A recent piece in Utility Dive titled "Rate cases are strategy: Redefining how utilities drive regulatory outcomes" makes a compelling argument: utilities must stop viewing rate cases as necessary accounting inconveniences and start treating them as a core strategic lever.
At the EEI 2026 annual meeting in Las Vegas, the hallways were buzzing with this sentiment. But while the industry agrees on the strategy, there is a palpable anxiety regarding the execution. It is one thing to file a resilient, forward-looking plan; it is quite another to prove, two years later, that the work was executed with the level of rigor, safety, and cost discipline promised to regulators.
The Utility Dive article correctly highlights that regulatory bodies are demanding transparency. They want to see affordability metrics, risk-based targeting, and verifiable customer benefits before the filing even lands.
However, the real operational challenge, the one we heard about in sessions across the board at EEI, is the "execution gap."
Most utilities have sophisticated tools for planning (like GIS and engineering models) and separate systems for tracking (like EAMs and financial ledgers). But the business process connecting these systems is often fragile. When a regulator asks to see the evidentiary trail for a multi-million dollar resiliency project, utility teams are frequently forced into a manual scramble: pulling spreadsheets, reconciling fragmented data, and reconstructing work orders from disparate email chains.
This is not just a technology issue. It is a fundamental business process issue. If your compliance evidence relies on manual reconstruction, you aren't just adding risk to your rate case, you are creating a bottleneck that prevents your field teams from operating at the speed the grid demands.
When we engage as a business process consultant, our goal isn't to rip out your existing systems. Utilities have millions of dollars invested in OMS, CIS, and EAM platforms. The problem isn't the software; it’s the lack of orchestration between them.
"Execution proof" means building a business process where compliance evidence is a byproduct of the work, not an afterthought.
When a field crew completes a vegetation management span or a grid hardening job, the system should automatically:
By moving from manual handoffs to automated workflow orchestration, utilities are finding that rate cases become significantly easier to defend. You aren't "reconstructing" your performance; you are simply exporting the high-fidelity record of work that your systems already created.
The utilities that succeed in this new regulatory climate will be those that treat operational traceability with the same intensity they treat engineering design.
As the pressure for faster permitting and higher transparency grows, fueled by the AI-driven load demand and national security priorities discussed at EEI, the "old way" of managing operations is becoming a liability. Utilities that leverage automated execution tracking are not just saving time; they are building a persistent, auditable record of their performance.
That record is the best leverage you have in a rate case. It turns the conversation from "did you follow your plan?" to "here is the verifiable proof that we executed it safely, on time, and exactly as filed."
At Macedon, we help utilities bridge the gap between their regulatory commitments and their operational reality. If you are looking to evolve your business process from manual reconciliation to automated execution proof, let’s talk about how to orchestrate that transition.
Want to continue the discussion? Schedule a chat with Tom.