Crystal Wilde: We are retaining 90 to 92% of our staff over a year's time frame when you look at one year. And so that is incredible.
Clay Sellers: Got questions about the Brazos. No more unknown. Ever wonder where that water comes from or where it goes? We're unpacking the Brazos River.
Charlie L. Shugart: Look, we all need to get paid. We all want good health insurance. And honestly, sometimes reading corporate mission statements feels like eating cardboard. If you're currently quiet quitting, aggressively scrolling job boards, or you're just hungry for a gig that actually leaves the planet a little better, stick around. And since no one but my supervisor wants to sit there and listen to me gush about my position, we brought in the right people to give you the 411 on all the things you want to know about working at the Brazos River Authority. Because we have more office locations than you might realize and an even wider range of expertise needed to develop, manage, and protect the water resources of the Brazos River Basin. I'm Charlie Shugart, and this is Unpacking the Brazos River. Which brings me to my guest today. Joining me on the mic, we have three newbies to this podcast. Crystal Wilde, BRA's Chief Human Resources Officer, Jennifer Kidd, Human Resources Generalist, and Chantel George, Human Resources Benefits Administrator. Welcome to the show, you guys.
Jennifer Kidd: Thanks for having us.
Crystal Wilde: Thanks for having us, Charlie.
Charlie L. Shugart: So glad you're here. Well, since y'all are new to the podcast, let's go around the table, give everyone kind of a little history about your time here with the BRA.
Crystal Wilde: Okay. Well, I'll go first. I'm Crystal Wilde, and in February, I celebrated my eighteenth anniversary here at the organization. I've always told people I'm an accidental HR. I did not know this would be what I was going to be when I grew up, but I got recruited a long time ago, started as an HR assistant, and worked my way up, and just fell in love with our mission and the people here, and decided this is the career for me.
Charlie L. Shugart: Yeah. Awesome
Jennifer Kidd: Alright. Well, I am the new kid on the block. I'm Jennifer Kidd. I am the HR generalist. I have been with BRA a little over a year on what was the twentieth was my one-year anniversary.
Charlie L. Shugart: Nice.
Jennifer Kidd: Yeah. So, I've had close to thirty years in HR, but not all here.
Charlie L. Shugart: Yeah.
Jennifer Kidd: It's sad I didn't get here earlier.
Charlie L. Shugart: Well, we're glad you're here now.
Chantell George: I'm Chantel George. I will have been with BRA - September will be two years. As the other ladies, I have years of HR experience, but I really enjoy working for the BRA.
Charlie L. Shugart: Awesome. Well, I appreciate you guys sitting down for this so we can kind of help give everyone the information that they would like to know about working for the Brazos River Authority. For anyone who's tuning in who's never really heard of the BRA, how do you describe our organization to people when you're out there talking to them about, you know, what it's like to work here?
Crystal Wilde: Of course, you know, you start with our mission – manage, develop and protect. You know, go over our mission and what our organization does and explain to them that we provide water to the citizens of Texas within our basin. And we do that by several different means, you know, we contract, people just buy directly from us. As a part of our mission, we also are required to protect this water in this basin, so we do that through, we've got involvement in the Clean Rivers program, and we have our aquatic scientists that are going out throughout taking water samples and testing things. And then we do that on the water and wastewater side as well by providing treated water to either go to our customers or to go back into the basin.
Charlie L. Shugart: Yeah. Much broader than I feel like people think of when they hear our name.
Crystal Wilde: Right. Maybe people know us and they think, oh, well, you just have this lake.
Charlie L. Shugart: Right.
Crystal Wilde: You have all the water in Waco, right?
Chantell George: In the Brazos River.
Crystal Wilde: No. We don't have any water in Waco.
Chantell George: I do a lot of sharing and educating to let them know we have dams, we have reservoirs, we have wastewater treatment. So, and they're really surprised at how broad the Brazos River Authority is. Whenever I say Brazos River Authority, they say, Oh, you supply the water out of the Brazos River. No, we do a lot more than that, so just kind of educate them on everything that we do.
