Planned maintenance outages are among the most operationally sensitive events in power generation. They compress complex, high-risk work into narrow timeframes while requiring the rapid mobilization of large contractor workforces.
For Southern Power, a leading wholesale electricity provider with more than 13,000 megawatts of generating capacity across 57 sites, these events exposed a critical operational vulnerability: ensuring contractors arrive fully qualified during high-volume planned outage maintenance.
During outage mobilization, hundreds of contractors would arrive on-site, many without having met required qualifications. What followed was not just delay, but disruption across safety, operations, and workforce coordination.
When I first got to Southern Power, I noticed a huge backlog of contractors at the entry gate trying to get in to perform work.
– AJ Hester, Health & Safety Principal, Southern Power Company
Southern Power’s planned outage model relies heavily on contract labor. At peak events, 300 or more workers may arrive within a short window to execute maintenance and repair work.
However, required qualifications such as drug screenings, background checks, safety credentials, and documentation were often verified only upon arrival.
This created immediate breakdowns:
You’re talking about 300 contract workers trying to get into a gate on day one of a planned outage. The line is backed up with some contractors ready to work and some not ready to work.
– AJ Hester
The challenges extended beyond getting contractors on-site.
“Our process at the time was very manual and very fragmented,” Hester said. “A portion of each part of the process lived with a different group or a different person.”
Internal teams were managing compliance across multiple systems and paper records, often spending three to four hours per worker verifying requirements manually.
Planned outages became continuous fire drills, with teams balancing compliance verification alongside their primary operational responsibilities.
At a surface level, the challenge appeared to be onboarding inefficiency. In reality, it reflected a deeper structural issue.
“I think over the course of time we’ve kind of taken it as that’s part of the business.”
— AJ Hester
Power generation is the core output. During an outage, that output stops. Every delay extends downtime and increases cost, both in lost production and labor. At the same time, contractors on site are being paid, even if they are waiting instead of working.
Southern Power partnered with Veriforce to shift the model from reactive, on-site verification to ensuring all requirements are met before workers arrive.
“The real thesis of the entire conversation was having workers show up on site ready to work.”
— Chris Stockton, Director of Utility Client Services, Veriforce
The focus was clear. Ensure contractors arrive fully qualified and ready to work.
This approach introduced:
“Instead of workers showing up at the gate asking what they were missing, they now have that visibility at their fingertips before they arrive.”
— Chris Stockton
Contractors gained real-time insight into what was required and what remained incomplete.
“Giving our contractors visibility into their workers’ compliance was beneficial to them because they haven’t had that in the past. They couldn’t see what the compliance status was.”
— AJ Hester
Instead of arriving at the gate to discover issues, workers could resolve them in advance.
Implementing a new contractor management strategy required coordination across safety, operations, procurement, and contractor partners.
Southern Power adopted a phased approach, focusing first on critical requirements before expanding over time.
“We didn’t bite off more than we could chew. We focused on key areas to provide impact and then built on that.”
— AJ Hester
“I think when it comes to pivoting, what starts with making sure people have orientations up front, through the partnership we were able to identify additional areas to streamline and consolidate data into one spot.”
— Chris Stockton
This approach enabled the organization to:
As the system matured, Southern Power moved toward a single source of truth for contractor compliance, strengthening consistency and reducing ambiguity.
Within the first year, Southern Power achieved significant improvements:
More importantly, the operational experience changed.
“Now contract laborers show up pre-compliant. They get through the gate, get on their tools, and get to work.”
— AJ Hester
“The product is power… when you’re in an outage… you’re not producing product.” Stockton added. “Any potential for delay… is expense to the company not only in product but also in labor.”
The removal of gate congestion improved execution timelines and reduced the cascading impact of early delays.
What began as a planned outage readiness initiative quickly revealed broader applications across the organization. As adoption expanded, Southern Power identified opportunities to extend readiness requirements beyond planned outage scenarios and leverage Veriforce WorkerPass additional workforce types and operational contexts.
“One of our mantras at Southern Power is continuous improvement,” said Hester. “We recently executed an enterprise-wide agreement with Veriforce to expand usage across Southern Company, including contractor credentialing and supply chain. The possibilities keep growing because the foundation is strong.”
“Not a week goes by where we don’t find another area where this can be utilized.”
— Chris Stockton
The initiative evolved into a broader capability supporting workforce visibility, consistency, and operational control.
This gave stakeholders clear visibility into requirements and status. It also created a consistent record of what was completed and when. The technology itself supported this shift by connecting people with the processes they rely on.
“From Southern’s perspective, we wanted a partner we could trust, that delivered great support and service to our team and our contractors; with technology tools that were highly configurable. Different parts of our business have different needs. We didn’t want to find another piece of software for another part of the business. We chose Veriforce because they could meet our requirements, but also some future initiatives our team hadn’t even considered. That, and the service, support and experience Veriforce delivers to our contractors helped us make our decision,” said Hester.
Southern Power Company’s contractor management transformation demonstrates that improving outage execution requires more than faster onboarding. It requires certainty that every worker arriving on site is qualified, compliant, and ready to perform.
By shifting from reactive verification to structured readiness, Southern Power Company improved operational control, strengthened workforce coordination, and reduced disruption during critical outage events.
“It’s paid dividends. It really and truly has.”
— AJ Hester
Learn how today’s top utility safety leaders partner with Veriforce to improve contractor management from onboarding to onsite.
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