Transitions: Meet your new CEO

Be sure to read on for an exten­sive Q&A with York Electric’s new CEO, Craig Spencer, in which he dis­cuss­es his vision for York Elec­tric, his lead­er­ship style, and his thoughts on best prac­tices, all fol­lowed by a brief bio. 

Although it is my first time con­nect­ing with you in the CEO space, I feel priv­i­leged to have served you through­out my career, help­ing to design a robust and reli­able elec­tric dis­tri­b­u­tion sys­tem. My focus on our mem­bers, just as it has been for the pre­vi­ous 32 years, will remain top pri­or­i­ty as I grow and learn in my new role. Dur­ing this tran­si­tion, it is impor­tant that you know our com­mit­ment will not waver. Your co-op will remain your trust­ed source for safe and reli­able pow­er and infor­ma­tion, a place where employ­ees are our great­est asset and where we’re always look­ing out for you.

We’ve been hard at work with some excit­ing updates to increase the resilience of our sys­tem. Our new Alli­son Creek sub­sta­tion will be online by the end of sum­mer, pro­vid­ing more capac­i­ty in the Lake Wylie area. This sub­sta­tion is served with a new trans­mis­sion line, pro­vid­ing more reli­able ser­vice and oppor­tu­ni­ties to iso­late out­ages and restore ser­vices faster when out­ages occur. Grad­ing bids for two addi­tion­al sub­sta­tions in the Fort Mill area are also under­way. The sub­sta­tions will add over 40 megawatts of capac­i­ty to bet­ter serve the growth we are expe­ri­enc­ing in this area. Last­ly, our road con­struc­tion for the Spring Lake Busi­ness Park is in progress. YEC has part­nered with the City of York to spur eco­nom­ic devel­op­ment for increased com­mer­cial use in this area as res­i­den­tial devel­op­ment con­tin­ues to pros­per.

We stay busy behind the scenes here at your co-op mak­ing con­tin­u­ous improve­ments to the elec­tri­cal sys­tem, plan­ning for the future and com­bat­ting ris­ing prices to hold down the cost of pow­er. How­ev­er, we are nev­er too busy to lis­ten to you—our mem­bers. I want you to know that I’m will­ing and ready to learn from you as your co-op’s new leader. Gain­ing wis­dom from you is the only way we will suc­ceed in con­tin­u­ing to serve you with excel­lence. Sim­i­lar­ly, to me, it always makes things eas­i­er when you get to know some­one. I invite you to get to know more about me in the news extra sec­tion of this mag­a­zine edi­tion.

I’m excit­ed for this new chap­ter, hon­ored to have been cho­sen to fill this role and pledge to always work for the good of our mem­bers.

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Continuing our legacy of members first

YEC’S new Pres­i­dent and CEO, Craig Spencer, shares his per­spec­tive on lead­er­ship, best prac­tices and your co-op’s future. Spencer’s vision for suc­cess is not sole­ly his own, but one of all employ­ees, some­thing the Board of Trustees saw as one of his many assets when they select­ed him to fol­low in Paul Basha’s foot­steps upon his retire­ment in June.

Q: You’ve worked here 32 years. What makes York Elec­tric spe­cial to you, and why have you stayed?

A: We embrace a cul­ture of fam­i­ly at YEC where our employ­ees not only depend on each oth­er, but we learn from one anoth­er. With­out a doubt, the peo­ple are what make this co-op spe­cial to me. I’ve ded­i­cat­ed my entire career to this group of peo­ple and this com­mu­ni­ty because of the work we have and will con­tin­ue to accom­plish togeth­er to take care of our mem­bers.

Q: How are we set apart from oth­er coop­er­a­tives?

A: While all elec­tric coop­er­a­tives seek to min­i­mize acci­dents, both in the field and in the office, YEC’s cul­ture of safe­ty has remained a sig­nif­i­cant dis­tinc­tion through­out my career. I feel blessed to work for a co-op with a staff and Board of Direc­tors that will always put employ­ee safe­ty above all else. Pri­or­i­tiz­ing this, along­side the intense growth our ser­vice ter­ri­to­ry has expe­ri­enced over the last few decades, allows us to safe­ly pro­vide reli­able pow­er at com­pet­i­tive rates.

Q: What do you see as York Electric’s biggest threats?

A: Before I address the chal­lenges, I’d like to assure you that your co-op is in great shape. Work­ing togeth­er as a team has allowed us to over­come many obsta­cles in the past, and this mind­set will con­tin­ue to help us nav­i­gate our future. The most sig­nif­i­cant threats I see that we will face togeth­er are the lack of depend­able pow­er gen­er­a­tion, gov­ern­ment reg­u­la­tions and ris­ing pow­er costs. South Car­oli­na has been, and will con­tin­ue to be, one of the fastest grow­ing states in the coun­try. To guar­an­tee that com­pa­nies and man­u­fac­tur­ers con­tin­ue to expand into South Car­oli­na, which will keep the econ­o­my mov­ing for­ward, we need to safe­guard always avail­able pow­er gen­er­a­tion. New gov­ern­ment reg­u­la­tions, which involve tech­nolo­gies that are not yet proven to be sus­tain­able, pre­vent us from expand­ing our ener­gy gen­er­a­tion assets. They also add tremen­dous addi­tion­al costs to new gen­er­a­tion projects. Last­ly, infla­tion con­tin­ues to chal­lenge our abil­i­ty to hold down pow­er costs. Just as the cost of liv­ing for our mem­bers is on the rise, the cost of equip­ment con­tin­ues to increase.