Crystal Wilde: When I go out to recruiting events, you know, you're at these colleges talking to students, and they have all these different majors, I kind of try to, hey, what's your major? What are you doing? Because what a lot of people don't realize is that we are across the basin, so we're all across Texas, and we have different types of employment. So, you've got professional careers, we've got engineers, we've got aquatic scientists, we’ve got accountants, IT professionals, and social media. So, we've got so many different jobs just in our central office. But we also have careers that aren't the traditional path. So, we've got maintenance technicians, wastewater, and water operators, and people who are out at our lakes, and at our plants, who maybe are going for a technical career or something like that. So, we just have people of all walks of life here at the organization. I think that's what makes us a great place to work, because you get exposed to so many different people. And we pride ourselves in having the best in our fields in every position that we hire.
Charlie e L. Shugart: Yeah.
Crystal Wilde: So, it's so great to come to work every day and know that you're working with professionals that know what they're doing, and this may sound silly, but are a joy to be around. Because when you have people that are passionate about their employment and their jobs and our mission, then that just gets everybody fired up.
Charlie L. Shugart: Yeah. No. I don't think that sounds silly at all. What is it that drew you personally to the BRA itself?
Crystal Wilde: So, what drew me was the HR manager at the time called me and asked me to come and apply and work for her. So that's what got me here. And then, you know, after working for a little while, I thought, oh, well, maybe I'd like to be like a regional businessperson. You know, I was getting my business degree. I thought, oh, that'd be a neat job. But then once you get into HR and you start helping employees manage things, that's not their expertise because they have a day job and that's not what they do. That's what we're here for, is to help them manage that so they don't have to worry about those types of things. And so, once you get in the door and you start doing that, it's really gratifying. That's what keeps me around is making sure that I can help our employees.
Charlie L. Shugart: Yeah. I love that.
Chantell George: What got me here was Crystal Wilde. She actually reached out to me on LinkedIn. I honestly thought it was spam. Like, because I mean, I've been here four years, and I had never heard of the Brazos River Authority. But then when I went online, I'm like, Oh, it's a real position. And so, of course, I applied, and here I am today. But what has kept me here are my team members, and, of course, my boss, Crystal Wilde, who is super, super supportive. I never feel like I am a bother to her, which is very important to me as a person, to not feel like I can't get the answers that I need. Another thing that has kept me here are - all of the employees. Here at the central office, when I go out to the dams, when I go to the wastewater treatments, I always feel welcomed. And then of course the management team. You know, we have different managers on the different departments and everything, but they are all so supportive of me and then I see the support that they give to their staff. And so that's what's kept me. And then of course our awesome GM. So, all of that, of course, we are in HR, so of course, the benefits, which I'm sure you're going to get to later
Charlie L. Shugart: Oh yeah.
Chantell George: I mean, there is a level of stress that all jobs have, but I don't have excess stress because I'm able to get the support that I need for my job. Then I'm able to support employees who are out in the field.
Charlie L. Shugart: Yeah, absolutely. And I know when people hear people bragging on the people who work at an organization and saying they're super friendly and super nice, you're like, well, of course you're going to say that. But I see new people after new people when they come in, and they're like, “Oh, you guys meant that.”
Jennifer Kidd: And that's what I tell Crystal all the time. I have not dreaded coming here one day. Crystal is supportive. All my teammates are supportive. Even though I came in with a lot of experience, it's all new experience because things are done a little differently in every organization. So every day I'm like, "Wow, I get to go to work instead of have to go to work."
Charlie L. Shugart: Yeah, absolutely. Let's talk a little bit more about the different types of roles that exist and kind of the different backgrounds required for the positions all across the basin.
Crystal Wilde: You know, here in the central office, we've got a whole team of IT professionals that are anywhere from, you know, network and systems admins to programmers to IT techs, cybersecurity specialists. In each department, you've got so much variety of different walks of life. In HR, we have benefits experts, the payroll specialists. So, we've got those different types of careers with their own specialties within that. And in F&A, you've got accountants, you've got accounts payable, there's just so many vast opportunities. One of the jobs that I think is cool and a lot of people don't realize that we have that is SCADA. If anybody knows what SCADA is, this is like an automated systems thing. They use them at Coca-Cola in the plants. They use them at the diaper plants for automation. But we use them in our water and wastewater treatment plants. We use them at lift stations to measure things and call out if there's a problem. And a lot of people don't realize that is something they could do with that degree,
Charlie L Shugart: Right.
