By Cindy Hadsell

This article was originally published in 2024, Issue 1, of the Retiree Guardian. Newsletter of the CenturyLink Retirees.

What follows is a condensed script from an Employee Video Tape shown on January 3, 1984. It was created in Omaha Public Relations for NWB employees. Please consider this an NWB/Mountain Bell Celebration of 1984!  — Cindy

Dick McCormick

I’m Dick McCormick, and I’ve invited you here today so that we could reflect together with pride on our past and toast our future in Northwestern Bell and U S West. The Bell System was a winning team, and I’m proud to have been part of it all for 22 years. They can break us up, but nobody can take back the memories and the satisfaction of working with that fine organization.

“I’ll never forget January 8, 1982, either. I’ll never forget the hurt and the shock that I personally felt then knowing that the team was going to be broken up. It was the day after divestiture was announced. I was at the office with Jack MacAllister. We spent the day brainstorming on what we could do with the opportunities that lie ahead.

U S West was incorporated on September 21, 1982. The stock began trading on November 21, 1982. So, to me the beginning of U S West was January 9, 1982. The day that Jack began formulating this in his mind. We’re here to toast a new U S West. A new beginning for a great organization of people.

“From a business standpoint, U S West is going to be aggressive. It’s already indicated that by being the first to name itself. We are U S West. It was the first to announce several new areas of business. It was the first to hold meetings with the investment community, not only in financial centers in this country, but in Europe as well. That’s being aggressive. We’ve got something else going for us and that’s you. The people are going to make us successful.

Next, Tom Madison will tell you a little bit about where we’re coming from and where we go from here.”

Tom Madison

I’m pleased to be with all of you this morning to talk about our future. Before I do that, I’m standing by a wall of historical items. Here is Angus McDonald working after a blizzard. That prompted our slogan of Spirit of Service. Top quality service was provided by this vintage equipment, the gloves, the tools, the operator boards – all these things were really part of our history.

I don’t think there’s any question that the Bell System provided the best telephone service in the world. How did that happen? It happened because we had three strengths: People; Service Quality; and Technical Competence. Those strengths are really the building blocks for our future.

Here we are today starting our future, yours, and mine, and as we look at our future and our new opportunities after divestiture, we can see that we must focus on our customers in the marketplace.

Our lines of business organization will do just that. We have structured our company around the marketplace. It’s interesting to note that in our previous structures we’ve really focused on two pieces of the marketplace: the residential market and the business market. In our new environment, in our new lines of business organizations, we have 27 markets. Just think of the difference there. The new opportunities, the new ways to meet the needs of our customers.

The new challenge is for us as employees to make sure that we’re doing the job we must do to satisfy our customers and the marketplace. “Last year we started a new program called “Easy To Do Business With”. Be EZ is an important part of our overall strategy. We want to take that strength of the past, the quality of our service and build on that by being easy to do business with.

We looked at the opportunities and created these new lines of business around the marketplace. We thought about how are we going to deal with the various new markets or new customers that we now have. Some customers today were our competitors yesterday. The MCIs of the world, the Sprints, all of the long-distance carriers are no longer competitors in that sense of the word. They are customers, and it’s a great market opportunity for our new company. Long distance carriers and Independent Companies are new marketplaces.

Our Communication Services organization will focus on the retail marketplace, large business customers, and medium to small business customers. Our Consumer Market is our residential market.

We have a new organization called Advanced Information Markets. Information Services is going to be involved in a lot of new opportunities. In fact, just last month we started a new service in our operator services organization called Customer Name and Address Service. For every call to our directory assistance organization asking for a name and address, we get $0.50 per call. How many calls do you think we had in the first month? Over 60,000 calls! That’s the kind of opportunity that our new lines of business will help us focus on to create new products and services that will be new revenue streams for us. “And the bottom line of course is you and I will benefit because our company will be a healthy successful company.

The only reason we’re going to be successful is if you and I agree that we have to be responsive to the customers in the marketplace and we have to work well together to understand where we want it to be in the future.

We’ve got a lot of things to do in 1984. How are we all going to understand what those opportunities really are? We’re going to do that by working together, having you, the employees that are out visiting with our customers on a day-to-day basis telling us what’s needed so we can create services and products. These are the challenges of the future.

“There is one thing I’d like to leave with you here. There are over 18,000 employees in our new company. We need each of you to participate in our success by telling us what the customers are saying to you. You’ve got to participate.

I’m sure there are some who have apprehension. I’m sure you feel a little concerned about losing some of our history, losing maybe some of the Bell System Spirit of Service. But what we’re really doing today is standing on the threshold of building a new Spirit of Service. If we work together, we’re going to help U S West become the best regional holding company in the United States. I believe that will happen, and I hope that we’ll take advantage, starting today, of sharing your ideas and your views on making our company the most successful company in the world.

I look forward to working with you in 1984 to accomplish that objective. Thank you.”

“Thanks, Tom”

A new beginning requires a lot of thought and a lot of soul searching. You’ve made it clear that you don’t mind sharing some risks with the company if you have a voice and that we all share in the rewards. We already had a mission statement, the corporate goals, and our 1984 strategy. But what was missing was a statement about our Shared Values. Here’s what we developed.

First, we do work that is worth doing.

Second, we provide our customers with outstanding value.

Third, we succeed through people. You know, we’ve had an exciting time in the last four years. In this country, with probably the worst economy any of us can remember, we’re introducing technology at a pace that’s unbelievable while going through divestiture, and reducing the workforce without a layoff.

Fourth, we’re a team that competes effectively. I would ask each of you to work on interdepartmental cooperation.

And finally, we are U S West. The shareholders of U S West are our shareholders, and our primary job is to create the highest possible value for them.

We were only 4% of the Bell system. Geographically, U S West is a diversely picturesque region from the forests of the Northwest to the lakes of Minnesota to the Black Hills and the Rockies. U S West is the largest area of the new companies that start business today. And it’s estimated that it will grow at the fastest pace of any of them, in personal income, population and job expansion.

I believe it was you who made that Spirit of Service more than a phrase and have made it something that our customers have come to expect, and certainly something they deserve. We may not have been around at the start of Spirit of Service. But divestiture didn’t stop it either and you are here at the start of U S West.

Here’s a toast to our new beginning. A new day. A new way. This really is your company. This really is your new beginning!

CenturyLink Retirees : “To preserve and protect the pension and benefits we earned, and act as a point of contact for retirees concerning pensions, benefits and health care.”