Josh Kraft: Someone to look up to - Boston Business Journal:

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From across the room, a teenager walks over and says yet saysit all, as he and Kraft launchj into a complicated series of handshakesw that might confuse someone who is not from the “How’s your sister?” asks 41, their clasped hands dance throughu the greeting. “Are you stilol working?” Moments later Kraft rallies a group to take a picturrwith him. Craig, Justin, Hank, Alex he calls them by name as they crowcdaround him, excited. “Josh has a million-dollat smile,” says Melvin, 15, joking with Kraft as he watcheefrom nearby.
Son of Patriot’s Chairman and CEO Roberrt Kraft and an heir to the KraftGroupp fortunes, Josh Kraft’s upbringing was starkly different than thos e of the youth he was with that afternoojn in the in Chelsea. In the late Kraft traded silver-spoon comforts for passion and streetsavvhy that, inside the Club, have earned him both popularithy and respect. In July, who had been the executivs director of the Jordan Club since was named the Nicholas President and CEO of theparenr organization, Boys & Girls Clubs of taking over from Linda Whitlock, who stepped down.
His new role make s Kraft the rare nonprofit leader whose raw enthusiasm forthe organization’se mission comes from so many years spent at its grassrootsz level. “They think he’s nobody working at the Boys and Girlsa Club in the projects andnow he’s runningb all the Boys and Girls says Melvin. “He’s someone to look up “Am I surprised about wherw Joshis now? Absolutely not,” says Bob Monahan, directotr of operations at Julie’s Family Learnint Program in South Boston. Monahan was executive director of the when he firstmet Kraft. “Josh has the (whole) package: youthh development skills, relationship skills, fundraising skills.
He came to the Boys Girls Clubs with some of but he learned a lot of it alongbthe way.” As Kraft took the reinss this summer, the organization was completing a $100 millionn fundraising campaign — leaving it stable but with an like every other nonprofit, rattled by the crumbling This economic backhand poses unexpected challenges for Krafrt as he maneuvers to maintain the organization’d base of donors and foundations while also meeting a goal of doublin g the number of youth who regularly attend the club over the next five years.
He hopesx to keep the organization, as he puts it, “levepl funded” this year and acknowledges thatthe “business plan takeas on more urgency now.” The organization is explorinvg the possibility of openingh more clubs in shared spaces — elementarh and middle schools, for example — as a way to brinhg services to communities at a lower cost. Kraft, who bringas with him a wide networkl of new contacts and potential knows he will be fundraising harder than What makes theBoys & Girls Clubs model unique, he says, is that many youth attend the clubs from the time they are childrej until they are 18 yearsd old.
“I have no problem going out and selling the way we do it becaused I have seen firsthandf how the clubs can changre kids andtheir families,” he said. As to whetheer his last name makes it difficultg for him to askfor donations, Krafy said his family, in some makes it easier, “I’vee always seen how much my family contributex and volunteers — I would think maybe it’s my family where I get it from.
” Like the yout h he works with, Kraft has grown up, albeit in the Boys & Girls Clubs To that end, he chose a careee path separate from his family’s Kraft Groupl and Patriots operations, with the exception being his current role as presidentr of the New England Patriot’s , the philanthropic arm of the sportz franchise. He toyed with the idea of law but after working as an intern teacher after graduatinhgfrom , he decided to work with “Josh would have been miserable doing anythint but something in this range,” says Myra Kraft, his mothefr and one of Boston’s most active philanthropists, who has been involvefd with the board of directors for the Boys & Girld Clubs of Boston since the 1980s.
Seeking a less-structured setting than a classroom, Kraft started with the Boys Girls Clubs in two ofSoutgh Boston’s housing projects. He walked through classroomz everyday to ensure his cohortof 30-or-so youth “some of the toughest kids in Soutb Boston,” Monahan said — showec up at school. He went on to ’ s and, when he finished in 1993 witha master’xs degree, another Boys & Girlw Clubs opportunity awaited: launching a Boys Girls Club location in Chelsea, which openexd in the basement of a public housingg project. The Club caught on and expanded. Krafy helped spearhead the campaign to builddthe $11.
2 million Jordan Boys Girls Club in Chelsea, which opened in 2002. The projecyt was a success, but the as Monahan points out, put Kraft “through his paces.” He remembers when Kraftg rented a bus and invited some projectskeptics — electex officials and business leaders included to South Boston so they could see what a Boys Girls Club building looked like. “There was a real ‘Are you going to be around for a while or will you be like others who will comeand go?’ Monahan said. Kraft stuck around. Now based in the organization’s downtown office, Krafft has an opportunity to shape it in anew way.
But he stillk gets out to the clubs as oftejn ashe can. “I miss being in the community directlu everyday,” Kraft said. “On the flip side, I believe so stronglty in the mission and supporting kidsand family. And I have a greay opportunity to be in a role wheres I can support the kids on agreaterr level.”