Dianne Lowe says she didn’t have a specific career path in mind during her early days in Greenwood, but she’s happy with the job she ended up with at Greenwood Leflore Hospital.
Lowe, 48, a pharmacy tech manager and clinical specialist, has worked for the hospital for nearly 26 years.
The Greenwood native graduated from Amanda Elzy High School in 1986 and earned a degree in liberal arts from Jones County Junior College in 1990.
Growing up, she preferred the indoors to the outdoors and enjoyed reading and spending time in the kitchen with her mother.
“I really thought I wanted to go into the Air Force,” she said. “I don’t know why. ... That was just odd.”
While at Jones, she met the son of the owner of WGNL, who told her about plans to open a radio station — not only in her hometown but close to where she lived. She ended up working there as an announcer, sales representative and office manager. But that was only a part-time job for Lowe, who also worked at Malouf Furniture for a time.
One day, Margaret Buchanan from the hospital came to the radio station and told Lowe that she seemed like a good worker and that she would call if a job became available at the hospital. Soon, three jobs came up, and Lowe interviewed for all three.
“She said, ‘All three of them want you. Pick what you want,’” Lowe recalled.
She started as a pharmacy tech, and it took some adjustment.
“It’s like a class within itself, learning all the different meds,” she said. “It’s a lot.”
She now oversees four people at the pharmacy, and she enjoys interacting with the public, even though people sometimes come in in stressful situations.
“You’ve got to have a good personality to work at that window and not let stuff just get to you. You’ve got to have that elephant skin,” she said. “And you’ve got to think about it: They’re not feeling good; they could be mad or upset about something or just sad because of a procedure or news they’ve gotten. You’ve got to be sympathetic.”
She gives high marks to the pharmacy’s manager, Dean Kidd, saying that he’s open-minded and lets her bring in new ideas about how to improve the job.
She also has been given some freedom in how she conducts her visits to clinics to make sure they are using the medications properly.
“He lets me be more of an independent worker, and I like that part,” she said. “He trusts me to do a lot of stuff.”
She also has continued to learn as she has worked. She earned a bachelor’s degree in business administration from Mississippi Valley State University in 2014 — “just to better myself in case something comes up” — and has applied for MVSU’s MBA program, which she hopes to start in August and finish in two years.
In her spare time, she likes to read, cook and follow the activities of her 7-year-old son, Kaleb, who plays soccer and baseball in youth leagues and attends Pillow Academy.
In general, she said, she is determined to find a way to be happy regardless of what comes.
“Every day is not going to be great,” she said. “But my thing is this: I don’t let people set the tone for my day. I set my tone.”
She’s also been happy to stay in the small town where she grew up.
“I like this life,” she said. “I’m not a city girl at all. I like just hometown living.”
•Contact David Monroe at 581-7236 or dmonroe@gwcommonwealth.com.
