Ed Taylor receives Excel award from Associated Electric Cooperative
Ed Taylor of Jonesboro, manager, gas maintenance, at Dell Power Plant, received Associated Electric’s 2021 Excel award for Innovative Action at the cooperative’s recent 28th annual employee recognition award ceremony hosted at its Springfield, Missouri, headquarters.
The Excel awards are peer-nominated recognitions of employees who have excelled in their careers, leadership, mentoring, innovation, community services, teamwork or exceptional contributions.
When Associated introduce a new software management program systemwide, Taylor understood from 26 years in the U.S. Navy as a nuclear engineer that you have to get buy-in when introducing a new program. He took ownership, “dug in pretty hard” into the software and trained maintenance co-workers one-on-one so they better understood the system. He did the same for Dell’s operators, then shared his knowledge with employees at Associated’s other gas plants. All this with less than two years at the plant.
The nominator praised him, saying, “He is not doing this extra work because he was told to do so; he is doing it because he wants our process to work!”
Taylor also has improved the plant’s preventive maintenance program and maintenance schedule with more precise instructions, specific to each part and piece of equipment. His initiative has helped make the plant more reliable, now running nearly 24/7 and providing low-cost energy to Associated’s members and other energy users.
Associated Electric Cooperative Inc. is owned by and provides wholesale power to a system of six regional transmission cooperatives and their 51 local distribution cooperatives. This cooperative system delivers electricity to 2.1 million member-consumers behind the 935,000 meters served in Missouri, northeast Oklahoma and southeast Iowa. Associated’s mission is to deliver economical and reliable power and support services. Associated is a Touchstone Energy Cooperative.