At Entergy, every employee has a designated role during a response, and whether it’s a minor disruption or a major event, each role is critical to helping us restore power as safely and as quickly as possible. In this edition of Meet the Pros, we are taking a closer look at the people and roles behind the scenes that are needed to help crews successfully restore power after a storm. While their role during a response may look different from their daily responsibilities, our employees’ preparedness and expertise strengthens our readiness, resilience and commitment to serving our customers and communities.   

Meet Denise Gordon, a senior scheduler for the work management department at Entergy Mississippi, based out of Jackson, Mississippi. She began her career at the company as a customer service representative in 2001 and worked in that role for seven years before moving into the credit department as a specialty clerk, where she stayed until 2014. After working in other roles outside of the organization, she returned to the company in 2020 for her current role. Gordon holds a bachelor’s degree in business administration from Jackson State University. 

Although Gordon’s primary role is serving as a senior scheduler, during storms or major events, she seamlessly shifts into her incident response role as a lodging site specialist. 

“My main responsibility in my incident response role as a lodging site specialist is to make sure that our line workers and contractors have safe and secured lodging during storms, update and assign new rooms daily and ensure that all keys and items are accounted for once the workers leave for work or to a new site,” said Gordon. In the recent winter storm that swept across our service territory earlier this year, she managed the daily lodging needs for more than 200 line workers.

Activations can happen suddenly when storms develop and require quick action by roles like our lodging site specialists, who must pivot from their day-to-day responsibilities to serve in our restoration response.  

“We received an email instructing us that we were being activated and relocated to the site within 24 hours to prepare for the lineworkers and contractors to arrive,” Gordon said. “As part of our activation, we had a virtual refresher training about how to utilize the lodging systems and then we got to work.” 

Roles like Gordon’s play an important part in our restoration response. At the peak of the January winter storm, the company activated a workforce of more than 9,400 restoration workers, including 5,700 contract and mutual assistance resources. Supporting the needs of such a large influx of crews during a disaster is critical to helping us restore power to our customers. While the role can be demanding, response workers like Gordon get to see first-hand the impact our company has in the communities we serve.

“It was a rewarding experience to be a support system and give our team members a safe place to rest and recharge after working long hours in hard conditions. The contractors and lineworkers from across the United States and Canada were extremely polite as we served them. Some even wrote letters afterwards thanking me for my service and how much of an impact my role had on them,” she said.

Gordon says one of her favorite accomplishments in this role was when a crew supervisor had issues with his lodging assignment. She was able to correct the situation by confirming his lodging and preventing him from traveling to another lodging site in the harsh weather conditions. “The lineworkers and hotel staff were so happy to have additional assistance. This increased the speed in which we could provide a place where our lineworkers could rest and shower—some after working almost 16-hour shifts,” she said. 

When asked about her favorite part of working at Entergy, Gordon points to the organization’s culture, “I take pride in working for an amazing company that cares for their employees, especially during tough times. Working with such amazing and dedicated people makes every minute of my role worthwhile.” 

Every employee at Entergy has a role during restoration because we are driven by our commitment to serve. Our response team members, like Gordon, embrace complexity, overcome obstacles and deliver meaningful solutions to our communities and customers in the moments that matter most following a storm.  While the challenges may look different for each incident, we know the resilience of our employees and communities will help us weather any storm, together.