Jeff Wunrow Work Biogragphy
Born in Janesville WI in 1960. I was introduced to challenge early in life having to
re-learn to walk twice by the age of 8. Legg-Perthes resulted in being immobile from
waist down for a full year at age four. Rumatic Fever and Koria resulted in being
bed ridden for 6 months at age eight. These set backs taught me at an early age that
patience and determination could help me to overcome many challenges.
In my teen years I discovered photography and fell in love with it. By age 16 I
had combined by passion for auto racing with photography and was working as
a freelance photographer covering races at Road America in Elkhart Lake WI.
Photography led me to studying conventional pre-press in the late 1970’s in high
school. Post high school I attended Milwaukee Area Technical College, earning an
Associates Degree in Printing and Publishing in 1981. My Dad had modeled during
his career that if you do what you love, you love what you do. Little did I know just
who important this concept would be in my life.
Entering the workforce in a recession in the early 80’s finding full time print work
was tough. I ended up working three part time jobs in pre-press and printing from
82-84. During this time I also married my high school sweetheart Christina. In 1984
I was able to get a job in the pressroom at Quad as a jogger. Over the next 12 months
I was blessed to be a part of Quad’s explosive growth, being a part of 4 new press
start-up crews. I fell in love with the Quad culture. It really resonated with me. I was
proud to be living Harry’s circle of learning, to Learn your job, then know your job,
to improve your job and them teach it to someone else.
In 1985 I had an opportunity to transfer to the pre-press department just as they
were expanding from the original Pewaukee location to the new Sussex plant. From
that point on, pre-press and all if it’s future iterations has been my life’s passion.
From 85-87 I worked first in pre-press production as a process cameraman and
litho-stripper. In ‘88 I had the opportunity to be on the ground floor of the new
Imaging Service Rep position. In my early years of customer service I learned that
when presenting a client with a solution to their production problem, it was always
better to give them two or three options to choose from, even if they where not all
great options so they felt empowered by the opportunity to be in control of the final
decision. I earned my Masters Cup that year and was name to Management in 1989.
1990 was a big year for me and my young family. In September, I applied to be
a part of the Management start-up team for the our first remote imaging site in
Anaheim CA. Harry Quadracci interviewed me for 2 hours during which time he did
his best to convince me I was crazy to want to move to Southern California. In the
end, my confidence and commitment won the day. He told me I was to be fly to LA
that same Sunday to be in the Anaheim office on Monday morning! Ready, Fire, AIM!
For the next three years my role was to manage the service team while at the same
time instilling the Quad culture in the land far away from the heart and soul of the
company, Harry Quadracci. Because this was our first remote site, Harry had a
strong interest in its development. I was very fortunate to be able to interact often
with him. As was his way, he also took a keen interest in our young family, getting
to know them and on several occasions dining with us. During this phase, the Quad
culture value of Together we can do far more that individuals working alone was not
just a wonderful concept, but was also a key part of the Anaheim sites success.
In 1993, my VP Tom Frankowski asked me if I would be interested in being a part
of a new team at Quad, one that would focus specifically on selling our pre-press
offering to the market. Prior to this time, it was the print reps that were responsible
for generating new work. I had never sold anything before so I was scared and at
the same time excited about the opportunity. This is well before any formal sales
training was available at Quad so I spent a lot of time listing to audio books from
the top sales people of the day during my long So Cal commutes. In the mid 1990’s
Quad embraced the concept of SPIN selling which was based on the concept of
asking questions to uncover Situation, Problem, Implication and Need payoff. This
really resonated with me as allowed me to quickly understand where the client was
coming from then frame solutions as Need Payoff which always result in the client
saving time, money or space.
