Blue Ridge Employee Retires After 39 Years
For Immediate Release
Contact: Renee Whitener, Director of Corporate Communications, Blue Ridge Electric Membership Corporation, (828) 758-2383 ext. 3213; Pager:1-800-471-1323; or E-mail: Renee Whitener
Lenoir, North Carolina (June 20, 2003) – When Chuck Troutman first came to work at Blue Ridge Electric Membership Corporation in 1964, the decade of love, peace, and harmony was well underway. Flower children in tie-died clothes flashed peace signs at every corner. The Beatles were invading America—to America’s delight. Space exploration evolved from sci-fi to reality. Gasoline was .30 cents a gallon. And while the country still mourned the loss of one of our nation’s greatest presidents, the Civil Rights Act was taking root to open doors some Americans dared not even dream about in earlier generations.
We were a nation of change when Chuck Troutman, a fresh-faced college graduate with a psychology degree in hand, landed his human resources job with Blue Ridge Electric, a not-for-profit electric cooperative owned by the people it provides services to. “Blue Ridge Electric was what some folks originally called the REA,” Troutman said, referencing the Rural Electrification Administration formed by President Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1935 to help build electric generation and transmission distribution systems for rural areas that private companies wouldn’t serve.
Today, electric cooperatives serve 36 million people in 47 states. Blue Ridge Electric is one of the largest, with 65,000 consumers in Caldwell, Watauga, Ashe, Alleghany, Alexander and Wilkes counties.
“I’ve watched a lot of changes over the years, but it seems like yesterday when I first came to work here,” said Troutman, who has lived all his life in Lenoir and retires in June as director of employee development. With all the changes the nation has witnessed in 39 years, Troutman says his area of specialty has seen equally great change. “When I first came to work, there were only four pieces of federal legislation impacting the workplace; there are now 72,” he said. “And with every piece of legislation, there are literally hundreds and hundreds of pages within each piece specifying how companies must comply with the law. This has dramatically changed the nature of human resources jobs.”
The University of Chapel Hill graduate said he’s also seen the nature of other Blue Ridge employees’ work change over the years. “The complexity of the jobs has changed. With more electronics, technical skills are essential now. When I first came, I was only the second or third person here with a college degree; now it’s the norm for many of our jobs because the level of business, technical, and communications skills required have grown greatly over the years,” he said.
Troutman initiated the very first personnel services at Blue Ridge Electric when he was hired. Then General Manager Cecil Viverette and Barbara Deverick, next in command, were visionaries who foresaw the need for such services for their employees and to make the cooperative stronger. “The job grew from there,” Troutman said.
“We worked together to build the structure of the middle management group to handle the day-to-day work and planning so that the senior staff could focus on strategic functions,” Troutman explained. As one of the first cooperatives in the nation to develop this structure, Troutman said Blue Ridge Electric’s strategy paid off. “The efficiency and productivity this generated eventually resulted in our average cost for consumer connections being a lot lower than for the average cooperative,” he said.
Another example is the changing nature of line work. “The standard when I came was a seven-man crew: a general foreman, at least three linemen, an equipment operator, and a grounds man, with sometimes a fourth lineman. With advancements in training and by investing in more and better equipment, we were able to reduce the standard crew size to just two line technicians while also extending the work life of the linemen. They used to be worn out at 50 because the nature of the work was so physical; they tend to work until they’re well into their late 50s or early 60s now. It’s still a physically demanding job, but it’s now a job that also requires greater technical skills.”
The area Troutman is most proud of is the work he’s contributed to over the years regarding wages and benefits, and employee policies. “Blue Ridge Electric is a place you’re proud to work for; our employees are our ambassadors,” he said.
“When you have the kind of reputation Blue Ridge Electric enjoys, there are many people who want to come to work for you. That means you can be selective in who you hire,” Troutman explained. “I am pleased to say that Blue Ridge Electric can select the ‘cream of the crop’ so to speak. And having the very best employees is what’s ultimately best for the member-owners of the cooperative,” he said. “When you hire mature, responsible people who are committed to making a career here at Blue Ridge Electric, the turnover rate is lower, the training costs lower, and you have capable people who deliver the top notch customer service our members deserve. So, I have a lot of satisfaction in having played a part in significantly impacting the quality of our workforce because it has benefited the cooperative and its members.”
Troutman, who has also overseen human resources functions for Blue Ridge Electric’s subsidiary, Blue Ridge Energies, since its inception in 1998, says he is looking forward to retirement. As director and past president of the Rotary Club of Lenoir, Troutman will play an active role in Rotary for the next two years as assistant district governor and he was elected to serve as district governor of Rotary International for western North Carolina in 2005-2006.
As Troutman looks forward to retirement, he says after completing landscaping projects at home, he and his wife Betsy will be visiting their two grandchildren (and another on the way) more often. “We’ll be on the road to Florida to visit our son Stuart, our grandson Samuel, and his wife Rachel who is expecting our third grandchild,” Troutman said. “Our son Tim’s wife Michelle and our granddaughter Grace have spent time with us the past year but they are now in Kentucky where Tim is stationed with the Army’s 101st Airborne Division, and we’ll be very excited to see them, especially when Tim returns from his tour in Iraq.”
Blue Ridge Electric employees celebrated with Troutman and said their good-byes at a retirement party held this week at Cedar Rock Country Club.
