Mario Carmona, associate director of Documents and Media, will be retiring in June. We sat down with him to reflect on his 30+ year career at UCSF and the lessons he learned along the way about leadership, adaptation, and staying relevant.
Tell me a little bit about how you got started working in the Documents and Media (DM) space, and then what brought you to UCSF?
I came over to UCSF from San Francisco State. I was doing operations for the campus bookstore there at State, and I'd been there nine years. The opportunity happened when we had a bookstore at Millberry Union, where the pharmacy is now. I was the bookstore sales floor manager.
Reprographics moved into Campus Auxiliary Services (now known as Campus Life Services), and when that happened, their director saw the work I was doing for the bookstore and said, ‘I need to pull you out of the bookstore and just have you do all the marketing for all of my units’. He was running Reprographics, mail services, the bookstore, the technology store, and logistics (known then as distribution and storage). I was working as his assistant to the director, then as a marketing manager, holding a bunch of different titles within his division of CAS.
In 2008, we were trying to figure out the future of our print operations at UCSF, and the director encouraged me to really embed in Reprographics and Mail. So, I did, and that's where I've been ever since. I've been associated with Documents and Media since 1997.
The Documents and Media team poses for a silly photo following a group meeting.
From what I've seen, just by visiting Documents and Media, it's gone through so many different iterations as technology and the university's interests have shifted. During your time here, what is the biggest change that you've witnessed?
For the 2023 UCSF Waste to Art challenge, Mario reconfigured a desktop printer that was set for surplus and transformed it into a robot, and a as a sustainability conversation piece.
Yeah, definitely. When I became associated with the operation, our main shop actually was over in South San Francisco. We had offset printing presses and press operators. For a period of time, we actually had those presses in our big production room at MCB. We dealt with a camera room, making plates, printing, and ink, and all that kind of stuff. It was an old school print shop. The biggest change was when the technology got where it needed to be for us to use it, which was using digital presses. When they made the decision of pulling out the offset printing presses and just going all digital, I think that was a big change.
The other big change that happened I still remember, us producing using multiple part forms as part of our job intake. So, if you walked in to see us and needed to get something done, somebody would take out that 8 ½ x 11 multiple-page sheet form, and they'd go, ‘Hi, how can I help you?’ and they would write out your order, and then they would tear off the yellow copy and hand it to you. And that's gone now. Everything's by email, or you use an online Qualtrics form, or there's a TouchNet store, and just all that kind of technology. To keep up, you need to embrace it.
I think it's a very relevant thing to think about and talk about today, as we're seeing another shift with the onset of AI, and to consider how we adapt so that what we do remains relevant and important enough to stick around.
I remember when [people thought] paper was going to go, and printing was going to die. We were all going to have Kindles and use our tablets to do reading, and books were going to go away. And we were going to be in major trouble.
And the fact is, here we are today, and people love reading books. They love touching printed things because they want to get away from their technology. There's been this ignoring of that part of the population that isn't into technology, that don't want to always be stuck on their phone, or they don't want it– that whole fear of being tracked.
Literally just walk around a grocery mart store and look around– all the stuff that is printed. The cardboard box that holds cereal - that's a printed box. The shopping bag for the store is a printed bag. Print is never going away.
Mario and his wife, Esther Carmona.
You just celebrated 30 years at UCSF last year. Did you ever imagine that you would be here at UCSF for this long? And if not, what made you stay?
I'll be totally honest, within my first five years of my career at UCSF, I didn't know if I was going to stay at UCSF. But then, one thing changed, which was my wife; she was working at UC Law. She was a big driving force to go, ‘let's see how things play out here’. Then came all these growth opportunities within our unit.
Read about Mario's 30 year legacy, in the words of his peers.
I think that's what kept me here, really. I felt I had a responsibility to my team to keep making sure we're around, relevant, and represented right.
If you could share one thing with someone who doesn't know much about Documents and Media, what would you want them to know?
For most people, when you need something printed, most likely you're going to go online and look for custom printing or go to FedEx Office, or a UPS Store. Well, at UCSF, you don't need to do that because we’re your in-house printing implant. So, anything printed you need access to, we can either produce it in-house on campus or we have partner vendors who can quickly allow us to get you what you need. And the value of that is you're able to use recharge, which is the university billing payment system, and you don't pay sales tax, you don't need to deal with getting reimbursed, or cutting POs [purchase orders], requesting checks, or using a procurement or personal credit card. You just give us your recharge account (COA or Speedtype), and we'll take care of it. You don't need to go anywhere else.