The mid ‘90’s were a turbulent time in Anaheim. The operations manager, who
was also a good friend, was not embracing the transition from film to fully digital
workflows. At a curtain point there was much internal conflict that worked its way
up to Tom Frankowski and Harry Quadracci. Customers were not happy and our
employee’s were not happy. On a dark day in early summer of 1997, Tom came
into to town to let us know that our Opp’s Mgr. was gone and that Harry was giving
us three months to turn the shop around or it would be closed. He appointed me
Interim Opp’s Manager, called the management team together and listed the 10
things we sucked at. These 10 things became our mission statement for turning
things around. During this time I would come in at 4 am, do as much of my sales job
as I could, then from 8 am to 8 pm deal with my Operations responsibilities. During
this time, Ken Eazell and I became strong partners in working to right the ship. He
had a strong production background while mine was more admin so we were a
great team. By the end of the year we had not only met Toms 10 point mandate,
more importantly re-built the site from the ground up to a modern digital media
center with all our customers happy. Building on the Quad Values was Harry’s
concept of Find a Better Way. That more than anything was key to the turnaround of
Anaheim.
Once the Anaheim shop’s turnaround was complete, I was given the opportunity to
either remain on as Operation’s Mgr. or move back into sales. As much as I enjoyed
my time in Opp’s I really did miss sales. I also knew that the site, now that the
problems were fixed was going to need new work to help with the next phase of its
existence. It’s a decision I am really glad I made!
As the 90’s were coming to an end our Quad print sales office in Marina del Rey,
CA had developed reputation of being dysfunctional. The reps didn’t get along
with each other, the plants had a very low opinion of their ability to find qualified
new work and they were not embracing prep and print together as a strategic
sales solution. There were a lot of young inexperienced reps and 1 or 2 really
seasoned guys that did great work but didn’t have any interest in mentoring. Over
the previous years Joel Quadracci had started his sale career and by this time had
just been promoted from Sales Mgr in NYC to VP of Sales. He knew that in order to
continue to grow the company and give our clients access to Sales Executives, there
needed to be a new position created. In late 1998, Joel approached me about the
new position of Sales Leader for the LA Sales office. While I was flattered, I told him
I had never sold print. He told me that was not important, what was important was
to make the Sales team a team, to mentor the younger reps and to get them focused
on the right opportunities. These were all things he had seen me do in Anaheim and
he knew I could do them in LA. I had always trusted Harry, and I sensed that I could
trust Joel. And they clearly had trust in me. Now all I need to do was get the sales
reps to trust me and more importantly trust each other. The Quad Value of Trust in
Trust would be our touchstone.
From 2000 to 2005 our sales office grew to know then trust each other. We focused
on the concept of team selling, which allow us to sell the whole offering as a single
unified solution. The plants also over time came to trust that we were bringing good
opportunities to them. Our sales grew and our sales team grew. It wasn’t easy but
we did it. During this window of time two major events happened.
In the summer of 2002, HVQ passed away suddenly. I’ll never forget the call I
received late at night with the news. My wife and I stayed up all night first crying
and then reminiscing on the wonderful memories we had of him and his support for
my career and my family. I vowed then to do everything I could to keep his legacy
alive in my heart and also in the culture that he had had infused into everything I did
at work.
In February of 2003, an even bigger blow came. My Mom Joanna suffered an aortic
aneurism in their Tucson AZ winter home and was rushed to the hospital. My Dad
was trying to put on a positive face, but I could tell in his voice this was serious. I
jumped in the car for the 8-hour drive to Tucson. 90 minutes into the drive, while
in the middle of the Mohave Desert, my Dad called to tell me that Mom had passed
away. There I was, completely alone in the desert as emotionally crushed as a
person can be, crying out for human touch. Finally arriving at my parents house,
I walked in to find my Dad with my sister Debra and brother Dave. The hug and
tears that followed are seared into my memory. Minutes after arriving, my cell
phone rang, with Joel Quadracci calling to offer his condolences. The love I felt for
my family and my job both reminded me of how blessed my life is. From my Mom I
learned to always give more that you receive, to give love out in generous doses, to
always wear a smile and to laugh openly and often.
