AI READINESS SERVICES
THE PROBLEM
AI can drift, hallucinate, and
optimize toward unintended
outcomes… failures that never
register as anomalies under
traditional cybersecurity monitoring.
THE GAP
AWWA notes that nearly half of utilities have no formal AI governance. You can count on neither government agencies nor AI vendors to build it for you. It’s up to you but WY is here to help.
THE OFFERING
A structured, customizable, six-month assessment and training offering that moves your utility from awareness to assessment to action. Grounded in engineering, not hype.
Helping water and wastewater utilities decide whether, when, and how to adopt AI; safely and responsibly. Agentic AI is arriving at water utilities faster than rules meant to govern it and the pressure to adopt is real. So are the operational risks. Agents bring new cyber-attack vectors, as well as other risks most utilities are not yet prepared to counter/manage. Our industry-leading cybersecurity and data governance experts will help you build the capacity to evaluate these tools on
your own terms, govern them like the safety-critical systems they are, and keep your operations resilient no matter where these
technologies go next.
A structured path from awareness to action. The West Yost AI Readiness Assessment is built to move deliberately — the same conservatism that has served water utilities for a century, applied to the newest tools at the plant gate.
Key deliverables you keep
- AI Preparedness Assessment Technical Memorandum: current state, gaps, and prioritized recommendations.
- AI Governance Framework: charter, roles-and-responsibilities matrix, and risk management approach.
- Policy template library: acceptable use, third-party AI procurement, and incident response.
- Prioritized use-case narratives with data, technology, and cybersecurity requirements.
- Alternatives evaluation across commercial, platform, in-house, and hybrid approaches.
- AI Adoption Plan & Roadmap: portfolio, pilots, cutsheets, schedule, and costs, plus a leadership presentation.
Grounded in established standards
The assessment is built on recognized frameworks and the engineering disciplines water utilities already trust, not on any single vendor’s product roadmap.
- NIST AI Risk Management Framework
- SANS AI Security Controls
- Cyber-Informed Engineering (CIE)
- CISA Joint AI Guidance
An Honest Premise
This engagement does not assume the answer is yes. For many small and mid-size utilities, the most defensible near-term decision is to wait, watch, and learn while the technology matures. The assessment gives you the footing to make that call deliberately — and to be ready to move when the time is right.
Each phase produces working artifacts your team keeps and uses: facilitation materials, findings summaries, a governance framework you can actually operate, and a costed, CIP-aligned roadmap. The detail follows.
What the Engagement Delivers
An eight-task engagement, typically six months, co-led by West Yost’s Resilience and Data practices and scaled to the size and ambition of your utility.
TASK 1 · FOUNDATION
Project Management
Initiation and kickoff with Engineering, Operations, IT, executives, and key partners such as your SCADA integrator. Clear roles, decision rights, and data-sharing protocols from day one.
TASK 2 · UNDERSTAND
Introductory & Visioning Workshops
Practical, utility-focused grounding in what AI can and cannot do, then tailored visioning sessions for executives, operations, and engineering/IT to define what success looks like here.
TASK 3 · UNDERSTAND
Information Discovery
A structured review of current data management, cybersecurity, AI use (formal and ad hoc), and governance — through documentation, interviews, and onsite assessment — plus a roles-and-responsibilities mapping.
TASK 4 · ASSESS
Preparedness Assessment & Governance Framework
Findings evaluated against established frameworks, gaps and risks identified, and a working governance framework built: charter, roles matrix, risk approach, and a policy template library.
TASK 5 · DEFINE
Use Cases, Alternatives & Recommendations
Candidate use cases prioritized by value, feasibility, risk, and data readiness. Three developed into detailed narratives, with an alternatives analysis spanning commercial, platform, in-house, and hybrid paths.
TASK 6 · IMPLEMENT
AI Adoption Planning
A prioritized project portfolio, CIP-standard cutsheets, a phased roadmap, and an adoption plan — built around low-risk, high-value pilots that let your organization learn before it commits.
Tasks 7 (as-needed implementation, program management, and governance support) and 8 (contingency) extend the engagement as your needs evolve.
ABOUT THE TEAM
West Yost’s Resilience practice is led by Andy Bochman, Resilience Strategic Lead and author of the “I Am the Guardrails” series, previously Senior Grid Strategist at Idaho National Laboratory where he co-developed the Cyber-Informed Engineering methodology and co-author of Countering Cyber Sabotage (CRC Press, 2021); and Andrew Ohrt, PE, CISSP, Resilience Practice Area Lead.
Start the Conversation
Whether you are ready to move or sure you should wait, the first step is the same: understand where your utility actually stands. Reach out to West Yost’s Resilience team to scope an AI Preparedness & Safety Governance engagement for your organization and team.