Make a Difference. Be a Mentor.

When I started working for what was then known as KPL Gas Service on February 12, 1990, I was a 24-year-old kid with very little natural gas or gas appliance experience.

After meeting J.T. Scott, my new supervisor, Frank Mackey, the Installation and Service (I&S) superintendent, and getting a brief tour of the facility, I met George Hickman, the 60-something white haired gentleman with a neatly trimmed moustache who would be my first and ultimately most influential trainer. George was within a year of retiring from a long and distinguished career as a gas serviceman. George was well respected by his peers and supervisors.

George worked his same route every day, which was the Independence Northeast area. If you’re familiar with Independence Missouri, George’s area was east of Noland Road to MO 291 highway and north of 35th Street to US 24 highway. This was an area largely consisting of low-income residents, who sometimes had difficulty paying their gas bill.

There were many old homes with gravity furnaces and standing pilot and match lit ranges in that area. In those days, many yards had operational gas lights that we as gas servicemen were required to service when on-site for service calls. In other words, stumbling across modern, electronic ignition gas appliances in George’s area was about as common as finding a four-leaf clover.

All of this, from the low-income nature of the residents of the area to the outdated gas appliances made this the perfect area for a new employee like me to train to become a gas serviceman.

George Hickman was meticulous in his work. I can’t count the number of times I would do something that I thought was “good enough” that earned me a stern, but polite, scolding from George. I was impressed that even though we were not being watched by a supervisor, George worked as though we were.

George took his work seriously. He observed everything I did. If he didn’t see me do it, he made me redo it. George taught me that before his signature would be affixed to any work order, every single detail had to be correct.

George taught me to leave every house better than I found it. Sometimes this meant we cleaned up the customer's range top before and after we worked on it. George also called every woman "ma'am" and every man, "sir." He was always respectful and polite, even when others weren't to him.

George taught me not to judge the customer, because even if they have fourteen cats and huge piles of laundry, we don't know their circumstances, or of any difficulties they may be experiencing.

George would always find something to compliment in every customer's house as a way of showing respect to the customer, even when finding something to praise was challenging.

George was a diminutive man of about 5 foot 8 inches in stature. He wore a spotlessly clean, perfectly ironed and creased grey polyester work uniform with polished black shoes every day. He was a man of routine and habit. He took his 10 am 15-minute coffee break at McDonald’s. His 12-noon 30-minute lunch break at McDonald’s and his 2:00 afternoon 15-minute break at McDonald’s.

I sometimes chuckled at George’s predictability, then I realized his routines are one of the things that made him proficient at his job. George religiously followed processes and procedures. He didn’t skip steps or mix things up. He performed his duties the same way, every time. He didn’t take a 16-minute break or a 35-minute lunch. He took exactly the allotted amount of time.

George took the same view of work processes. If procedures required us to conduct a 5-minute meter shut-in test, the test would take 5 minutes. Not 4 minutes or 4-1/2 minutes. It took 5 minutes. Every time.

When George taught me how to visually inspect customer piping, we started at the location where the gas line first entered the building. Every time. This is essential to not missing any piping that may be hard to find.

Starting the inspection at the appliance and tracing back to the entrance guarantees you will eventually miss something. That could be an improperly capped or damaged pipe, that may leak later and endanger the customer.

I trained under George for a few months, then I worked on my own, however I would call George frequently to ask questions, because I knew he would give me the right answer.

One time I was at an apartment building struggling to find an underground leak on the customer’s side of the meter. Gas readings were next to the foundation of the apartment building. I called George who was kind enough to come to me to help. He listened to my explanation of possibilities and grey areas, acknowledging by slowly nodding his head with his hand under his chin. Then George asked me “What does the procedure say to do?” I told him, “To shut the gas off, vent the readings down to zero, then tell the customer to call a qualified repair company.” George said “Correct. Do that. See you later.”

I felt like a fool because the answer was so obvious. I then realized that the other issues I thought were important were not because our company has procedures to address these situations. My job wasn’t to question the procedures. I was expected to know them and follow them. ?

George retired in 1991 as the Independence Service Center was being permanently closed and the Independence employees were being relocated to the Lee’s Summit Service Center about 15 miles away. George had spent his entire career in Independence and was no fan of changes to his routines. He had no desire to pack up and move to Lee’s Summit.

For years later, I would run into George when I worked at the new Independence Training Center. The last time I saw him was at an Independence McDonald’s restaurant about 10 or 15 years ago when George would have been between 80 and 85 years old. I shook his hand and asked how he had been, told him about changes to the gas company and what I had been doing since we last spoke. After several minutes of politely listening to my ramblings, George asked, “Excuse me sir, but have we met before?” I realized George was still the same good-hearted gentleman. He was the kind of man who would patiently listen to someone he didn’t even know.

That was a humbling experience. George was an important mentor to me, but as the years progressed, he had completely forgotten me. I thought of how proud George would be to know that I taught his black and white, right or wrong approach to thousands of gas workers.

George positively impacted many gas workers, although he probably never knew the extent of his influence.

Of all of the experienced service technicians I could have been assigned to for training, I’m so happy that my boss, J.T. sent me with George. That decision started my career off on the right foot.

I recently saw that George Hickman passed away at the age of 95. What a full life George lived. What a great example he was of how one person can make a difference.

I hope I’ve made the kind of positive difference in the lives and careers of others as George Hickman made in mine. I trust you are doing the same for people you have influence over.

We should all strive to make a difference. To be a mentor.