Crystal Wilde: is come to work for a river authority. Engineering, different types of engineers. Most of them, I think, are civil engineers, but we also have a chemical engineer who works here.
Chantell George: We have lake rangers.
Crystal Wilde: We have lake rangers.
Chantell George: Maintenance.
Crystal Wilde: Actual certified police officers.
Chantell George: Yes. Wastewater.
Crystal Wilde: Water and wastewater.
Jennifer Kidd: We have maintenance techs. I mean, you're more entry level, that is a way to work your way up into the company.
Crystal Wilde: Mhmm. For sure.
Chantell George: Admins and all of those
Crystal Wilde: Oh, of course. We have to have administrative support for every place. They need someone to run the office.
Chantell George: But there are just so many positions, you just have to go to what, brazos.org
Jennifer Kidd: You can go to brazos.org
Crystal Wilde: You’ve got to go to brazos.org and see all the things that we do.
Charlie L. Shugart: You kind of mentioned this about there being different locations throughout the Brazos River Basin. Obviously, we're here in Waco at the central office. But what are some of the other different locations that we have?
Crystal Wilde: So, our furthest north location is going to be Possum Kingdom Lake. So that's kind of West of Fort Worth, North of Stephenville, and what do we have? 35 employees there?
Jennifer Kidd: 35.
Crystal Wilde: We actually have two different crews at that location, and we have the same at our Lake Granbury. We've got the ones that are that mainly maintain the parks and the things around the lake, Then and we actually have a dedicated maintenance crew for the dam structure. So, we call those our reservoir systems maintenance unit or RSMU. So, we like to use acronyms here. And they're dedicated to maintaining that structure that is nearing a 100 years old. So, they've got concrete specialists, welders, sandblasters.
Charlie L. Shugart: They've got divers, too. Right?
Crystal Wilde: Absolutely. Because they have to go in and check the structure down under the water.
Charlie L. Shugart: It's probably not something people think of immediately.
ChantelI George: I know. Yeah.
Charlie L. Shugart: If you're going to inspect the dam, you need to be able to
Crystal Wilde: You got to get in there and look at it.
Crystal Wilde: Yeah. Exactly. So, we have the same thing at our Lake Granbury location. The three reservoirs that we own and operate are the two on the main stem, Possum Kingdom and Lake Granbury. And then we have Lake Limestone, which is on the Navasota River. And it is a more rural location. They don't have an RSMU crew there because they just got new gates put in. So that's exciting for that location.
Jennifer Kidd: Yes.
Crystal Wilde: But we do have a really great maintenance crew and lake staff there that take care of the customers and all the parks and the dam structure. And then we move south and, you know, you're at the central office here in Waco, where all of your administrative support, you know, centralized accounting, HR, IT, and public information, what I call the corporate office. Right? And then we've got water and wastewater treatment plants that we operate that don't belong to us. We operate them for other cities. We have Temple-Belton. We've got Dozier Farm, which is actually in Temple. We also have water treatment at East Williamson County, which does belong to us. So that's not a contracted facility. That's one that we own and operate, and that is for drinking water for the city of Taylor and surrounding areas, purchase water from us from there. I'm trying to move down the basin. We do wastewater for Hutto.
Chantell George: Clute and Sugar Land.
Crystal Wilde: Oh, yes. Sugar Land.
Charlie L. Shugart: Way South.
Crystal Wilde: At the end of the world. You know, and all the eighteen years that I've worked here, and I've got to remedy this, guys, I've never been to the Clute facility.
Chantell George: We went to Clute.
