Sophia D. Skoda, ‘93 (Environmental Engineering) Director of Finance, East Bay Municipal Utility District (EBMUD)
I love my job at EBMUD as Finance Director! EBMUD provides water to 1.4 million people and wastewater treatment service to 740,000 people in the East Bay. My job is to ensure we make smart financial decisions on behalf of these customers. This means working as part of our nearly 2,000 person team of utility workers, engineers, customer service staff and more to provide 24/7 access to the Bay Area’s drinking water and to make sure that wastewater from our sinks, toilets, etc. is treated for pathogens before it flows to the San Francisco Bay. As part of this work, we balance our costs “non-rate" revenues (investment returns, sales of hydroelectric and other generated renewable electricity), and bond funding to develop fair and reasonable customer rates for our water and wastewater services. EBMUD is a steward of important natural resources, so this is a significant responsibility, particularly as affordability of these services is critical given the wide spread of incomes in our area.
When did you first get introduced to the field of engineering?
My father is a Civil Engineer. He received his B.S. through his Ph.D. at UC Berkeley and spent most of his career working in water supply and sanitation in Asia and Africa for the United Nations. I grew up with photographs of happy children gathered around handpumps.
Tell me about your pathway to your current work
During my time at Stanford, I decided I needed work experience so I called the Public Works Department of the City of Palo Alto and asked if they had internships or if I could volunteer. They didn’t have an internship program but created one that I know continued to hire Stanford CEE students for a long time (and still might). After Stanford, I spent the summer working at the United Nations Environment Programme in Nairobi in the Water and Lithosphere unit. I was supposed to return to Stanford to work on an M.S. degree in the CEE department, but a photographer friend died in Mogadishu that summer photographing one of the raids later portrayed in the film Black Hawk Down. For some reason, at his memorial service, it became clear that I wanted to work on the M.S. at U.C. Berkeley.
I spent the next year plus at Cal which is where I took my first course in an area in which I have spent much of my career, Water Resources Economics. I spent a summer in Mexico City working for a family friend’s water resources consulting firm followed by my first real job with a heavy construction firm working on environmental remediation at closed military bases. I took my California P.E. license while working there.
Around this time, I decided I would like to do something broader than the remediation work. My mother saw a job advertisement in the Wall Street Journal for an engineer with an M.B.A. to work in utility finance. I didn’t have an M.B.A. but I applied stating that I would be happy to take finance and accounting course work needed. I was lucky to be hired by a wonderful manager who became a mentor to me and to have someone on our team leave suddenly which gave me an opportunity for trial by fire!
I later moved to a specialty firm (started by two engineers – one from Stanford and one from Cal) which focused largely on rates, changes, and municipal bond advisory work for water and wastewater utilities. It was exhilarating and felt so tangible and impactful. Asking what fair rates and charges should look like for California communities all of whom had different values, user characteristics, and finances was so fun. Taking bonds to market to pay for new infrastructure was fun too.
As part of this work, I evaluated the economics of a trucked waste-to-energy program that EBMUD started in the early 2000s. It was a fascinating project and, when a senior engineering position came open to run the program, I applied and decided to take the leap into the public sector. I ran EBMUD’s trucked waste program for 8 years during which we became the first North American wastewater plant to become a net seller of energy to the grid. An opportunity came about 10 years ago to manage EBMUD’s treasury which included rates and charges, the municipal bond program, and the District’s investments. A year into this job, my wonderful boss, also a Stanford graduate, left and I was fortunate to be selected to fill his role as Finance Director where I sit today. My career has benefited from good luck, persistence, and people who took the time to invest in me.
What about this work inspires you?
I am inspired by the possibility of how real stewardship of water and our environment can make the world a safer, more fair, more peaceful, cooler place to live. I am inspired to lend my experiences and voice towards these ends.
What challenges are you currently working to surmount? What challenges have you overcome?
I was fortunate to become a mother, a bit later than what might be considered average. While I formerly was able to solve many problems with additional time spent, this is no longer a viable option. I have had to prioritize strategically, delegate more, be more judicious about my time and energy, and give up certain things too. I still have not figured out how to work back in regular exercise – I will have bursts and then it gets crowded out. But I WILL figure it out. In terms of overcoming challenges, I used to feel embarrassed about asking what I was afraid might be a silly question or one I should know the answer to, with age has come the freedom to worry less about what others might think and a track record of getting lots of great information that has helped solve many problems.
What does it mean to you to be an engineer?
I took me a long time to feel comfortable calling myself an engineer. I felt like an imposter for a long time, a woman of color, and especially as I was working on the intersection of finance and engineering so non-traditional in all ways. One day, I ran into an old friend who asked me what type of work I was doing. I explained my work and his follow-on question was a good one – “What qualifies you to do this work?” I hesitated for a minute, why was I qualified… and then said with a conviction I had not felt before – “Because I do it every day.” I think being an engineer for me, is choosing to use engineering thinking to work through the plethora of problems that arise on the job I have been given whether it be big or small.
What advice do you have for students considering engineering as a field to pursue?
Engineering thinking is such a wonderfully useful skill. It’s an investment up front and it might be a little harder for some students (I was one) than for others, but oh the rewards!
Favorite book?
That is hard!! One?? Sooo hard. A favorite book is West with the Night, a memoir by Beryl Markham who grew up in Kenya which is where my father was born and raised and where I lived from age 9 until I finished high school. Beryl was an early female aviatrix and was also a well-regarded horse trainer in the early 1900s. She was the first person to fly alone from East to West across the Atlantic. I remember coming home after taking the SAT in Nairobi to a party my mother was hosting. I was holding the book as I entered the living room and one of the women from an old Nairobi Indian family noticed it and said “Oh you are reading Beryl’s book…she worked for my father training horses....he had to let her go, she drank you know..” It's beautifully written and she was an amazing person.
Favorite podcast?
I am not a regular listener but when I have a long car ride, I find myself turning to This American Life or RadioLab. I appreciate experiences that help me see the world differently and I often have this feeling after a ride with either of those two.
