M. Tech. (Business Administration, Faculty of Management Sciences), Vaal University of Technology / Organisations need employees who are willing to go beyond the requirements of the job to contribute to the organisation’s effectiveness. An evolving trend in the organisational behaviour literature indicates that job satisfaction (JS) and organisational commitment (OC) are attitudes that have a major impact on organisational outcomes such as productivity, job performance, turnover intentions and organisational citizenship behaviour (OCB). Although the relationship between the aforementioned constructs is considered important, there is a paucity of research about the relationship between these constructs in the context of the water utility company. The primary objective of this study was to investigate the impact of organisational commitment and job satisfaction on organisational citizenship behaviour at the water utility company in Gauteng. A quantitative research approach and a survey-based descriptive research method were used to achieve the primary objective. A structured questionnaire was issued to 400 randomly sampled respondents. Furthermore, means and factor analysis were performed to determine the level of job satisfaction, organisational commitment and organisational citizenship behaviour of employees and to establish the underlying factors of the constructs respectively. Additionally, a correlation analysis was conducted to establish the strength and direction of the relationship between the factors. Finally, a regression analysis was performed to confirm the predictive relationship between factors. The findings of this study showed a positive correlation between affective commitment, indebted obligation and moral imperative; JS and OCB; and no predictive relationship was observed between continuance commitment and OCB. Based on the findings, it was recommended that JS should be improved through mechanisms such as job-fit, job enrichment and career advancement. Furthermore, performance-related pay and mentorship programmes should be introduced to improve employees’ organisational commitment. Finally, recognition should be given to employees to encourage them to maintain their willingness to display citizenship behaviours.

Distributed, renewable generation-units and more efficient use of electric power,demands a developed electric grid. This grid is often referred to as the “Smart Grid”. This future electric system rise expectations among actors in the existing electricmarket. International organizations share visions of opportunities for electricityconsumers and new actors, ready to enter the market. At the same time, electricutility companies may question the need for some of these upcoming changes, as theyare sometimes expected to lead the development. This paper therefore seeks to investigate the business opportunities related to SmartGrids. This is done throughout interviews, literature-studies and analysis usinginnovation-development theories. Primary focus of the paper is directed towards theelectric utility companies, secondary towards electric consumers. Business opportunities for utility companies are found to be primary associated withoperation and maintenance aspects of the grid. Developed control-systems andupdated maintenance strategies may increase the overall system knowledge and thequality of the distribution. Cost-reduction activities as these are probably results ofthe revenue-cap regulation controlling grid companies. Future consumers may benefit,socially and economically, from solutions visualizing and controlling different electriccomponents in the real estate. At the same time the development of Smart Grids is a rather slow process, partlybecause of large amount of system-components and partly because of existing rulesand laws concerning the electric system. In order to identify future opportunitieswithin Smart Grids, it is crucial to gain knowledge of the system and to satisfy realneeds or problems.

The aim of this master´s thesis is to find a suitable means of communication to provide supervisory control for the distribution network of the utility company E.ON. Comparison of a digital radio system, which would be in the property of the company and of the radio systems of mobile operators is done. In this work the reader gets familiar with the structure of the distribution network of the utility company E.ON and with the scope of activities of the grid controller. The reader also gets acquainted with the current state of the radio system of the E. ON, and with the requirements, which should be fulfilled by them. An important part of this work is formed by the description of the possibilities of the private radio systems and mobile operators. At the end, the possibility of the private radio systems and systems of mobile operator usage in the Smart Grid system is given.

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<p>Is North America vulnerable to widespread electrical blackout from natural or man-made disasters? Yes. Are electric utilities and critical infrastructure (CI) operators prepared to maintain CI operations such as, hospitals, sewage lift stations, food, water, police stations etc., after electrical blackout to maintain National security and sustainability? No. Why? Requirements to prioritize electrical restoration to CI do not exist as a requirement or regulation for electrical distribution operators. Thus, the CI operators cannot maintain services to the public without electricity that provides power for the critical services to function. The problem is that electric utilities are not required to develop or deploy a prioritized systematic plan or procedure to decrease the duration of electrical outage, commonly referred to as blackout. The consequence of local blackout to CI can be multi-billion-dollar financial losses and loss of life for a single outage event attributed to the duration of blackout. This study utilized the review of authoritative literature to answer the question: “Can a plan be developed to decrease the duration of electrical outage to critical infrastructure”. The literature revealed that electric utilities are not required to prioritize electrical restoration efforts and do not have plans available to deploy minimizing the duration of blackout to CI. Thus, this study developed a plan and subsequent model using Model Based System Engineering (MBSE) to decrease the duration of blackout by providing incremental electrical service to CI.</p>