Dan Brody, Financial Advisor

Dan Brody was elected to the position of UUA Financial Advisor by the 2005 General Assembly in Fort Worth. The financial advisor is charged with advising the President and the Board of Trustees on financial policy and on ways of maintaining the institution's financial health.

Brody has extensive experience in financial management and planning. He is currently vice president of the Boston-based Keefe company, an urban planning and real estate development firm that provides service to government, nonprofit and private sector clients. In this position he is responsible for preparing financial analyses, environmental impact documents, and developing Web sites. Before starting the job at Keefe in 2002, Brody was Assistant Dean for Financial Management and Planning for eleven years at the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University. As chief financial officer for the school, he was responsible for a $100 million budget and the management of a ten-person financial office in charge of budgeting, accounting, and research grant administration.

Before starting at the Kennedy School, Brody worked as Deputy State Budget Director for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts from 1987 to 1989. In this capacity he developed and implemented the state's operating and capital budgets totaling $13 billion. Before this, he worked as Assistant State Budget Director and Budget Analyst.

Born in New York City, and raised in a Philadelphia suburb, Brody is a 1971 graduate of Harvard University and has a Master of City and Regional Planning degree from the University of California at Berkeley.

In addition to his professional responsibilities, Brody has served in many volunteer capacities. He is a member of the Board of Directors and the Web site manager for Newton Conservators, in Newton, Massachusetts, a citizens' group advocating to keep the town's open spaces. He has also served as treasurer for Brigham Community House, a drop-in center for teens, and on the Board of Directors at the Riverside Children's Center, both in Newton.

At First Unitarian Society in Newton, where he has been a member for ten years, Brody has served as chair of the board of investment and of the planned giving committee. His involvement with Unitarian Universalism began when his older child, Isaac, who was then 12, announced to the family one day that he wanted a Bar Mitzvah. This was a surprise because no one in the family had participated in a synagogue since Brody's own Bar Mitzvah thirty years earlier. After some discussion revealed that Isaac was really looking for a place to discuss spiritual issues, the family began attending the First Unitarian Society. Isaac and his brother, Andy, were both enthusiastic graduates of the Coming of Age program, and the family's involvement with the Society has continued to grow.

Brody considers communication skills—in addition to his broad financial experience—as one of the important strengths he would bring to the position of financial advisor. "I've worked in complex organizational settings," he says, "often in positions where my effectiveness depended entirely on my ability to listen to others, to reconcile opposing viewpoints, and to persuade people to follow my advice."

Brody believes that one of the greatest challenges facing the denomination is growth. "We need to encourage growth in the denomination by creating new congregations and by increasing our visibility among people, especially youth and communities of color, whom we've had difficulty attracting in the past."