Crystal Wilde: I know! I will say one thing that I really like about our organization, and I don't know if it will change my mind if this changes later because of population growth, but most of our locations are in not large metroplex areas. Some of them are very rural, some of them are just mid-sized cities, and so it's not hard to get to any of our locations.
Charlie L. Shugart: Right.
Crystal Wilde: The drives are usually pretty good, and as a small-town girl, I kind of like that feeling.
Jennifer Kidd: Yeah. Absolutely. That's right.
Charlie L. Shugart: Well, I mean, a big green flag for any company is retention. Do people tend to stay at the BRA for a long time?
Crystal Wilde: So right now, our retention rate is running around 90%, between 90% and 92%.
Charlie L. Shugart: What's that mean?
Crystal Wilde: It just means that we are retaining 90% to 92% of our staff over a year's time frame when you look at one year. And so that is incredible. Most organizations strive to be over 80%. So, for us to be at 90%-92% is really great. And I think people come to work here, and then they realize how one, great the people are, how good the benefits are, how the retirement options that we provide to our employees, and really just say, you know, this can be a career. I can stay here. And so, we've got people who have been here thirty-five years
Charlie L. Shugart: Which is crazy.
Crystal Wilde: That are still young.
Charlie L. Shugart: That's amazing.
Crystal Wilde: They're not even retirement age. So, I've seen it in the public. They're like, "Oh, yeah. I've been trying to get a job at the BRA forever, but nobody leaves."
Chantell George: That is so true.
Crystal Wilde: People lock in, and they stick with it.
Jennifer Kidd: That's right. Like I said earlier, I'm just sad I didn't get here sooner.
Charlie L. Shugart: Yeah. What do you think fosters that loyalty?
Jennifer Kidd: I'm going to say leadership.
Crystal Wilde: Absolutely.
Jennifer Kidd: We have exceptional leadership. You know, the people at the top really care. They care about us. They care about our success as well as the BRA’s success. So, you know, I think that's where it comes from.
Charlie L. Shugart: Yeah. Something is doing the trick.
Jennifer Kidd: You want to be here.
Chantell George: That is so true. It's definitely leadership. I would definitely say that.
Charlie L. Shugart: Well, we talked about a lot of the different positions across the basin. Are most of the jobs with the BRA, you need to come in with a high-level degree, or are there opportunities to kind of learn and grow throughout the organization?
Jennifer Kidd: I would say opportunities to learn and grow. A lot of those come with, you know, you need to earn this by a certain date, but there's a lot of growth potential within the organization.
Charlie L. Shugart: A thing that has become really popular over the past couple of years has been remote work. Does the BRA have any of that throughout the basin?
Jennifer Kidd: Absolutely, yes. There are hybrid schedules. Each department pretty much figures out how they make that work.
Crystal Wilde: I mean, there are certain locations that it doesn't lend to and, you know, I've had people be like, oh, well, you get to work from home. I'm like, well, yeah, I can type a paper or draft a document from my keyboard, when you can go rebuild a pump from your house instead of at the plant.
Jennifer Kidd: Exactly. I'm going to be impressed.
Crystal Wilde: Then yeah, you can work from home.
Jennifer Kidd: Right. So right. Of course.
Crystal Wilde: Yeah. Unfortunately, not everybody gets the benefit of that. But it is nice to have that capability for sure. COVID really just changed the whole mindset of the world really on how we can be successful with still having that availability. I still like the in-person meetings. I like to see everybody's friendly faces, and I really love those just conversations that just flow. You know, you're just thinking, and people come up with new ideas, and I don't see that you get that as much from a Teams call.
Charlie L. Shugart: Right.
Chantell George: Even though the locations may not offer remote, I have noticed that they offer flexible scheduling. Right? We have some who work Monday through Thursday with Fridays off. It's just according to the need of that location, just working something out with the supervisor. And from my seat looking out, I really see that the supervisors and management out there are very, very supportive.
Crystal Wilde: Absolutely.
Chantell George: Even though it's not remote, everybody is not working eight to five. So, there is flexibility, everyone.
Crystal Wilde: At every location. Thank you, Chantell.
