operations executives separately, and I would ask each the same question: which risk does the board discuss least in proportion to its consequence?

For the rest of the year I would serve as a committee member and say less than I think. I would ask for one or two pieces of evidence rather than new reports: the last incident or drill review, the list of external connections into operational systems, or the assumptions behind the largest capital project. I would hold back proposals until I had seen a full annual cycle, unless I saw a safety or security risk that could not wait.

At the end of the year I would ask the chair whether my questions had helped, and whether my utility background had narrowed my view of a different business. I would expect to have learnt more than I contributed.

Conflicts and their management

My employment at Quillmere comes first, and any appointment would require our chief executive's consent and a review by our general counsel. Because Quillmere is owned by municipalities and regulated by the province's energy regulator, I would not join the board of another Ontario electricity distributor, a company that supplies meters, control systems or cyber security services to Quillmere, a generator or storage developer seeking connection to our network, or a body that intervenes in our rate proceedings.

I would disclose my directorships at Tillbrook College and Quillmere Fibre Inc., the fact that Quillmere funds a training partnership with the college, and any relationship with the First Nation development corporation with which we are building a jointly owned substation. If a matter touching any of those relationships came before a board I served on, I would declare it, leave the discussion and ask that the minutes record it. If such matters became frequent, I would resign rather than hold a seat in which I could not contribute.

I would keep Quillmere's confidential security information entirely out of another board's discussions, even where it seemed directly relevant. The twenty-five days a year I can commit would be agreed with Quillmere in advance and would include time for site visits and an unexpected incident.

My independence statement

I am a serving executive of a municipally owned distributor and a director of its fibre affiliate. Any board considering me would need to assess my independence under the rules that apply to it, which for a Canadian listed company include the securities rules on audit committee independence. I would disclose my employment, my directorships, any shareholdings and any commercial relationship between Quillmere and the organisation, and I would not describe myself as independent until that assessment had been made.

Board and committee exposure

Served as a director

Tillbrook College

Board of governors; audit and finance committee member

September 2021–present

Governor of a community college that trains powerline technicians and electricians; member of the committee that oversees its budget, audit and capital projects.

Served as a director

Quillmere Fibre Inc.

Board of directors of an unregulated affiliate

June 2020–present

Executive director of the group's fibre-leasing affiliate; votes on its budget and on contracts with the regulated distributor, under affiliate rules that require arm's-length terms.

Reported to a committee

Quillmere Power Corporation

Audit and risk committee

April 2019–present

Quarterly reports on cyber security, technology risk and isolation drill results; attends for those items.

Presented to the Board or a committee

Quillmere Hydro Inc.

Full board

2022 and 2024

Presented the storm-resilience programme in 2022, set against a shareholder's undergrounding request, and the meter replacement business case in 2024.

Presented to the Board or a committee

Kelsvar Oil Sands Corporation

Board environment, health and safety committee

2013–2014

Presented the capture study and pilot results, including the recommendation to defer a full-scale plant.