Stefanie Anderson, Vice President, Production, Daily Herald, Arlington Heights, Ill.

By: Mark Fitzgerald No one has to tell Stefanie Anderson that she entered a boys' club when she steered her career toward newspaper production. Even as recently as 10 years ago, she notes, there were few female leaders in operations. What she can't figure out is why.

"It's such a fascinating field, I don't know why it was typically a male-dominated area," she says.

Anderson got into newspapers more or less by chance. "I was in college in California, and looking for a part-time, early-morning job," she recalls. "And newspapers were just about the only place with that kind of a job, besides flipping pancakes at Mickey D's or something." The road to VP/production for the Daily Herald in suburban Chicago began with a job in The Fresno (Calif.) Bee's circulation customer service department.

Chance might have helped put Anderson into newspaper operations, but it plays no role on the job. "You can count on Stef, especially in forecasting," says Daily Herald President and CEO Doug Ray. "In this business, with so many dollars tied up in raw materials, to miss that forecast by even a little bit makes a big difference. But she never misses. She essentially nails it every time."

While Anderson, 43, was establishing her newspaper career in California, the Paddock family-owned Daily Herald was turning what had been a thrice-weekly focused only on Arlington Heights, Ill., into the full-service daily that became the state's third-largest and fastest-growing newspaper. She arrived just after the Daily Herald green-lighted the biggest capital investment in its history ? building a $50 million production plant and installing two MAN Roland Regioman presses.

Working under Bob Finch, who retired at the end of 2004, Anderson was a key player in vetting presses and making a final recommendation. "My part in the move over to the new plant was more logistical and operational," she says.

Designed to suggest the architectural style of Illinois native Frank Lloyd Wright, the graceful Daily Herald plant houses equipment that, while new and reliable, is no longer all state-of-the-art.

"We were on the brink of so many huge technological breakthroughs" when the Daily Herald was building and equipping the plant, Anderson says. Consider platemaking: "UV wasn't ready for us. Thermal wasn't fast enough."

With the enormous amount of zoning the Daily Herald does, plate changing on the fly was a temptation, but the paper ultimately decided, she says, that "it wasn't ready ? and I don't know that it's ready yet."

Still, the paper's vice president of advertising, John Kelly, calls Anderson "our secret weapon against the two larger metros in the Chicago marketplace" because she's willing to take on extreme ROP zoning, sub-ZIP code preprint requests, and increasingly tighter ad and editorial deadlines.

The Neighborhood section can be zoned 29 ways, though most days it runs 17 or 18 zones. The final run has a potential of 18 zones on the press. Add the many insert zoning options, and the production center often loads hundreds of different packages into delivery trucks.

In January, the Daily Herald converted to lighter-weight newsprint, but its waste, which was measured at 2.33% in July, beats the industry standard.

Colin O'Donnell, Paddock Publication's vice president of operations and planning, says he nominated Anderson in part because of her ability to build a team. "She places a high value on experience, innovation and retention," O'Donnell said in his nominating paper. "Her top 10 direct reports represent 230 years of experience."

Anderson credits her team as well. "I can't look at this award as a personal thing, because the people I work for are excellent," she says. Operations, Anderson adds, "is not something any one of us can do by ourselves."

CAREER HIGHLIGHTS:

Joined the Fresno (Calif.) Bee as a customer service representative in 1981

Took on various circulation department responsibilities at the Peninsula Times in Palo Alto, Calif., in 1986

Moved to the Daily Herald, Arlington Heights, Ill., in 1993, where she worked in special sections marketing

Transferred to information technology; rose through management ranks to prepress manager, operations manager/production, and production director

Promoted to assistant vice president of production; vice president since March 2006