The first time Jeff Greiner laid eyes on Kim, he knew there was something captivating about her.
Jeff was an officer, a captain in the United States Air Force, and Kim was enlisted. Both were stationed in Indiana.
“Jeff first met me when I was arguing with his boss and my boss in the Information Office down the hall from the Wing Commander. Jeff was stunned to see me arguing with his superior officers, which I think made him a bit intrigued,” states Kim, “but I was too concerned with winning my argument to notice. Soon, thereafter, we met at a party and he asked me out.”
The couple was inseparable and wed within the first year of dating.
On February 16, 1979, Jeff and Kim married, with the blessings of the base and wing commanders and the entire senior staff. “It was one of the biggest events of the year at Grissom Air Force Base,” states Kim.
Jeff and Kim’s family grew as they had four children, Renee, Stacy, Joe and Jack. “Renee was ‘Made in Japan’ as we like to say, and the rest of our children, right here in California!”
Not only do Jeff and Kim share a love for one another, they are also committed to each other in the workplace. Together, they worked as a team at Advanced Bionics, a global biomedical company that improves lives by manufacturing, marketing, and supporting state-of-the-art cochlear implants for those with severe-to-profound hearing loss. “Jeff led and built Advanced Bionics from its infancy into a multi-product company, and I was his partner at home, who later became involved in AB while building multiple employee programs and planning employee appreciation events,” states Kim. “He is a natural born leader…we were a team who complemented one another.”
“In the building of our company,” states Jeff, “there were many challenges along the way; creating sophisticated technology to enable deaf people to hear; battling with an overly bureaucratic FDA, satisfying a demanding principal shareholder and Chairman of the Board, and building a leadership team that put the interests of the Company over their own. During this journey involving constant struggle, there was one person who always had my back: Kim. I am lucky…and blessed.”
How do they make it work? “You need to be equal partners in all levels of responsibilities at home and at work,” states Kim. “You need to always be setting the bar higher. You have to be the kind of person your partner respects and he or she needs to do the same. Most of all you have to be selfless in marriage and in business. It’s not about you or what you want, it’s about what the marriage needs and it’s about what the business needs.”
This month, Kim and Jeff will be celebrating 34 years of marriage. “Kim is funny, full of energy, competitive, athletic, and always entertaining,” states Jeff. “Because of her, my life has been more adventurous, more combative over meaningful issues, and more full.”
“I like that Jeff has always been motivated by mission and never by power, prestige, position or prosperity. He’s authentic and a much better man than I am a woman…I feel very lucky …” |
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