Committee work: more digital, collaborative, and efficient with Online Standards Development (OSD) – practical insights from the German chair of an IEC committee

Before OSD was introduced at the beginning of 2025, it had already been available for selected pilot projects. The international IEC committee immediately seized this opportunity to create its new standard IEC 63445 with the help of this future-oriented tool and process. Mr Klingner enthusiastically reports a significant time saving with OSD, referring to a direct comparison between a project with, and one without OSD. We were interested in finding out more about his initial user experience with OSD and asked Mr Klingner for an interview.

DKE: Good afternoon, Mr Klingner. We have learned that you are part of one of the first IEC committees to use OSD and we are very excited to hear about your experiences firsthand. Which project(s) have you worked on using OSD? 

Klingner: It is the standard IEC 63445 “System referencing conductor switching device” for which I act as project manager in the IEC committee SC23K “Electrical Energy Efficiency products”. The final draft for an International Standard (FDIS) has just been submitted for voting. Meanwhile, two more projects in the standards series IEC 63402 “Energy Efficiency - Customer Energy Management Systems” are now also running with OSD. One is currently in the Committee Draft phase (CD), that is, a draft standard being commented on by the committee; the other is in the Committee Draft for Voting phase (CDV), that is, a draft standard being submitted for vote. And we have also just started a New Work Item Proposal (NP), i.e. a new draft standard project in this series of standards, using OSD.

DKE: What has changed for you – compared to previous committee work – in creating, editing and commenting on a draft standard using OSD?

Klingner: The first major change is using the tool instead of working with the previous word processing program. There are no more problems with the IEC macro (these are system automations defined in word-processor macros), which normally does not work well with a company's IT system.

Formatting is now automatic. Numbering is handled by the tool. It is also very easy to move, delete or add a section without having to worry whether cross-references will still work correctly after moving things around.

During the commenting phase, you can see other committee members adding comments to the document before the committee meeting starts. This allows you to respond to these comments in advance, or skip creating your own, if someone else has already commented on the same passage. There is also the possibility to indicate support for someone else’s comment.

DKE: In comparison to creating or commenting on a draft standard without OSD, how has your work with OSD changed? What extra value does the system provide for you and your colleagues in the committee?

Klingner: With the word processing program, one always had to put effort into “making the document look pretty” after a meeting with the project team. With OSD, this step is no longer necessary. The work progress can be saved as PDF right away and content work can continue in OSD.

A project manager can assign text proposals for a section to a project team member. They can work directly in OSD without the project manager later having to merge different contributions. Everyone else can review these proposals before the next meeting and already insert comments – without the project manager having to send extra emails. Thus, a meeting can be made much more effective, as everyone can enter the meeting much better prepared. And the project manager is relieved of having to distribute the work progress. After a commenting phase, there is no longer the need to sort the comments in the text document, as they were already entered in the right place in OSD.

Even when a CD or CDV is ready, one just needs to send an email to the secretary asking for the document to be sent out for distribution and for a “Compilation of Comments” (CC) to be generated, i.e. a summary of all submitted comments on a draft standard, from the comments in OSD. Back and forth communication with the IEC editing about details can be largely eliminated. This also significantly reduces the secretaries’ workload, as they no longer receive a document from the project manager to be forwarded to IEC, but only have to indicate that everything is ready in OSD.

DKE: In your use of OSD in the committee, have you seen areas where you or your colleagues would like future development or optimization?

Klingner: As with everything that is quite new, there are of course one or another buttons missing or well hidden in a submenu, waiting to be found. Since we were part of the pilot early on, I have already seen several improvements and am confident that through the use of OSD and feedback to IEC we can improve many things.

One point that IEC has paid little attention to so far is that in future, it will not be possible to do all work online in OSD. For this, the function to generate PDF documents is very useful. It would be perfect if one could generate PDF documents with line numbers, in order to assign comments even faster. With this system feature, IEC could take off even a little more work from us.

Another point that still needs good ideas is how to handle so-called “general comments”. These are comments that refer to the entire draft standard, not just to a single paragraph or word. They all appear at the beginning of the document which can be somewhat confusing. As long as there are only two or three, it is easy to keep track. But if there are many, it quickly becomes confusing. Perhaps a separate feature will be needed for this type of comment.

DKE: Is there anything you would like to pass on to other committees that have not yet worked with OSD?   

Klingner: In Europe, we have limited resources. Our resource is innovation and OSD is an innovation in standardization work. Clearly every innovation brings changes that challenge us to let go of familiar and cherished practices, but they also offer opportunities for improvement. These optimizations we can accompany positively through constructive commenting - even when good proposals are rejected. Nothing is more important than “not giving up”. And especially in Germany, we have always taken the lead in standardization. So, we should also be at the forefront with the tools of standardization work. Like every new tool, it will eventually become familiar through use, and only those who use it intensively can truly contribute to its improvement. 

DKE: Thank you very much.

Klingner: Gladly.

Editorial note:

The responses reflect the personal views and opinions of the interviewee and do not necessarily represent those of DKE.

Further information for national and international committee members and DKE employees

The IEC offers a wide range of training resources on its website to help users familiarize themselves with OSD. The OSD Tool page of the DKE Hub for DKE employees provides OSD resources such as training materials, workshop recordings, FAQs, etc. At meine.dke.de in the OSD section, OSD resources are made available to DKE committee members, such as training materials, workshop recordings, FAQs, etc.

The project manager for OSD at DKE is Natalie Mundle from the Digitalization department.
Contact: natalie.mundle@vde.com.