From Computer Programmer to Strategic Partner

For Bob Wright, the true joy of his job as assistant vice president, Print and Distribution, at Unum Global Programs, comes from helping his company’s business leaders do their jobs better. During the 32 years he has spent with the Chattanooga, Tenn.-based provider of disability, life and voluntary insurance products, Wright has moved his department away from the mindset of simply waiting for jobs to arrive, and reshaped it into a genuine business unit for the company.

“What I’m really proud of is that transformation—going from a very transactional entity…to being more of a strategic business partner for the business leaders of our company,” he says. “I have a lot more contacts with the business areas than we ever did in the data center, and there’s more of an opportunity to work with them to help them solve problems and find better ways of doing things.

“It’s much more fulfilling than just the pure data center operation,” he declares.

It was through the data center, though, that Wright entered the world of printing. Born in Columbia, S.C., where he still resides, he initially thought his future lie in computer programming, so he enrolled in a technical college to learn more.

“I went to computer programming school long enough to realize I didn’t want to be a computer programmer,” he laughs.

After a brief stint at a bank, Wright signed on with the Colonial Life & Accident Insurance Co. back in 1980, where he ran the IBM mainframe printers. From there he moved into the computer room before being promoted to night shift manager in 1983. He stayed in this role for the next 12 years.

When Unum purchased Colonial, it consolidated the data centers, and Wright was made director of computer operations, overseeing facilities in both Columbia and Portland, Maine. But when Unum outsourced that operation to IBM in 2000, Wright decided to go to IBM along with it. He grew to regret his choice.

“I had an opportunity to come back to Unum managing…the print location here in Columbia,” he says. So in 2001, he returned to Unum to supervise the printing of some 400 million impressions a year. As if that wasn’t enough to occupy his time, he also enrolled in evening business school at Southern Wesleyan University.

Promoted to Director

When his boss retired four years later, Wright was promoted to director, overseeing printing in four locations, Columbia, Portland, Chattanooga, Tenn., and Worcester, Mass. One of his first moves was to merge in the mailing operation.

“It really let us leverage a lot of skills across the wider operation,” he says of the merger, “and it allowed us to create a lot of efficiencies.”

Then in 2007 he brought forms management, production and fulfillment—which had been outsourced to R.R. Donnelley & Sons since 1999—back in-house.

“Bringing the fulfillment work back has been a big win for the company,” Wright says. “It’s saved a lot of money.” And improved service and quality, he adds.

In 2008, an individual disability insurance unit asked Print and Distribution Services to produce its enrollment materials in color.

“We did the research and found out we could produce them in-house pretty economically,” he says. So the operation added a Xerox iGen3 that year, starting down the road to color printing. Last year, with increasingly more enrollment materials switching to color, the in-plant upgraded to an iGen4 and added a second one in Chattanooga. Then it tried to expand into marketing materials. The effort was not entirely successful, Wright admits. Adding color to transactional documents was one thing...

“But getting into the true…full-color, high-quality marketing pieces was more of a challenge for us,” Wright observes.

After encountering some quality issues, the operation took a step back. It redesigned some of its processes, bought ORIS color management software, improved its color consistency, then reengaged with the marketing group.

“So we’re looking to see even more volume on those iGens from that,” he says.

With 152 employees in four locations, Unum’s Print and Distribution group is currently working to create an automated document factory, which will include a digital storefront and content management. The in-plant most recently added a Gunther Duet inserter, which Wright says is the first of its kind; it can insert into both letters and flats in one stream, improving productivity and quality. The way Wright sees it, all these additions and improvements are helping Unum’s business leaders do their jobs better, and that’s the part of his job he likes best.

“The strategic part of it is a lot of fun for me, and just working with our business partners to help them solve business problems, I get a lot of enjoyment out of that,” he says.

Wright doesn’t shy away from challenges outside of work either. A long-time triathlete, he completed his first Ironman Triathlon (2.4-mile swim, 112-mile bike ride, 26.2-mile run) last fall and is in training for a second one Thanksgiving weekend in Cozumel, Mexico. In between he’s competed in several Xterra (i.e. off-road) triathlons.

He and his wife of 12 years, Monica (a marathoner herself), have a son, 11, and Wright also has a daughter, 22, and another son, 19, who is about to join the U.S. Marine Corps.