Red Level native Michael Tyler Spivey was this year’s Covington County Committee on Employment of People with Disabilities Outstanding Employee of the Year.

Spivey started his career journey in high school while he coped with cerebral palsy.

Regular meetings with his vocational rehabilitation counselor provided him with a wide range of vocational counseling and assistance, which included everything from vehicle modification to career path planning.

Vehicle modification gave Spivey the opportunity to drive and greatly enhanced his ability to be more mobile and independent.

Spivey attended school at Troy University and in 2014 vocational rehabilitation efforts helped Spivey obtain his first full time position as a technical service representative at Sitel.

“I honestly don’t know where I would be in life if I didn’t have Mr. Daugherty,” Spivey said. “They have been so great with me.”

Spivey worked with Sitel for three years until March of 2017 when Sitel closed the local facility, laying off more than 400 employees in the Covington County area.

Spivey said that when that happened the only thing he could do was go back to the vocational rehabilitation and ask for their help.

“I went to Mr. Daugherty again and asked if he could help me,” Spivey said. “And again he helped me out.”

Spivey was given a referral to J. Lodge, which had recently partnered with the state vocational rehabilitation program to fill work from home technical analyst positions.

Upon completion of an assessment and interview screening process, J. Lodge made Spivey an offer and he was hired as a quality analyst on February 19.

Spivey said that he is very meticulous about how he approaches his job.

“The employees who I audit have very important scripts that they must work from,” Spivey said. “The scripts have critical legal implications for the contractor and I have to make sure that the company’s requirements are being followed very precisely.”

1. Lodge senior training manager Donald Belcher said that Spivey is above all of the minimum metrics on the account he services.

“Tyler consistently scores in the top four of all analysts at J. Lodge,” Belcher said. “He works hard to achieve his performance and has shown great discipline and dedication in his work here.”

Todd Fister, the J. Lodge account team leader, said that Spivey does excellent work and asks questions when needed to ensure that he is scoring accurately.

Spivey said that he was completely caught off guard when he received the award.

“I don’t know how I got it, I was completely caught off guard,” Spivey said. “But I am very grateful that I am being recognized and it is a pleasant surprise.”