Todd Keith
Job Title: President
Company: Hero Services
Location: Knoxville, Tenn.
Age: 29
Years on the Job: 11
Interests: Riding on his jet boat with his wife and children
As a teenager, Todd Keith helped his father wire his house and says his dad is the reason he is in the electrical industry today.
“He tried to get me into electrical years before I did,” says Keith, who was born in Los Angeles County, Calif.
Straight out of high school, Keith started as a grunt/helper, taking on the jobs the experienced workers didn’t want to do. For years, he learned by watching technicians work and asking questions.
After attending trade school and learning through on-the-job training, he moved into management as the president of Hero Services. Every workday, he strives never to stop learning and always be improving, even while facing challenges such as unpredictability and change.
“I often joke that I spend my day eating elephants and chasing rabbits,” Keith says.
In his current position, he has developed systems to help the field workforce. For instance, his company experienced a digital transformation by shifting from paper invoices to the use of iPads. Also, Keith worked to enable GPS tracking in the fleet of vehicles and arranged for the set-up of display screens in the office so the dispatchers could track the service trucks.
Currently, he is working on growing his company’s brand so the business can be the largest of its kind in the area. As such, he tries to invest in a new technology each month to automate tasks and provide new options like vehicle tracking. He says he feels like his time in the field has given him insight into what his team faces and how he can help them, such as setting up a performance-based pay structure that allows employees to earn as much money as they are willing to make.
“I care about my people and genuinely want them to succeed,” Keith says. “I can only consider myself successful if my team is succeeding.”
