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 a quantity of main pump firms as an software engineer and regional supervisor.
In 1969, Harris was one of the 4 engineers who based Hydro, Inc. with the mission of offering engineering providers to the pump aftermarket industry. From the start, Harris believed in enhancing the reliability and performance of pumps and encouraging innovation. He was later appointed as president of Hydro.
Hydro began with a single store in Chicago; under Harris’s leadership and imaginative and prescient Hydro grew to become the most important impartial aftermarket pump company on the earth. Today, Hydro stands proud with 15 service centres in 9 countries.
Harris was instrumental in defining the tradition of Hydro: unbiased, engineering- and innovation-focused, and devoted to the shopper. He helped develop programs for buyer education in pump processes, believing that the data of how to safely keep and operate pumps was one thing that must be shared with everyone. He spearheaded many inventions in the way in which pumps are serviced, using state-of-the-art know-how to re-engineer pumps for maximum effectivity.
Harris is survived by his spouse of 56 years, Rita, who he met while on the University of Illinois. She later grew to become vp of Hydro, they usually labored side-by-side to make the company preeminent in the trade. Their management was characterised by a special commitment to their workers, who they handled like household. They inspired all service centres to honour Hydro’s workers with month-to-month employee celebrations and an annual Employee Appreciation Week. As he as soon as stated: “Hydro became the corporate it did due to the commitment of our folks – machinists, mechanics, engineers, administrative and gross sales workers – who all share a pivotal role in serving our prospects.”
The culture of care and loyalty nurtured by the Harrises inspired admiration and esteem in all of Hydro’s workers, lots of whom have worked at Hydro for greater than 20 years. Harris was additionally well-respected by his friends within the pump business. In 2014, he was elected as president of the Hydraulic Institute, the biggest affiliation of pump trade producers in North America. In 2015, Europump awarded him its President’s Silver Award in recognition of his priceless contributions to the pump industry.
Bob Jennings, Corporate Trainer, pays a personal tribute:
“I started with HydroAire in 1976 and quickly discovered that George Harris was the consummate protagonist who always anticipated greater than people were keen to provide. As an employee, I discovered quickly that half-hearted measures have been unacceptable and an perspective of ‘good enough” was by no means tolerated. To think that เกจวัดแก๊สหุงต้ม took a rag-tag group of 5 street-wise salesmen and turned the corporate into a global organization with 19 services worldwide is an amazing accomplishment. It took hard work, long hours, a “never say never” mindset, and teamwork to develop the company as he did. He needed to be one of the best, he wished the corporate to be one of the best, and he needed every of his employees to be their greatest.
George was a gifted particular person who had the uncanny ability to “see over the horizon” and will glimpse the lengthy run wants of the trade lengthy before others had digested last week’s changes.
There was additionally a side of George that most people by no means had the opportunity to see: As tenacious a businessman as he was, he was equally generous and caring to those in the “Hydro Family.” George and Rita at all times treated their employees as “adopted sons and daughters” and so they personally bore the burden of understanding that their enterprise selections not solely affect the corporate but the well-being and safety of their employees and their families as well.
George might be deeply missed, however his legacy will reside on. He hired what he considered the “best of breed” and those that shared his imaginative and prescient for the lengthy run, and the corporate is saturated with like-minded individuals who will continue to develop the corporate properly into the longer term.”
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