General Manager’s Message – August 2025
Believe in You
Have you ever had someone fully believe in you?
Most of us can answer that question with mom or dad. Maybe a grandparent. I’m asking about outside of your family — a teacher, a coach, or someone you work with. I have been blessed to have several people outside my family believe in me.
Do you know how I know Douglas Green believed in me? He told me.
He also told me he loved me. I think it’s rare for men to express their feelings and to encourage others. That did not stop Mr. Green.
On June 10, 2025, I lost my true believer, and cooperative members lost a true advocate. Mr. Green served South Alabama Electric Cooperative for 41 years, never losing focus on who he was there to serve — the members.
At the beginning of the 32 years I knew Mr. Green, I wasn’t sure how to take him because he was always picking on me. Even after I became the general manager, he would tell wild stories about me at employee functions for all to hear. By then, I knew if Mr. Green picked on you, he liked you. Every time he saw my wife, Nelda, he joked about what a good job she did writing my monthly articles. She would respond and say, “No, he writes them.” He would reply, “You don’t have to cover for him.”
Mr. Green was a special person. He was a special leader with a talent to apply common sense to leading young people and a large corporation like South Alabama.
Mr. Green, an educator and principal at Zion Chapel School, had a wonderful approach to giving young people a second chance. If a student got in trouble, he would write the child’s offenses on a piece of paper. He told these students if they never returned to his office for a disciplinary matter, he would not tell their parents and would destroy their files after they’d finished school.
If the student kept their promise, Mr. Green kept his promise.
Mr. Green applied that common-sense approach in the boardroom. I saw him take complex issues and bring management and other trustees to a simple solution that was always fair to the cooperative and its members.
As much as I admired Mr. Green’s problem-solving and leadership abilities, what I regarded in him most was his faith. The trials Mr. Green faced could only be supported by a strong faith in God. Mr. Green was married 3 times. Each one of his wives preceded him in death. He was blessed with 2 children, Larry and Karen. Mr. Green buried his only daughter and watched his son battle cancer. These challenges are not easy to navigate even with strong faith, but Mr. Green leaned on his faith in Jesus Christ hard and was able to show how Jesus Christ carries you during your worst trials. When Mr. Green prayed, it was like he was having a conversation with Jesus.
Today, I know he is having a face-to-face conversation with his Lord. I say that not to comfort his family, friends, or myself. I make that statement because his presence with the Lord is a fact.
It’s difficult to move forward without a man who truly believed in me. But, as I learned from him, I will lean on my faith to get me through losing Norman Douglas Green.
As I looked down at Mr. Green at his funeral, he cracked me up one last time. In our South Alabama Electric headquarters building, you need a security badge to enter the office. Mr. Green often lost or forgot his security badge. But as I looked down at him, he was wearing his South Alabama Electric Cooperative security badge, and I just smiled. He no longer needs that security badge because he already had his heavenly security badge laminated years ago.
I will see you later, Mr. Green. Thank you for being a true believer in me.