Veteran Spotlight: Jeffery Clemons
We Salute Our Team Members Who Served in the Military
In this month of Veterans Day and Thanksgiving, we want to express our deep appreciation to the men and women of CoolSys who have served our country in the Armed Forces. We are proud that so many of you have chosen to join Team CoolSys after your military career.
Among our group of veteran employees is Jeffery Clemons, a level 4 technician in Phoenix. Having grown up in a small town in Kentucky, Jeffery saw the military as an opportunity to expand his horizons. At that time, he had never flown in an airplane or even been to an airport. “When I was 17,” he says, “I didn’t know what I wanted to do, but I was sure it was not sitting through schooling.” So, following in the footsteps of his great-grandfather, grandfather and an uncle, he joined the military.
Jeffery served as an infantryman in the U.S. Army from September 2007 to February 2011. He was stationed at Ft. Lewis near Tacoma, Washington, and was deployed to Afghanistan from summer 2009 through summer 2010.
A Growing Career
With an education in automotive and diesel mechanics, Jeffery worked as a technician for Nissan for five years before moving into HVAC-R. After working briefly for another HVAC-R company, he joined Source Refrigeration — now a CoolSys company — in June 2018. From their base in Phoenix, Jeffery and a coworker specifically serve Century Link, a telecommunications company, in locations throughout Arizona. Jeffery is a success story for the CoolSys technician education program; he tested into CoolSys as a level 2 tech but has advanced to level 4 through in-person and online training.
One of the many things Jeffery appreciates about CoolSys is the company’s willingness to give a chance to young people who don’t have a formal education but show the determination and motivation to learn the trade. “A lot of people don’t realize that you don’t necessarily have to have a traditional education to work in the skilled trades,” he says. “If you show initiative and apply yourself, you can create a great career for yourself.”
Congratulations, Jeffery — and a heartfelt thank you to all of our veterans!