Mississippi Power has announced that Tommy Murphy is the company’s new Vice President of Customer Service and Operations, effective April 2.
A Pascagoula native, Murphy will oversee Power Delivery, Customer Service, Sales and Marketing, as well as the company’s Coast and Northern Divisions.
“Tommy brings a wealth of knowledge and experience to our executive team from his 36 years of distinguished service across the Southern Company system and across a wide variety of business units,” said President and CEO Anthony Wilson. “He is well-known for his passion of being a community leader and a great mentor for the next generation of leaders. He carries that same devotion to providing our customers with the world-class service they deserve from us.”
Murphy has served as Mississippi Power’s Coast Division Manager since 2016, overseeing the company’s operations, customer service, and local community and government relations for seven coastal counties. He joined the Southern Company system in 1985 and has held a variety of management positions at Mississippi Power, Alabama Power and Gulf Power.
“It is an honor to be able to lead such an outstanding organization that is dedicated to giving our customers around-the-clock, customer care,” Murphy said. “We will continue to modernize and harden our grid as we use the latest technologies to provide our customers and communities with the safe, reliable energy that they expect from us.”
He is active in numerous community outreaches. He has been named among South Mississippi’s Outstanding Community Leaders and a recipient of the Coast Young Professionals’ Forever Young Award honoring mentors. His community roles have included Coast Chamber President, Hancock County Chamber President, NASA Partners for Stennis board, loaned executive for United Way, President of the Mississippi Gulf Coast Technology Council, external advisory board for the University of Southern Mississippi and Leadership Gulf Coast.
Murphy graduated with honors with a Bachelor of Science degree from the University of Southern Mississippi. He is also a graduate of the Georgia Institute of Technology management program.
Murphy and his wife Kristi reside in Bay St. Louis and have two adult children, Brent and Shannon.
Moss Point native Mike Middleton is returning to Mississippi Power to become the company’s new Coast Division Manager. Middleton began his career as a co-op student in Mississippi Power’s Pascagoula office. He worked for the company for 14 years and held several leadership positions before joining Georgia Power in 2014.
In his most recent role at Georgia Power, Middleton was the Metro Distribution general manager, overseeing engineering, construction and maintenance of the electrical system serving more than 1.2 million customers in the metro Atlanta area. He also led the distribution area’s efforts to develop a prevention and recovery strategy as the city hosted Super Bowl LIII.
Middleton and his wife, Quinyanna, have one son, Matthew.