Q: What do you see as our biggest oppor­tu­ni­ties?

A: Despite our obsta­cles, YEC can still ful­fill its goal of pro­vid­ing afford­able, reli­able and safe ener­gy to our mem­bers. We can still offer com­pet­i­tive rates through excel­lent mem­ber ser­vice and new tech­nolo­gies that improve our elec­tric grid. YEC is always research­ing new ways to improve reli­a­bil­i­ty for our mem­bers, while main­tain­ing the per­son­al lev­el of ser­vice that our mem­bers love.

Q: What is your vision for York Elec­tric?

A: What­ev­er YEC’s short-term and long-term goals are, we must always pri­or­i­tize our cul­ture of safe­ty. It helps us go home to our fam­i­lies each day and helps min­i­mize the cost to pro­vide elec­tric ser­vice. No vision for this com­pa­ny can be achieved with­out healthy employ­ees, a mis­sion I’m proud to con­tin­ue cul­ti­vat­ing. Addi­tion­al­ly, I hope to expand mem­ber edu­ca­tion and trans­paren­cy on indi­vid­ual ener­gy usage. In the midst of the obsta­cles that I pre­vi­ous­ly described, it is more impor­tant than ever to empow­er our mem­bers to not just under­stand how they use ener­gy, but to man­age their use. This empow­er­ment begins with our employ­ees, who will be find­ing new ways to make this infor­ma­tion more user-friend­ly and read­i­ly avail­able. The more infor­ma­tion we have, the bet­ter we can man­age YEC’s elec­tric sys­tem and improve reli­a­bil­i­ty.

Q: What is your lead­er­ship style?

A: In both my per­son­al and pro­fes­sion­al life, I always seek to lead by exam­ple, with a ser­vant mind­set. When encoun­ter­ing a new project, I first ask myself “How can we get this done?” I aim to be a proac­tive leader that seeks to empow­er my team. I can’t replace a pole after a storm, splice a cable, or fix a com­put­er issue, but I can work along­side our excel­lent employ­ees and ensure that they are equipped to not just do the job, but do it well.

Q: Who has had the most influ­ence on your life and why?

A: My par­ents. From an ear­ly age, they instilled in me a strong work eth­ic that I am proud of. While this meant I had to learn dif­fi­cult lessons as a child and young adult, I am tru­ly grate­ful for their sac­ri­fices and teach­ings.

Q: From what/whom do you draw your inspi­ra­tion?

A: My faith and fam­i­ly have been, and will always be, my inspi­ra­tion in life. I real­ize that I have been blessed beyond mea­sure. I am so for­tu­nate to have a beau­ti­ful and lov­ing wife, three won­der­ful chil­dren and a great son-in-law.

Q: In your opin­ion, what do we do best?

A: We have a mem­bers-first mind­set here at YEC. We look out for our mem­bers by going the extra mile, improv­ing the qual­i­ty of life in the com­mu­ni­ties we serve and leav­ing things bet­ter than we found it.

Q: What will be your imme­di­ate focus that will impact mem­bers?

A: I will direct my imme­di­ate atten­tion towards min­i­miz­ing the poten­tial adverse effects of ris­ing pow­er costs. Along­side this, we must con­tin­ue to invest in and main­tain our elec­tri­cal grid. I will focus on these two areas so that YEC can con­tin­ue to pro­vide the reli­a­bil­i­ty and com­pet­i­tive ser­vice that our mem­bers are used to.

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Craig Spencer

Expe­ri­ence: Spencer has worked at York Elec­tric Coop­er­a­tive for the past 32 years, start­ing as the pur­chas­ing agent for the co-op. He most recent­ly served as Chief Oper­at­ing Offi­cer after he was select­ed to become the next CEO. Pri­or to that he was the Vice Pres­i­dent of Engi­neer­ing for many years.

Edu­ca­tion: Bach­e­lor of Sci­ence in Elec­tri­cal Engi­neer­ing from the Uni­ver­si­ty of South Car­oli­na.

Fam­i­ly: Spencer has been mar­ried to his wife, Susan, for 30 years and they have three chil­dren. Ben, their eldest, recent­ly grad­u­at­ed from Duke Law School. Their twins, Sarah and Shel­by, just grad­u­at­ed from Ander­son Uni­ver­si­ty. Sarah, who was mar­ried last year to Mason Watts, majored in Chris­t­ian Stud­ies and will be attend­ing grad­u­ate school for Chris­t­ian coun­sel­ing. Shel­by grad­u­at­ed with a Bach­e­lor of Sci­ence in Nurs­ing and will be work­ing at AnMed in Ander­son.