Charlie L. Shugart: Sometimes people get restless, and there's a fear of getting pigeonholed into one role. Is there room to manifest a move to a different office or role? Do you tend to be more kind of locked in when you get hired at?
Chantell George: Well, Jennifer can answer that.
Jennifer Kidd: You don't get pigeonholed into, and there's always opportunities. I mean, myself as a generalist, that was my concern. You know, I didn't want to go be stuck in one role. That's why I like being a generalist, because I get to do a little bit of everything. But within the organization, there are opportunities. You know, we have internal job postings and, you know, the more you know, the better off you are.
Charlie L. Shugart: Yeah. No. Absolutely. Do y'all have any, maybe, good examples of people who came in at one role and moved to something else and is kind of thriving there?
Crystal Wilde: How about our general manager?
Jennifer Kidd: Absolutely. Our general manager.
Charlie L. Shugart: Tell everybody about that.
Crystal Wilde: I believe he started as an aquatic scientist fairly quickly out of college. I don't know. He may have worked somewhere else before that, but I mean, he's been in every department, I think. I don't know. He did government and legislative. He managed a basin. Just incredible opportunities and job growth.
Charlie L. Shugart: He's the perfect example.
Crystal Wilde: He is the perfect example. He really is. Yeah. Because he's gone from different departments, like he's started at the bottom and worked his way up. Myself because I've moved up an organization, but it's all been within the same department. So, I'm not as good of an example. But we have people who have started as a wastewater operator and worked their way up, and now they're, you know, regional managers of multiple water and wastewater operations. So, there are just a lot of examples of that opportunity and the growth in the organization.
Charlie L. Shugart: Let's talk about the benefits a little bit. Give us some highlight reels. What do people get excited about?
Chantell George: I can use myself as an example. When I was offered this position, my previous employer, one of the things that they said is we don't want you to go, so whatever they offer you, we will match it. Okay? So, I was like, oh, yay. But one of the things that they did not have was a retirement. And I could just kind of see that there was more of a team environment even during my interview. Where I worked was a great place to work, but it was kind like every department was their own department. I wasn't as much of a team that we have at the BRA. It was like that department did what they did, and they did that. It was a fun environment because of my department, but all of us weren't in sync with everyone. The retirement that we offer because it's a 200% match. We had the 401. It's a 50% match of what you put in. That's what it means, what you put in up to 6%. Oh my gosh, the benefits as far as the medical. Now one thing that I really want to share because this is how great our leadership team and everyone that we work with. Last year with the medical, there was a buzz that the medical was going to be astronomical, and we were really, really concerned about that because we didn't want to put that cost over to the employees. Like I said, we have a team, so our insurer, our broker that we use, fostered a great deal for us with Blue Cross Blue Shield of Texas and the increase did not, I'm just going to sum it up, the increase didn't roll over to the employees. The BRA absorbed that. With that being said, you go a further step because we have a board of directors. So, the thing about it is that anything that we do, for the most part, has to be approved through the board of directors. So now I have to shout out to the board of directors because they're the ones who have to approve this.
Charlie L. Shugart: Right.
Chantell George: Mr. Collinsworth says, hey, we want to absorb it, but it has to be approved to say, do we want to approve that in their budget?
Charlie L. Shugart: Right.
Chantell George: It's just all around good. I mean, I'm trying to think of everything. Oh, and then, like I said, we have the health fairs. We have the EAP, you know, as far as anyone needing some assistance if they're going through. We have a new program that I'm going to be promoting, HUSC, which is like a nutrition program. You're trying to lose weight. So, all of this is through our Blue Cross Blue Shield of Texas. There are so many benefits that we have. You may think, Oh, I only make this amount of money.” But then if you add in the benefits that we offer, the match that we're going to do on the retirement, the match that we're going to do on your 401 through Empower. All of these different programs that are free to you, the compensation is just awesome. Then I want to go on the other side. Again, like we've all been saying, it's not a health benefit, but I believe employees benefit from the leadership that we have here. It's like they say a lot of time, people don't leave because of money, they leave because of leadership.
Charlie L. Shugart: Yeah.
