EY and utilities giant Eversource Energy recently collaborated on an enhanced customer information system (CIS) for the latter. For any utilities company, a CIS is the most important IT system as it performs two functions:
- It acts as the company’s cash register that processes meter readings, generates and prints bills, delivers them to customers, and allows the company to provide seamless customer service while managing payments.
- The CIS connects to a company’s financial engine to report it on the financial ledger.
During a roundtable discussion, ERP Today got exclusive insights into the implementation of a customer information system at Eversource and the focus on agile as a means of delivering a truly adaptive and flexible customer-facing system. The discussion featured experts from EY and Eversource Energy including Dean Hanson, Partner, EY; Boris Sam Logoff, Managing Director, EY; Ron Beck, CIO, Eversource Energy; and Penny McLean Connor, EVP, Customer Experience and Energy Strategy, Eversource Energy.
What this means for ERP insiders
Adaptability to Evolving Market Needs
The success of Eversource’s CIS transformation demonstrates the critical importance of having a system that can evolve in lockstep with changing market dynamics and customer expectations. Rather than pursuing a complete rip-and-replace of legacy systems, Eversource leveraged scaled agile methodology (based on SAFe)— enabling development teams to co-create the system with business stakeholders and setting up groundwork for continuous enhancements without major disruption. It gave Eversource the ability to rapidly adapt, iterate, and respond to shifting priorities and customer needs—ensuring the CIS remained relevant and value-generating over time.
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Leadership-Driven Agile Culture
Eversource recognized that adopting agile wasn’t just about delivery mechanics—it required a cultural shift. Leadership took an active role in embedding agility across the organization, championing cross-functional collaboration, and ensuring that the principles of agility were embraced at every level. This intentional push from the top helped foster an environment where teams could move fast, make decisions quickly, and remain tightly aligned with the overall transformation goals.
Empowered Teams & Continuous Improvement
A core tenet of Eversource’s transformation was its commitment to continuous inspection and adaptation—of both the system and the delivery process. Through regular demos and retrospectives, teams were empowered to refine how they worked, ensuring delivery methods matched the realities of their context. This feedback loop helped identify and remove friction points early, enabled rapid learning, and allowed teams to own and evolve the processes that worked best for them—ultimately driving a more resilient and responsive implementation.
