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Family
First
Stephen Whatley left a 20-year career in air-conditioning repair
to spend more time with his family. Today, he’s built an extended
family with the residents and staff of Bay Meadows Apartments.
BY RACHEL ZOCH
I
t’s hard to believe that Steve
Whatley’s been part of the Bay
Meadows community less than
two years. He knows many
residents by name and wears
many hats—Mr. Fix-It, community chef,
dad and even receptionist upon occasion.
Whatley applied for the community’s
lead maintenance job after deciding it was
time to make a career change and look
for work that would allow him to spend
more time with his wife and four children.
“It was hard for me to do it because I
already had built up time and seniority with
the company, but I did it because my family
means more to me,” he says. “I never knew
a year and a half from [the day I applied]
that I would be where I’m at now.”
Good Neighbor
The property’s manager was unsure
about him at first, but Whatley is no
stranger to apartment maintenance, having
supervised installations and first-year maintenance on new properties for 15 years.
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November 2010
“At first they weren’t going to hire me
… but I knew I could handle the job and
do the job,” he says. “I’ve done makereadies, I’ve done all that stuff—it’s just a
little different from what I was doing
before. So they gave me a shot.”
Whatley quickly made himself a vital
part of the community, moving onsite
with his family. He relishes the opportunity
to walk his younger children to and from
school and enjoys the extended family he
has built with the residents and fellow
staff. He also volunteered to man the grill
for the property’s monthly cookout, just
one more way he’s helping to foster a
sense of community.
“I’m the one who volunteered for it at
the get-go, and you get a good meal free,”
Whatley says. “The residents never had
anything like that. They always had the
little pastries and stuff. We grill burgers,
we did barbecue, we smoked brisket. I volunteer with that, because my kids come
up there and they’ll have fun, and everybody’s just collaborating.”
Team Effort
Whatley looks out for his fellow residents and says his relationship with his
coworkers at Oak Leaf Management is the
best of any job he’s ever had.
“We work together as a team, and we
all get along,” he says.
Without his teammates, he says, he
would not have been named Maintenance
Technician of the Year for the Houston
Apartment Association. “Not one person
can do it by themselves,” he says.
Whatley is always on the lookout for little things he can do to be more efficient
and to add value for the residents.
“Our key thing is trying to keep the
people here to renew their leases,” he says.
“Tell them, ‘If you renew your lease, we’ll
get your carpet shampooed, or you can get
a choice of your ceiling fan installed.’ I
think I had six people right off the bat
who came up and renewed their lease
ahead of time, and they weren’t due for
another two, three months. It’s renewing
the lease that saves money, and you can
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“I'm always trying to give our residents the best quality.
I treat them as if it were me –
how would I want to be treated?”
Steve Whatley
Maintenance Technician
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November 2010
UNITS 71
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For more on National Apartment
Careers Month, which is February 2011,
please visit www.naahq.org
/education/NAAEI/campaigns.
For the Apartment CareerHQ.org
logo, e-mail [email protected].
get further along, I think, on getting
things updated, and it means that we can
get to other issues.”
He also gets a kick out of helping people in unexpected ways. He surprised one
resident by shampooing her carpets after
hearing that her child had been ill and
throwing up on the carpet.
“She didn’t think I was going to do it
that day,” he says. “I went ahead and
shampooed her carpet because I knew it
had be to pretty stinky in there. She came
running out and gave me a big old hug,
saying, ‘Thank you!’ ”
What Goes Around
Reactions like that are what drives
Whatley. He appreciates being appreciated
and is a firm believer in treating others
with kindness.
“It’s just seeing the gratification,” he
says, “and you don’t get it all the time,
but you do get it here and there. Like I
said, I get a big kick out of seeing people’s reactions.”
Whatley says being helpful is simply
his nature, and he delights in the opportunity to get creative and solve problems.
“I like to build things,” he said. “I had
a wood shop, and my wife would be the
first to tell you that I’ve got all the tools
like Tim the Tool Man Taylor, and I like
to get them out and use them.”
He’s also setting a good example for
his children through his work ethic and
positive attitude, as well as his belief that
what goes around comes around.
“You do good, it’s going to come back
to you tenfold,” Whatley says. “You don’t
do it to see what you’re going to get
back—you do it because that’s the way
you want to be treated.”
Whatley definitely feels rewarded. He
says the maintenance award came as a
total shock to him, and it still seems
surreal. He kept the plaque in his
apartment for a day or two but quickly
decided it was better suited for the
leasing office, where it advertises to
prospective residents that they will be in
good hands.
“Im always trying to give our residents
the best quality,” he says. “I treat them as
if it were me—how would I want to be
treated?”
In the end, he says that it’s all about
the relationships. His former boss tried to
lure him back with a lucrative signing
bonus, but Whatley said, “No thanks,”
because he has found a happy niche at
Bay Meadows.
“It’s not about the money,” he says.
“It’s about where you’re happy and comfortable. That’s the best way to put it.”
This article was originally published in
ABODE magazine, September 2010.
Rachel Zoch is a member of the Houston
Apartment Association staff.
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