Crystal Wilde: So, I wanted to I wanted to piggyback on all that you were talking about.
Chantell George: Yes. Add more.
Crystal Wilde: And I used to always tell people all the time, you know, we are a governmental entity. So, we are stewards of the funds that we operate with.
Chantell George: Yes.
Crystal Wilde: And that sometimes means that our salaries might not be as competitive as the private industries.
Chantell George: Right.
Crystal Wilde: We make up for that with our benefits because they are incredible. And I tell people all the time, when you come to work here, you might not be rich right now, but when you get to that retirement date, and you receive your 200% match from TCDRS …
Jennifer Kidd: And interest.
Crystal Wilde: The account earns 7% interest every year until you get to that point, it is truly an incredible benefit. And there are many people who are getting more money in their retirement checks than they did when they were working here. I think that's great. People go, "Oh, well, maybe you need to be paying them more.” Well, they're making a pretty competitive salary already.
Chantell George: Yes.
Crystal Wilde: It's just that growth, that compounding interest gets you over time, and receiving that incredible match from our organization, it's amazing.
Charlie L. Shugart: Chantal, you mentioned the health fairs. Could you explain what it is you're talking about when you said you go to different locations to do health fairs?
Chantell George: One of the things that the BRA is very big on is promoting health, in addition to the awesome benefits that we do. So, what I try to do is come up with a different theme every single year. This year was the greatest health fair on earth, and it really was.
Charlie L. Shugart: And you had an amazing outfit.
Chantell George: The circus theme and I try to focus on one benefit that we offer in addition to, we also do home health kits. So, what that means is when I came here a couple of years ago, they used to do the blood draws, which was very beneficial because they were able to catch some issues that employees may have. And so, what I did was try to find an avenue to bring that back. And so, we were able to partner with Blue Cross Blue Shield to have Catapult to come. And so, again, even though we have all of these small locations, I was able to get a home kit. And so, what I do is they all go to the locations, and we all do them there. They mail them in, and then they're able to do a one-on-one with the nurse practitioners. So, in addition to that, I want to focus on one of the benefits. So, this year, we had TCDRS come in and speak on the benefits.
Charlie L. Shugart: And TCDRS is?
Chantell George: Our retirement that we have. The Texas
Crystal Wilde: County and District Retirement System. Remember? We said we have lots of acronyms.
Jennifer Kidd: We need to publish that acronym list.
Chantell George: And that was really important to me because we have a lot of employees who are getting ready to retire, and so they were calling me about their benefits. But then I thought, I'm like, hey, we have some new employees, then we have some people who are kind of may have been here ten, fifteen years. So I wanted to bring them out to kind of bring that benefit to let them know where you are in your retirement, how you can retire, how important this benefit is if you're 20 years old, you know, how this can really be a retirement for you.
Crystal Wilde: And I will tell you guys that bringing those blood draws back has been so beneficial for our organization because, I mean, I'm pretty good about it, but I know that, you know, a lot of people don't like to go to the doctor regularly. They don't like to go to their primary care physician. But if you bring it to them, they'll do it.
Chantell George: Right.
Charlie L. Shugart: Yeah.
Crystal Wilde: They're not going to go make a special trip to give blood, but they'll come and do it if you bring it to them. And so that has been just incredible to get that back.
Charlie L. Shugart: Have y'all ever seen a boomerang employee, somebody who left to go do something and they're like, nope, please take me back.
Crystal Wilde: Please take me back. Yes. Absolutely. Quite often.
Jennifer Kidd: Quite often.
Crystal Wilde: We have had a lot of people that have left, you know, went to try something new, maybe six months later, like, hey, can I have my job back? Some of them may be gone for a few years and before an opportunity comes up that they can come back to work for But, yeah, we've had several people like that.
Charlie L. Shugart: So, talk a little bit about the day-to-day. Do people mainly work within their own departments, or is it something where they work with multiple departments throughout the organization?