These two events, the passing of HVQ and the loss of my Mom, generated a lot of
reflection and soul searching. Chris and I had raised our family far from Milwaukee
where the rest of my brothers and sisters and Dad live. We really felt that although
we had worked hard for them to still feel connected through the distance, as a family
we should be closer. Ad to that my wife needing spinal fusion surgery we decided
that it was time to pursue trying to relocate closer to home. I approached Dave Blais
about this and he was very supportive but said it would take some time to find the
right place for me. In the end, he offered Premedia Sales in Minneapolis MN as they
had not had a Premedia rep for several years and needed help in growing that part
of the business. In July 2006, putting family before work, I took a demotion and
moved my family of five to the Twin Cities.
For the bulk of my career in sales my accounts reflected the market I was in, very
heavily publication with a about 10% catalog. In Minneapolis, the mix swung 180
degrees the other direction. So, I need to reinvent myself as a solutions provider
for marketers. Learning the dynamics of their business, the tools and expertise that
we had in the Minneapolis imaging site and how to match those things together to
create solutions for our clients. I was blessed to have amazing partners like Sharon
Pohlman in Operations and Dave Moffat in workflow solutions to help me on my
educational journey. I could not have survived and ultimately thrived through this
transition with out the core Quad Values I’ve learned over the years to lean heavily
on.
Even though my story at Quad is still being written, I am today the sum total of the
support, opportunities, struggles and triumphs I’ve experienced over the past 29
years. I’ve learned so much over that time, but more importantly I know there is still
so much more to learn. I know what I know, but I don’t know what I don’t know. So,
as I seem to have become one of the gray beards on the team (don’t be fooled I’m a
long way from retirement!) my learning circle is alive and well. What I try to teach
to others are the following lessons I’ve learned.
The Learning Circle: Be a life long learner. Never stop asking questions. Find a
better way and then teach it to someone else who needs the knowledge. Remember,
knowledge is only powerful if you share it with others.
Trust in Trust: The only way for others to trust you is for you to trust them first.
Give them trust before they earn it. Be trustworthy in your actions and people will
trust to you back. If we don’t trust each other, out clients won’t trust us either. As
Tom Frankowski told me the day he made me Opp’s Mgr in Anaheim “We must hang
together for if we don’t, we will all hand separately!”
Do it for the Rose: This is a mark of character. It’s not how you behave when all
eyes are on you, but rather how you behave when no one is looking that is the mark
of your character. Do the right thing, because it’s the right thing to do.
“Together we can achieve more that we can as individuals alone”
–Harry Quadracci
Our daughter Catie is having a milestone year. She turned 18 in May, graduated from Minnetonka High School in June. Click here to view the graduation tribute video we did for her. She started College in September. She is attending St Paul College in St Paul MN studying American Sign Language to be a translator/interpreter. After spending the first semester commuting while living at home, she will be moving into student housing at the nearby University of Minnesota’s University Village, where she will share an apartment with three other girls. She is hoping to continue working for Jimmy Johns sandwich shop, transferring to a shop close to campus. Needless to say she is very excited to start this new chapter of her life. 
Alex is 22 and really established at the University of Nebraska, where he is double majoring in Marketing and Public Relations. He lives in a small one bedroom apartment off campus, just a few blocks from the state capitol in Lincoln. Besides carrying a full course load, Alex also has a paid internship at the University of Nebraska Press, in their marketing department, focusing on social media. He also is the Editor in Chief for the campus satirical newspaper, The DailyER Nebraskan. This is his fourth and final year on the paper and in his new role he is really focused on setting the paper up to be financially viable for years to come. 
Our bonus daughters are doing well too. Dasha is now in her first year at the Ukraine National University in Kiev. She is getting all her generals out of the way while she figures out what she wants to major in. She wants to do something to help her country progress into a more democratic society. Only time will tell, but she is very committed to making her country a better place for future generations of Ukrainians. Thanks to Skype, we are able to keep in touch with Dasha regularly.
