Catching up with Gordy Morris

Gordy Morris has a left of legacy of service and training that will not soon be forgotten by colleagues at the Power Delivery Training department at Klondike and by linemen and Distribution managers all across Georgia Power. After joining the National Guard shortly after turning 18, the Douglasville, Ga., native joined Georgia Power in May 1979 in Substation Construction where he learned how a substation was built from start to finish. He made the move to Distribution in 1980 and moved through the process from helper to truck operator and winch truck operator to apprentice and then to lineman in 1984.

It was during his years as a lineman that Gordy discovered he had a real talent and passion for providing training for new apprentices. He leveraged that training experience and his background as a lineman to begin a new role as Methods and Training specialist (now Technical Training instructor) in 1998 at the Klondike Training Center. He was later promoted to a Training coordinator and ultimately as a Distribution training supervisor.

During his time at Klondike, Gordy played a key role in helping to develop several impactful training programs before he retired in 2025. These include the Lineman Development Program, the ELAC (Electrical Lineworker Apprentice Certificate) program, and an underground system safety program that earned him his first Service Excellence Award.

Passing along the torch of knowledge for a seamless transition

Gordy was known by his colleagues as a true subject matter expert due to his vast knowledge and decades of experience in Training and Distribution. So, passing along his knowledge has been critical to Georgia Power’s ongoing training success and could be a real model for how to prepare the next generation for success.

“Gordy was involved in more policy and procedure decisions than anyone I know,” said Jonathan Dean, who previously worked at Klondike and is now project manager for Workforce Strategy. “We saw firsthand how he developed the process and how we rolled something out to field employees, and he made a conscious decision to allow us to be part of those decisions. He made sure to capture the back story and kept great records as well with his notes so we and others could understand.”

“There were no surprises due to bringing us into the loop early on,” said Hank Smith, supervisor for Distribution Training, who inherited technical bulletin writing. “Gordy did a great job preparing us, and he also put us into positions to learn and grow outside of our comfort zone. He was one of the most influential people I’ve known at Georgia Power and was a real role model to me. We actually had to hire three people to backfill everything Gordy was doing.”

Hank credits Gordy’s transition process for making him and others in the department today’s “gatekeepers” of training knowledge.

We recently caught up with Gordy by phone from his home in Covington, Ga.

Gordy at his retirement party, July 2025.

What are you up to now?

Since retiring, I’m enjoying spending more time with my wife who had retired early from Georgia Power. I also try to stay active by walking the dog every morning, rowing, swimming, and working out. I am currently involved in several projects, including some woodworking, making pens, and Christmas gifts. I’m currently building a golf simulator at my house that I’m hoping will help with my golf game. I enjoy playing some golf when my schedule allows and occasionally play in some competitive golf tournaments.

I plan to get more involved in community service after getting through some projects to do more work for organizations like Tunnels to Towers and other organizations that support homeless veterans, which is near to my heart.

Gordy at the Klondike Driving Rodeo.

What was your proudest moment at Georgia Power?

Several proud moments come to mind. Being promoted to lineman was a proud moment, as well as joining the Klondike Training Center where I ran the Distribution training organization for the entire state; that was extremely rewarding.

But perhaps the thing I’m most proud of is just seeing employees that went through our training program to be successful at Georgia Power and grow professionally. Jonathan Dean and Hank Smith, who I hired and trained, come to mind, as both were promoted to Distribution Training supervisors when I decided to retire. Jonathan has moved on as a project manager for Workforce Development. I am so proud of them and others who have moved up to management. Helping people and seeing them become successful was really my drive to stay in training. I was blessed to have good relationships with supervisors, crews, and managers and to have impacted and supported every lineman in the company.

I also want to mention that I was very proud to receive the Southern Excellence Award for our induced voltage program. I took on the idea as a challenge after we experienced an unfortunate fatality. We rolled it out to all line crew personnel to help keep them safe, and they still teach it today in the company. It was my first award for a project, so it is special to me.

Gordy and wife, Tara, with family dog.

What did you enjoy most about your time at Georgia Power?

I really miss the people and all the great working relationships I enjoyed. I had a good support group and administrative team and there was a feeling of family. I was able to relate to the field employees since I was in their shoes and developed good working relationships with them, which helped to get buy-in for training procedures that were effective for all of Distribution. These procedures were crucial to have in place since the first thing people look at if we experience any accidents is the required training we have in place. I’ve had to appear in depositions and court hearings over the years, and we were largely successful due to having a solid training program for linemen to follow.

I also really liked feeling like you are making a difference in the community through all the work we at Georgia Power do among our teams and departments and across the company to be a citizen wherever we serve.

Gordy at his home golf simulator.

Can you share your secrets to success?

Surrounding yourself with good people who challenge you and vice versa helps everyone to improve. One of my biggest fears was hiring someone in our training organization who didn’t work out, but I’m happy that I felt good walking out of the door with the people I hired. Several other points were key for me:

• Getting your points across without tearing someone down and being constructive is important to developing positive relationships.
• Always listen and understand. Show empathy and support them and let them know you care about them.
• Have a strong work ethic. I took pride in my job.
• Understand rules and work procedures. Make sure people understand them and keep them simple. I didn’t want to roll out a program until we had solid answers as to why we are doing something to get buy in.

Gordy doing woodworking at home.

Looking back, is there anything you would do differently?

At times, I think that perhaps I should have moved around the company a bit more, having spent the last 27 years with Power Delivery Technical Training at Klondike, but I really had a passion for training so that kept me there. And I felt that I was good at my job and had a real opportunity to have a positive impact that affected every lineman who came through our training program. So, I kept my eyes on the task at hand, and at the end of the day, it’s been a really rewarding career.