Crystal Wilde: I know, especially with like all the different projects that we have going on, you've got program managers, project coordinators, engineers. You might have an environmental person, you may have a safety person in on the project, and maybe it's all central office people, maybe it's people from different locations. If it's out in the field, you know, they're going to have a project manager from there and then a project engineer from here. And so, there are a lot of cross-functional teams in the organization.
Charlie L. Shugart: Yeah. That's good. Allows you to work with multiple people on different levels of expertise.
Crystal Wilde: Different levels of all across the organization.
Charlie L. Shugart: So, if anyone is currently sold on working here, where is it they can go to kind of stalk our open roles?
Crystal Wilde: You can go to www.brazos.org. You will go to our employment opportunities tab and then it's either careers or employment opportunities. I had that backward, but you can find a link, and it will bring you to our current job postings. On the right-hand side, you'll see a place for you to sign up for job alerts. So if there's not something that you're interested or qualified to do at the time, you can sign up for those job alerts and each time we post a position, you'll receive an email that says, "Hey, BRA has a new job opening." You can also go look at our Facebook page, at our LinkedIn page. We have a fantastic public information department that helps us advertise those things.
Charlie L. Shugart: Shout out to my team.
Crystal Wilde: They do such a great job of highlighting a position for us each week and really help to attract people to look at our website and our jobs.
Charlie L. Shugart: What's something that you wish more people knew about working at the BRA that, you know, doesn't always come through in a job posting?
Chantell George: It is an equal opportunity organization. And I say that because when I was interviewed, I was told that there were a lot of people in the community who did not even apply here at the BRA because they weren't sure if they would be accepted. I just wanted to share that may have been the perception at one time. I mean, I don't know. I can't speak to that. You can only talk to people and what their personal experience has been. But because of my personal experience and me being here at this point, if that was the perception, then that is no longer correct at this point. So, anyone who is interested and sees a job application, regardless, if you feel you qualify for that position, I encourage you to apply.
Charlie L. Shugart: Yeah. Since you guys have been here, has there been a specific moment that really stopped you in your tracks and made you go, wow, this is exactly why I do this job? This is why I'm here. This is why this matters.
Chantell George: One example was when I had my health fair, when Mr. Collinsworth came, and there was a vendor there that I wanted him to meet.
Charlie L. Shugart: And for those who aren't familiar, Mr. Collinsworth is our GM/CEO.
Chantell George: Yes. There was a vendor there that I wanted him to meet because she had handled one of our sessions for us, and he walked up to her table and was just talking to her. He didn't introduce himself. He didn't say anything about who he was. And I'm like, oh my gosh. I'm so glad the two of you are together, you know, so I introduced him, and she was like, you were just, like, so humble here, and you weren't going to even tell me who you were. And he was like, no, I'm just trying to participate. But I mean, just this again, like I said, just the support that I received because he is the general manager, you know, he is responsible for this whole organization, you know, and I know he has a super busy schedule.
Charlie L. Shugart: Yeah.
Chantell George: But for him to take the time and come and participate and be there, you know, to just be a part and speak with all of the vendors, just to know what was going on in that time. And then another time is just whenever I am preparing for the health fairs or preparing for my open enrollment, these ladies here are always there to support me. My buddy is not here, Tammy, my roommate. She's my number one, but just the support. And then I'm going to go back to it again is that when I first came to this job, and Jennifer can probably attest to this, we have HR experience, but there are some gaps in knowledge sometimes coming into this position. And this one, even though I had the experience, the way that things are done, the different contracts, you know, it's a learning curve. And there was a period of time where was just like; I don't know if I can really do this. Like, this is a lot to learn. And I've always prided myself on, okay, I'm going to jump in there. Yes, a new job. Give me six months. I'm going to be an expert at it. That's just, you know, my pride that I have. But it took me a little longer than six months, I was kind of feeling some kind of way about that, you know? The example is Crystal can be in the middle of a meeting. She can be, you know, away from the office. Whenever I call or whenever I go to her office, she immediately stops what she's doing and I never see this, what do you want? You know, because I get that face. You know, I get that face sometimes, but when I walk in, you know, and she's like, yeah, come in. You know, just the welcoming, so it's just kind of like, even though I was feeling a certain kind of way, it was just she was there to support me. Okay, let's sit down. Let's go through this and see, you know, to make sure that I had what I needed, and I'm sure Jennifer can attest.
