Laurel Castiglione – Sr. Manager – Employee Experience, Pacific Gas and Electric Corporate Affairs
Specialties include: Web Governance, Intranet Strategy, Globalization and Employee Marketplace
Laurel joined the PG&E team in June of 2009 to lead the development and implementation of an intranet strategy. She is proud to join PG&E as a member of the Online Communications staff within Corporate Affairs. Her first order of business has been to learn about the utility industry and the impact of the PG&E intranet on the company. She is actively seeking to build a coalition with business and IT leaders from across the company.
Laurel has moved to San Francisco, California and is enjoying city life. It is a real treat to be able to transition to a new industry with such an exciting future. The utility industry is rapidly evolving and she is excited to be a part of it.
Laurel spent 32 years at General Motors learning the business from the ground up. She had the privilege of leading process and system integration for the GM’s EV1 – the world’s first modern fully electric vehicle. The EV1 was produced by GM in the 1990’s to address requirements of the California and NE State mandates. This program redefined electric vehicle technology and led to the hybrids and fuel cell vehicles which are on the roads or under development today from both GM and its competitors. Laurel’s role on this project was to manage the incorporation of the EV1 into GM’s corporate systems and to establish business processes which ensured the “rocket scientists” could produce and sell their invention. This challenge included responsibility for integrating Delphi, Hughes, GM North America and Saturn systems required to Design, Develop, Manufacture, Sell and Service the EV1 and the S10 Electric truck.
Laurel also established her first governance team to support the integration of 3 engineering centers, multiple manufacturing facilities and dealer networks. She incorporated a matrixed approach to ensure that all business functions such as R&D, HR, Communications, Engineering, Purchasing, Manufacturing, Sales, Service and Marketing from each business unit were adequately represented and supported. The success of the model surpassed the expectations of all including the leadership of Advanced Technology Vehicles. Disciplined but flexible, highly responsive processes tied to program management and earned value tracking resulted in program imperatives being met, effective communications, engaged employees and a network of relationships forged, integrating the entire organization.
Next stop on her integration training was her role as Information Officer for Pre-Production Operations. Laurel was co-leader of a global project assigned to plan for leveraging the capabilities and integrating Germany, Brazil and U.S. operations. The global team was made up of representatives from all three countries. Her primary job as IO included the assignment to integrate IT support of Car, Truck and Powertrain North American pre-production. This included responsibility for over the operations of more than 50 applications running in 11 facilities during the Y2K years. She utilized her skills in effective communications to ensure her team was supportive and bridged the gap between IT and business. She utilized her program management expertise to ensure the IT portfolio reflected and was aligned with her customer’s primary business objectives.
But what about Communications, isn’t this a Communications based community? It certainly is and Laurel’s experience did not stop with IT. She joined GM’s Corporate Communications team in 2002 to lead the mySocrates Portal. She used the opportunity to establish GM’s Intranet Strategy Board, a web governance team structure that incorporates stakeholders from around the globe, from all levels of the company and all business functions. She was responsible to design and deploy a consistent intranet content architecture, user experience and strategy. She integrated Communicators from throughout the world, established web content management processes, deployed tools and supported the efforts of all functions to deploy productivity tools throughout the web. It was a learning experience for all. The primary customer’s/champions of the globalization effort were Steve Harris, VP of Communications, Katy Barclay, VP of Human Resources and Ralph Szygenda the CIO. They served on the highest level governance team to steer GM’s web and portal teams.
Web, portal, social media, collaboration, role based presentation of content, engagement processes and an employee marketplace are all key components of the intranet activities in which Laurel has the highest level of expertise. Laurel has now founded her own company, Bridge the Gap Solutions, llc to utilize her skills and her network of experts to build the internal capability of other companies. Her participation as a community leader for Communitelligence will include discussions of the joys and struggles of transforming organizations to effectively engage employees, business partners and employees