Campus Life Services COO and Executive Director Joanna Trammel and Communications Director Sean Aloise to visit Mario Carmona and Business Development Manager Pamela Krol to see the Documents and Media operations at UC Berkeley. Doe Library, February 2026.
During the time that you've been with UCSF, what accomplishments are you most proud of?
If I were to pin it down, it's definitely three great years from 2009 to 2011. In 2009, when we were able to partner with UC Hastings [now UC Law] to take over their Business Center, and managing their entire campus printing fleet for students, as well as for departments.
The second one was in 2010. UC Printing Services was completely shut down, and we were able to go to UC Berkeley and, pretty quickly, take over the printing that they were doing for the entire UC Berkeley campus, as well as the Office of the President. At the same time, we launched managing the student and department copier fleet for the UC Library, there on campus for all their libraries.
Then, in 2011, John Plotts [former Senior Vice Chancellor for Finance and Administration] allowed Documents and Media to officially manage the UCSF Print Management Program (PMP) and manage campus copiers and printers at UCSF.
Mario Carmona presents on managing a successful copier management fleet at the 2026 ACUP Conference in Dallas, Texas.
To be able to be in that position to take the lead on having that happen under CLS leadership and for DM, I think that was a big thing. As I leave, I know that this is just part of DM operations now: we’re in Berkeley, we’re at UC Law SF, and we have the print management program. We’re it.
Carmona and Pamela Krol pose with the ACUP+ Gold Production Award.
We just came back from the ACUP [Association of College and University Printers] conference, and when we tell people there that we're managing over 1,000 office print devices, it just blows them away because at their school, they might be managing like only 20, 50,100, or 400 devices. So, it’s pretty amazing what we're doing.
Congrats again on winning the 2026 ACUP+ GOLD Production Award for Decals & Stickers.
Yeah, Ko [Kong, senior graphic designer] had a great design and with our sticker production work, it was a good team effort!
What has being at UCSF taught you about being a good leader?
They tell you that thing about learning from your mistakes. My feeling has always been, yes, learn from your mistakes, but also learn from others’ mistakes. So, if I've learned anything at UCSF about how to be a good manager, it is seeing the errors my peers have committed over the years and avoiding them as much as possible.
One of the biggest challenges we have had in the department previously was having a manager or a supervisor who was really good at giving directions and telling people what to do, but who never ‘got their hands dirty’. I always ‘get my hands dirty’. I want to understand what the job is and be able to do it myself. So then, when you're doing it, I can help you. If something's out of whack and you're telling me, ‘hey, this isn't working’, I can understand.
What I’ve learned to do that helped me succeed at UCSF is being hands-on, being willing to support my team, and knowing when to get out of their way.
From left to right: (top) Antonio Carmona, Brianna Carmona, (bottom) Mario Carmona, and Esther Carmona at Dolores Park.
In addition to your wife working at UCSF, your children also work at UCSF. What is it like having your whole family in the UCSF community?
My son actually worked in DM as an unpaid intern. We wanted him to be a good student and wanted him to understand that everybody contributes, and that sometimes you got to get your hands dirty, and that's where you're going to start. So, he knew what UCSF was. Everybody knew him as a kid growing up.
He applied to UCSF and worked in the Controller's Office for a period of time. And then he jumped over to IT. It was one of those things where he did that on his own because I don't know anything about computers outside of work stuff. He is totally an IT engineering guy.
And my daughter, she works for UCSF Health. She's a diet clerk and goes between Stanyan and Hyde, but it's the same kind of thing. She got her degree in Nutrition from [San Francisco] State, and the first path was to UCSF. She did the same unpaid intern thing here at DM, too, so she gets it.
Read the UC news profile about the Carmonas, UCSF's 'first family'.
I think it's just cool that they're here at UCSF. [My wife and I] will be retiring. And if they decide to stick long-term with it, hopefully in 30 years, when I'm 90, they'll be retiring from UCSF!
ACUP “wanted" Mario to stay longer. 2026, Dallas Texas.
Tell me about what's next for you. What are you looking forward to in this next chapter?
As long-term managers at UCSF using standard technology, we're connected to our phones 24/7. So even though it's an 8-to-5 kind of office, we're working all the time because you'll get work-related texts and emails. You are never really free from work, unfortunately. I think that I'm looking forward to not having my electronic work leash.
The other one is, you know, how on Fridays you look forward to the weekend? Well, every day is going to be the weekend for me! I'm looking forward to not caring about the weekend and then sleeping in.
I love sleeping in. And traveling. Esther and I are hoping to go to Europe. And also want to get back to Japan.
Well, that sounds exciting. I'm very happy for you. And I’ll be lamenting the days until that can be my future.
I know…slow and steady. It's like the tortoise. Slow and steady.