Jennifer Kidd: Oh, yes, I can attest that. 100% because, you know, there are certain processes here that I have never done before.
Charlie L. Shugart: Yeah.
Jennifer Kidd: And so, Crystal has always just stopped, she’s never made me feel like, why did I hire you? You know?
Chantell George: Because you feel like that sometimes as a new employee.
Jennifer Kidd: I'm harder on myself than anybody ever can be, so I want to do everything perfect because I want to put the best product out, and I can go to anybody in this building. If they know what I'm talking about, they'll help me. You know?
Charlie L. Shugart: Yeah. Absolutely.
Crystal Wilde: Alright. It's my turn to answer this question. When I came to work here, I started as an HR assistant, and I did FMLA, and I did retirement, and I did workers' comp, and just a bunch of different things. And I got to know employees, not just with, you know, work, but on a personal level. And there were so many instances where I've really helped an employee through a process, and that has always given me a lot of pride to be able to assist somebody through anything that they've never experienced before. That's one of the major things. My favorite job in HR is to recruit people, so that's my very favorite thing. I love recruiting. I've recruited both of these two ladies, and it's just one of my favorite things to share what we do and how great this organization is, and to bring somebody in, and of course, these two were way qualified and had tons of experience. But there are times when you recruit somebody who's just eager to learn, and you get them in a position, and then you see their career flourish after that. Those things are so rewarding to me. And as you know, Chantel has said it, but we also have amazing support. So, if there's a new initiative or something that you think is going to make things more efficient or work easier, we all jump on board and try to make it happen. Change can be scary sometimes.
Chantell George: Right.
Crystal Wilde: But here, we have the support to help us manage those changes.
Charlie L. Shugart: Well, one thing that I think is really cool that we have that I haven't heard y'all mention yet is something called fit time. Could you talk about that?
Jennifer Kidd: Yes. That is a time that the company gives us to get out there and get healthy. Move, do some exercise, and approved by a manager, take an hour, thirty minutes, whatever, get out, move, get healthy.
Crystal Wilde: It's great. And, you know, when we first implemented that program, the idea was people would go, we want people to be healthy. We want them to have healthy lifestyles, but we don't want them to sacrifice time with their families to do that.
Charlie L Shugart: Right. Right.
Crystal Wilde: Instead of them, you know, clocking out at five and going to the gym for an hour, and then maybe they have an hour commute home.
Chantell George: Right.
Crystal Wilde: You know, it’s seven or eight when they get home because they're trying to be healthy. That's one of the major reasons they implemented that is so people could take a little bit of their time from their workday and do that workout and then be home with their families.
Charlie L. Shugart: Yeah. I love that. I think that's a really cool thing.
Jennifer Kidd: Yeah. It also helps us be the best version of ourselves. If you want a place with great leadership and a fun environment, this is it.
Charlie L. Shugart: Yeah. No, I love it. And I will put the link directly to the how to sign up for job alerts and where the job postings are in the description, so you guys don't have to hunt for it at home. So, yeah. Big thanks to Crystal, Jennifer, and Chantell for coming in and sharing all of these details, guys. I really appreciate it.
Crystal Wilde: Yeah.
Chantell George: Yes
Jennifer Kidd: Enjoyed it.
Charlie L. Shugart: So, if you …
Chantell George: Oh, I do want to add one thing.
Charlie L. Shugart: Yes, Please
Chantell George: If you are hired, you will have the best HR support team ever.
Jennifer Kidd: Yes. Hear, hear.
Chantell George: You don’t have to put that in, but I just wanted to put that out there.
Charlie L. Shugart: Y'all have helped me, so I can attest to this. Alright, well if you have still got questions after listening to this episode, don't hesitate to reach out. Email us at information@brazos.org, and we will help you out. And if there's a specific topic or burning question that you want us to cover on future episodes, let us know that too. As always, thanks for listening and joining us on Unpacking the Brazos River.