During his 30-plus year newspaper career, Bob Palermini transformed his role from journalist to technology leader at newspapers ranging from a rural Illinois weekly to the Los Angeles Times.

Growing up in suburban Westchester, Bob loved to take photographs. He became a staff photographer for, and eventually editor of, his high school newspaper. The opportunity to express his creativity while documenting his world proved thrilling.

So during his NIU freshman orientation in the summer of 1974, before the photojournalism major took even one class in DeKalb, he snagged a job at the Northern Star.

“I wanted to be a journalist, and NIU was definitely one of the top places in Illinois to go for that,” Bob says. “The best part about the Star was that it was real-life newspapering. We were a dedicated group who put in crazy hours, cared about the product and really cared about doing journalism – good journalism.”

When he left NIU in 1977, he became editor of the tiny Tri-County Press in Polo – a newspaper that understood the role of community journalism and the importance of photographs in that mission.

He eventually put down his camera, except during Friday night football games, and led the business and production operations of the three small newspapers plus commercial printing venture as publisher.

“My interest in technology came from the photography,” he says. “A lot of photographers led the way and became the technology leaders at their papers.”

Bob went on to manage production and technology at various Shaw Newspapers and then landed a job with Tribune Company at their Newport News, Virginia paper. This led to bigger jobs in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida and then back in Chicago at the corporate office.

In 2000 when Tribune purchased Times Mirror, he moved to Los Angeles to become Senior Vice President and Chief Technology Officer at the Times and later Vice President of Technology for all nine Tribune papers. There he directed a project to implement and operate one of the largest newspaper editorial systems in the world, serving more than 3,000 journalists.

Two years ago, not enjoying the changes in his industry, he left the Times to become Vice President for Planning and Technology at Volunteers of America of Greater Los Angeles. It reminds him of his early days at the Tri-County Press: improving the lives of people in the place where he lives.

Bob and Tracy, his wife of 33 years, are parents to 23-year-old Stephanie, a recent University of Southern California graduate.