Business Boot Camp - How to Create and Maintain a High-Performance Culture

Speaker Bio: 

Winthrop Jeanfreau, Executive Director of iMpact Utah, has over 30 years of experience in starting, guiding, and developing emerging and rapid growth companies. Throughout his professional career, Jeanfreau has repeatedly demonstrated his ability to identify opportunity, marshal appropriate resources, and successfully grow new companies to maximum profit. Now he brings his considerable expertise to the clients of iMpact Utah, helping them find solutions to their most pressing issues as a training partner in operational excellence. 

As an entrepreneur who started twelve companies (and sold eight), Jeanfreau knows the perils of starting and running a business; the financial pressure, the operational nightmares, and the ruthless competitors. Rather than parroting disingenuous platitudes, Jeanfreau is driven to provide essential information and applicable tools that get to the heart of the complicated issues manufacturers face—and he has the experience and the vision to back it up. 

Before iMpact Utah, Jeanfreau was the Director of Executive Education and Director of the Business Resource Center (BRC) at the Orem and Wasatch Campuses of Utah Valley University (UVU). While there, Jeanfreau provided executive management training on revenue growth, operational excellence, leadership development, and capital acquisition. Under his leadership, the incubator companies housed at the BRC achieved record investment, specifically, eleven and a half times more investment capital than was achieved in the previous two reporting periods combined. 

Prior to his appointment to the BRC, Jeanfreau was the Director of the Small Business Development Center (SBDC). In his second year as Director, the Orem SBDC achieved all its annual metrics for client revenue growth, capital acquisition, and job creation by mid-year. As Director of the BRC and SBDC, Winthrop was responsible for strengthening Utah’s economic fabric and quality of life by facilitating the success and prosperity of all business endeavors in the Utah valley. 

Before his time at the BRC, Jeanfreau was CEO and founder of Aperion Audio, a manufacturer of audiophile quality home theater speaker systems. Jeanfreau pulled together a world-class team of acoustic engineers, manufacturing, marketing, and technology specialists to ensure Aperion Audio’s success. Jeanfreau was also the co-owner of the Oregon franchise of Shred-it International, a mobile, on-site, shredding and recycling company. Under his management, the Oregon operation set the record for all 100 offices worldwide for growth and profitability.  

Additionally, Jeanfreau was a co-founder, officer, and director of WRLD Enterprises, an Oregon holding company with holdings in Oregon, Washington, and Idaho. He also co-founded and served as an officer and director of Kameleon International, a regional vending system franchiser. Through Kameleon, Winthrop established a network of successful vending operators throughout a 10-state region. As founder and president of InCon Enterprise, Winthrop traveled to Almaty and Kazakhstan where he acquired the marketing rights to the by-products of Utah International’s mining activities in Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan and developed a marketing organization to sell these by-products.  

Jeanfreau holds a Bachelor’s in Communication and a minor in Management from the University of Utah, as well as an MBA from the University of Oregon. Additionally, Jeanfreau sits on the board of directors for the Professional Educators Association, a national association for Directors of University Professional and Executive Education programs worldwide. 

Jeanfreau is an avid reader and lifelong learner. He is rejuvenated by time with family, lazy days on any body of water, hiking, playing tennis, scuba diving, flying small planes, and riding motorcycles.