IT Manager
Corporate Office
We would like to announce Keith Ord as the 2022 August STAR Employee! Keith has been the IT Manager for Harbin Lumber Company for almost two decades now.
Keith grew up in Toccoa, Ga and soon after he graduated high school, he joined the Navy. After 6 years of service and working as an electrician in the Navy he decided to take a different role when he left and started working in home security and installation systems. Deep down he always knew that working in the IT world was his calling but never knew what the next steps would be. His father told him “If you can find a way to make money doing something you love, you will never work a day in your life.” This was just the beginning of Keith’s journey to reach his dream. In 1999 he began working in web design later switching to utility billing for the City of Toccoa. During this time he also worked on all the computers and really advanced the technology for the city from 2000-2004. On July 2004, Roger Bates former CFO for HLC, called Keith and told him about the opportunities at Harbin Lumber Company. His first interview was at Load Star in the conference room with Barron Harbin, Roger Bates, Chris Moon and Randall Lecroy. During that meeting Keith opened the doors for technology advancement opportunities at Harbin Lumber Company, changing the day-to-day operations in a positive manner.
Since 2004 when he joined the HLC family, Harbin has advanced leaps and bounds in the technology world. From creating a digitized operations and procedures manual that can be accessed online now for all employees (Before it was a printed 3 ring binder of almost a thousand pages.), to creating cloud services allowing the company to work remotely. This was a huge asset to the operation of Harbin during covid-19 allowing the company to still run efficiently.
“I know that no employee is indispensable but, for me, Keith Ord gets as close as you can get. For over 18 years I have leaned on his IT expertise almost daily and he has shared a lot of his knowledge with me. He knows more about Harbin Lumber's networks, IP addresses, Ubiquiti settings, LAN routers and IPv6 nomenclature than the rest of us will ever understand. I could not do my job without him. Harbin Lumber Company would not be as successful as we are today without Keith Ord. Thank you, Keith, for always being on call and always putting Harbin Lumber's interest first.”
Philip HuntCFO
Keith is married to his beautiful wife Katherine and they share a blended family together. They also have two cats, Ryker and Bryn. In his spare time, he likes learning physics, playing on the computer, going to the gun range, and photography. Keith says, “If I could teach anything to anyone it would be to always stay curious and you will have a great life.” He lives this moto out daily and truly believes that a learning curve will never end, and you can explore gaining new knowledge every day.
Keith, we hope everyone looks at each day with a new opportunity to learn something and grow. We know that this is what makes you special to our team, and you are a valued asset! Thank you for all that you do for Harbin Lumber Company.
Photographs captured by Keith.
