Goodwin L. Myrick’s resume belies the fact that he has been a farmer all his life.
President and chief executive officer are the words that jump out at the reader and listed beneath those terms are so many organizations that one might overlook the second, and key, word in the first listing: Alabama Farmers Federation. But there is no overlooking Goodwin Myrick, or the influence he has had on business and agriculture in the state of Alabama.
Goodwin L. Myrick was born May 9, 1925, in Etowah County, Alabama, to Marion Myrick and Lillie Burgess Myrick. He grew up a farmer, tilling the family soil, and establishing his first dairy herd in 1944 with eight cows. Today, with more than 400 Holstein dairy cows and 700 head of beef cattle, his dairy, beef cattle and farm operations encompass two farms and more than 2,000 acres in Etowah and Talladega counties. The farming operation is run through M&H Farms, a partnership between Mr. Myrick, his son Greg, his daughter Donna and her husband Tony Haynes.
Mr. Myrick began the executive side of his career by joining and progressing through the ranks of Alabama’s largest farm organization, following in his father’s footsteps as president of the Etowah County Farm Bureau Federation. Later he was elected to serve on the Board of Directors of the Alabama Farm Bureau Federation, the predecessor organization to the Alabama Farmers Federation. He was then selected as a vice president of that organization, and later, in 1969, as first vice president – a capacity in which he served for some nine years. In 1978, with the support of a grassroots movement within the organization, he was elected president. The members of the Alabama Farmers Federation and Alfa Insurance Companies Group have confirmed that original vote eight times since, and Mr. Myrick is currently serving his ninth term.
Since his first term in office, membership in the Federation has increased each year, growing from 223,000 members in 1980 to almost 400,000 today, making it the largest farm organization in Alabama and one of the largest in the nation. The Alfa Insurance Group has also seen an annual growth rate of 22.3 percent, expanding from a small, one-state operation into one of the strongest regional insurance groups in the United States. The Alfa Corporation, of which he is also president and chief executive officer, is now a publicly-traded insurance holding company listed on the NASDAQ stock exchange and listed five times in one 10-year period by Forbes Magazine as one of the “200 Small Best Companies in America.” In 1991, the Corporation was recognized as one of the Top 50 small company stocks in the nation by U.S. News and World Report and has been honored five times in the 1990s by National Underwriter as one of the Top 50 insurance companies in the nation.
Mr. Myrick led Alfa’s growth and expansion efforts in many ways. Under his leadership several subsidiary corporations have been formed or have been changed or improved to the extent that all are now operating at significant positive profit levels, including Alfa Investment Company; Alfa Realty, Incorporated; Alfa Builders, Incorporated; and Southern Boulevard Corporation. Under his leadership, an insurance pooling agreement was implemented that essentially changed Alfa Corporation from a life insurance holding company to a multi-line insurance holding company, with subsequent significant operational and financial benefits to the entire insurance corporation. He has also established an in-house advertising agency, Creative Consultants, Incorporated, which handles all of the Alfa Insurance, affiliate companies, and Alabama Farmers Federation advertising and placement.
Over the years Goodwin Myrick has said that one of the keys to his corporate success has been his strong belief that the greatest assets of his companies are the people who work for them and the persons whom they serve, both farmers and insurance policyholders. This philosophy played out into the concrete reality of a significant decline in the annual rate of personnel turnover. It went, for general employees, from approximately 52 percent at the time he became president to a current rate of about 11 percent at the headquarters office of the Alfa Companies in Montgomery, Alabama. For agents, on a statewide basis, the drop was even more dramatic: from about 85 percent at the time of Mr. Myrick’s election to a current rate of about 15 percent.
One of Goodwin Myrick’s first management decisions after taking the helm as president of the Alfa Group was to elevate the role of the human resources department, having it report directly to the president and centralizing all personnel functions of the several affiliate corporations and organizations. Compensation and benefits packages were unified, and he initiated an incentive pay plan that still involves all employees, from the entry-level hourly wage earner to top management.
Continuing to implement his philosophy to put people first and to make Alfa a leader in corporate America, Mr. Myrick led his companies to build and provide for their employees a state-of-the-art childcare facility, licensed for 120 children, adjacent to the corporate offices in Montgomery, one of the first of its type in the state. He has also been responsible for planning and implementing a corporate fitness center.
Today Goodwin Myrick sits on the boards of directors of Compass Bank of the South; of the Alfa Corporation and all Alfa Insurance Corporations and subsidiary corporations; the Alabama 4-H Foundation; and the Auburn University College of Agriculture Advisory Council, of which he served as the first chairman. He has led Alfa’s participation in United Way and other charitable causes and civic programs and has been responsible in recent years for the Companies’ contributions to many of the state’s universities, including The University of Alabama, Auburn University, Troy State University, Tuskegee University, and the University of Alabama at Birmingham. He has also implemented and expanded numerous individual scholarship programs, and under his direction, Alfa is a “Partner in Education” for two schools in the Montgomery County School System.
In 1990 Goodwin L. Myrick was named one of the 10 most influential men in the state of Alabama by Business Alabama Magazine, and in 1992 he was inducted into the Alabama Agricultural Hall of Honor.
And how would he like for history to remember him?
“I’ll tell you, “He once told the state’s capital city newspaper, The Montgomery Advertiser. “My Daddy had this reputation – if you wanted to do – Something good for the community, then don’t pass my Daddy’s house (by). He’d always help you.
“We want to build a better community, a better state. I don’t want to be listed as a negative.”
Goodwin L. Myrick need not worry. He will be listed as a positive – and a farmer.
