Southwest Dispatch veteran moves from Texas to Cali., from security to PERS

Most recently for us here at SSN, Ty was one of the nominees who got selected by the editors of SSN for inclusion in this year's prestigious 20 under 40 listing. Good luck to you Ty.

I spoke with Ty this morning via email and he talked a little about the impending move. Of the move to Cali. and to a different industry, Ty was hopeful and a little sad.

I have been with Southwest Dispatch for 14 years and absolutely love my job and the company. Life Alert approached me with a once in a life time opportunity that I could not pass up. The decision was made easier since they are not a third party central station and I knew that I would not be in direct competition with Southwest Dispatch. I respected my boss (Chip Bird) way too much to go to a competitor … It truly has been a bitter-sweet moment.

Ty said part of what intrigued him about the move was the opportunity to work in a completely different industry like PERS, where he could still use many of the strengths he's gained over the last 14 years at Southwest. A large portion of the time I recently spent at Southwest when Gregg and I were down there was devoted to looking at all the technological odds and ends Ty et al. had lying around. PERS is an industry Ty feels has its future in technology.

PERS is a different animal all together so the challenge definitely intrigues me. Now that the baby boomers have started to get into the mid-sixty age range, they are going to be looking for technology to assist them with their day to day activities. I think they will look at companies like Life Alert to help with that assistance.

Ty said he and his family are anxious and excited for the move.

My family is all on board since they love the beach and we are big into the outdoor sports life. My 11 year old is a nationally ranked track and field athlete and is heavily into tennis (although she was excited to have the opportunity to surf). The weather in California will give her the opportunity to train year round.

Again, good luck Ty.

I met Ty first in 2008 at the CSAA's Fall Operations Management Seminar in Peabody, Mass. We ate lunch together with Pam Petrow, among others, and talked about best practices and how lunch differed from previous years… Interesting topic, there.

I met Ty again just this year when SSN/SDN associate publisher Gregg Shapiro and I spent a week down in Dallas, visiting security firms (one of them, Monitronics, is possibly up for sale right now, in case you missed it) and depleting Lake Texoma of its crappie population.

I also wrote a story on an initiative Ty and his Southwest brethren recently undertook to streamline operations and go green. (I'm currently working on a story about DICE moving in much the same direction… tune in for that story later this week.)