Tributes paid to Hydro, Inc.’s president and founder.
George F. Harris, president and founder of Hydro, Inc.
Hydro, Inc. has announced the passing of its president and founder, George F. Harris, on December twentieth, 2021.
Born in Chicago in 1941, Harris came from humble beginnings, working as a waiter and a taxi driver. He attended the University of Illinois at Champaign and graduated with a Bachelor of Science degree in Engineering. After graduation, he labored at several main pump corporations as an utility engineer and regional supervisor.
In 1969, Harris was one of many four engineers who based Hydro, Inc. with the mission of providing engineering companies to the pump aftermarket business. From the beginning, Harris believed in improving the reliability and efficiency of pumps and encouraging innovation. He was later appointed as president of Hydro.
Hydro began with a single store in Chicago; under Harris’s management and imaginative and prescient Hydro turned the biggest independent aftermarket pump company on the earth. Today, Hydro stands proud with 15 service centres in nine international locations.
Harris was instrumental in defining the culture of Hydro: unbiased, engineering- and innovation-focused, and dedicated to the shopper. He helped develop packages for buyer training in pump processes, believing that the knowledge of how to safely keep and operate pumps was one thing that should be shared with everybody. He spearheaded many innovations in the way pumps are serviced, utilizing state-of-the-art expertise to re-engineer pumps for optimum effectivity.
Harris is survived by his spouse of fifty six years, Rita, who he met whereas at the University of Illinois. She later grew to become vice president of Hydro, and so they labored side-by-side to make the company preeminent in the industry. Their management was characterised by a particular dedication to their workers, who they treated like family. They inspired all service centres to honour Hydro’s employees with monthly worker celebrations and an annual Employee Appreciation Week. As he once mentioned: “Hydro grew to become the corporate it did due to the commitment of our individuals – machinists, mechanics, engineers, administrative and gross sales workers – who all share a pivotal role in serving our clients.”
The tradition of care and loyalty nurtured by the Harrises inspired admiration and esteem in all of Hydro’s employees, lots of whom have worked at Hydro for more than 20 years. Harris was additionally well-respected by his peers inside the pump trade. In 2014, he was elected as president of the Hydraulic Institute, the most important association of pump trade manufacturers in North America. In 2015, Europump awarded him its President’s Silver Award in recognition of his valuable contributions to the pump business.
Bob Jennings, Corporate Trainer, pays a personal tribute:
“I started with HydroAire in 1976 and quickly learned that George Harris was the consummate protagonist who always expected more than folks have been prepared to supply. As an employee, I discovered quickly that half-hearted measures were unacceptable and an attitude of ‘good enough” was by no means tolerated. To assume that he took a rag-tag group of 5 street-wise salesmen and turned the corporate into a global group with 19 services worldwide is an incredible accomplishment. It took exhausting work, lengthy hours, a “never say never” mindset, and teamwork to develop the company as he did. He wanted to be the best, he needed the company to be the most effective, and he wanted every of his workers to be their best.
George was a gifted individual who had the uncanny capacity to “see over the horizon” and could glimpse the future wants of the industry long before others had digested final week’s modifications.
There was also เกจวัดแรงดูด of George that most individuals never had the opportunity to see: As tenacious a businessman as he was, he was equally beneficiant and caring to those within the “Hydro Family.” George and Rita at all times handled their workers as “adopted sons and daughters” and so they personally bore the burden of understanding that their enterprise choices not solely have an effect on the corporate however the well-being and safety of their staff and their households as properly.
George might be deeply missed, however his legacy will live on. He hired what he thought-about the “best of breed” and those who shared his imaginative and prescient for the lengthy run, and the corporate is saturated with like-minded people who will continue to develop the corporate well into the long run.”
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