December marks the time for Strategic Planning. Wolverine managers prepare budgets, vice presidents think about divisional goals, and all this gets rolled up by the Finance & Accounting group so we can understand the impact on our bottom line. You might think this is a once a year exercise, and the truth is a sort [...]
“Use small words, I’m just a dumb concrete guy!” You better proceed with caution if you fell into this self-deprecating trap from Rick Deneweth. He was truly a concrete guy. In fact, if you wanted to rile him up, just say, “pouring cement’” and he would deliver a swift rebuke that cement is only one [...]
Wolverine rides a good wave right now. We provide value and competitive, reliable power for our member-owners. We own competitive generating plants that run well, we built and maintain a strong and improving transmission network, our stable and competitive member rates allow us to invest in our future, and we have talented, caring employees. When [...]
Yesterday morning's drive to work blessed us with brilliant autumn colors, which arrived finally after this year’s slow transition to fall. A few trees in particular stood out. Trees that I’d looked at dozens of times this year suddenly distinguished themselves from the rest of the forest. What made them special? What made them stand [...]
Many of us at Wolverine need to travel to do our jobs. In fact, my travel usually pales in comparison to others like Craig Borr, Wolverine's Executive Vice President, and CEO of our Michigan Electric Cooperative Association. He travels regularly to Lansing and Washington DC to advocate for Michigan cooperatives and build important relationships with [...]
This week frames opposite ways to tackle a difficult issue. On one hand, you have Wolverine announcing northern Michigan’s largest solar array construction, which we began building this week north of M-55 and our headquarters. On the other hand, we have the Clash of the Titans engaged in a war of attrition in Washington DC [...]
I’m back in the forest! That’s what I realized on my drive home this weekend after spending some time on my “deer blind.” I love this time of year as the nights get longer, and the mornings wake cooler, and I especially like spending this time in the woods. We start to see the first [...]
The Wolverine system comprises a complicated machine – 1,600 miles of transmission, 140 distribution substations, 35 transmission stations and seven power plant locations. This breadth of operation eclipses the complexity of many utilities several times larger than Wolverine. What keeps the machine running safely and smoothly? Wolverine employees. Yesterday we gathered in Grawn to tour [...]
I never took a wilderness trip with my daughter, Hannah. I took multiple trips with my sons — three with Isaac, and two with Ethan — but never one with Hannah. Sports schedules, work schedules, and other conflicts seemed to always get in the way. This summer, determined to take her on a trip, I [...]
Last Tuesday night, I hosted a dinner at Wolverine for a very special group of leaders. I invited each Wolverine Board Chairman dating from 1995 to the present. In addition, I invited Tom Stevenson (CEO from 1995-2006), Walley Garcia (long-time CFO) and Pete Chase (long-time leader of our Merchant Operations and Energy Control Center groups). [...]