Executive Privilege

My name is Brad Morrow. I am a Journeyman Lineman at United’s Meridian office, which is in Bosque County at the southernmost portion of United’s territory.

During my seven years of employment here, I’ve grown from a young man of 20 into a husband, a father and a member of United Cooperative Services. Since then, I’ve had the opportunity to go on three storm restoration efforts to provide aid to fellow cooperatives—from hurricanes to ice breaks—and all while also being a part of United’s team efforts to respond to power outages throughout United’s service territory.

I have become who I am today while being blessed with the opportunity to provide great service and value to our membership, and to work with an employee group that encourages others to succeed and become leaders who stand behind United’s core principles and the not-for-profit cooperative business model.

My job on the operations department team is never ending—from building infrastructure to new members and maintaining the existing lines that cover United’s territory.

Most of us here at United have families at home who rely on us, but every employee also knows we have a growing 70,000-plus membership and more than 100,000 meters to serve. We know our members rely on us to provide exceptional service and value. This means missed birthdays and holidays at times. While leaving our families to answer trouble calls can be hard, we always have a reason to keep pushing forward. That reason is you—our membership is the backbone of United.

As an apprentice lineman, it was a big eye-opener for me to see the work ethic, passion, and the heart countless employees exhibited in their work and service to United’s members. Working tirelessly through storms trying to restore power, staying late to complete one more ticket for the day to ease the next day’s work list, it has truly been an honor to be a part of the commitment United employees demonstrate day-in and day-out for our members.

Among the many other learning stints I’ve enjoyed since my employment, I recently had the chance to serve as the honorary Assistant CEO of the Week. My time was well spent learning about the major roles and departments within our cooperative, and the inner workings that keep a large member-owned company operating like a well-oiled machine, through both the good times and the bad.

One enduring theme I heard in all the meetings I attended during the week was that the staff and leaders of United are determined to grow with the evolving technology wants and needs of our membership. Exploring new avenues such as fiber-optic internet service, community and residential solar programs, internet telephone communications, and the day-to-day things that might go unseen or unthought of by the membership. Several of these included new software for billing and creating new and faster processes to improve productivity and time management. Building on that asset class is important to the cooperative’s aim of remaining operationally efficient.

The focus and energy spent even now on Winter Storm Uri and the disastrous financial effects it left within the Texas energy market still to this day was shocking for me.  This is something that United is trying to regroup and recover from now that Brazos Electric Cooperative’s bankruptcy reorganization is nearly complete.

High-speed internet was also extremely high on the list of importance, trying to get this service spread throughout our territory to members who have not had reliable internet service, or who have been underserved.

I hope I can continue to provide many years of exceptional service and value to the membership. So far, it has been an amazing seven years.

Our employee group here at United ihas the best interest of every member at heart, even as the cooperative endeavors to find ways to further mitigate costs to the membership. Every employee knows times have been difficult for the last several months with rising energy costs. United is still striving to bring those costs down for our membership, and to provide the value the cooperative has always been renowned for in the past.

I very much enjoyed the week I spent as Assistant CEO of the Week, and the opportunity to learn so much more about our cooperative. It  was an experience I hope to share with employees and our membership on all the ways United continues to push forward and make our mission statement a reality for all of our members.