Over the past several years, companies have been faced with much more regulation on how we do business.  These regulations have stemmed from the Enron debacle back in the early 2000's to recent episodes of identity theft from our locally headquartered TJX company.  In response to these new regulations, companies have implemented a number of new processes and controls to ensure that many types of risk are mitigated.  These include improved financial reporting processes, protection of confidential health related data to secure physical perimeters to keep the bad guys out.

This discussion will focus on what NSTAR has done to plan, define, develop, test and implement to be in compliance with these new regulations (sounds like a project, doesn’t it…).  In addition, we will look at the role of the project manager to help with compliance as changes are introduced into the environment.

As with any good learning opportunity, there is some homework involved.  Please come prepared with any new regulations or compliance requirements that your company has recently been faced with.  This is not necessarily about technology compliance, but is usually about business compliance.  We will spend the first part of the session in a working-group format discussing these recent changes as a prelude to the formal discussion.

Jack Bergen is the Director NIS Management Services at NSTAR Gas and Electric where he has been since 2001. In this role, he is responsible various " running IT like a business" functions such as risk management, financial and asset management, process quality assurance, IT communication services and the human side of IT.  This includes ensuring that IT is compliant with all policies and regulations in support of delivering critical business applications.  Jack was the co-program manager for the NSTAR SOX program in 2003-2004, and his area is currently responsible for supporting the SOX, CIP and NPI compliance programs at NSTAR.  Jack has had roles as the head of a PMO at both NSTAR and at Boston Gas Company, where he also was the Y2K program manager from 1997-2000.  Jack previously joined us as the utility industry representative for the career evening earlier in 2008.