Stephen Chan

Stephen Chan serves as Vice President of Strategy and Operations and Corporate Secretary. Internally, he facilitates strategy management and alignment across the organization, ensures effective board development and administration, and advances equity and effectiveness in its people, facility operations and culture. Externally, Stephen co-leads the Foundation’s civic leadership role to inform public discourse and action to advance a prosperous and equitable region.  This includes overseeing Boston Indicators, the Foundation’s in-house research center, and the Foundation’s public forums and events program which uplifts the work of our many partners and educates, connects, and mobilizes several thousand attendees annually.  Stephen also supports the advancement of two of the Foundation’s Affinity Funds, the Asian Community Fund and the Equality Fund focused on expanding funding to community-led programs in the Asian immigrant and LGBTQ+ communities respectively.

Stephen brings a range of policy and strategy experience to his work at the Foundation.  He has served as an Advisor to Mayor Thomas M. Menino at the City of Boston where he launched the Mayor’s Office of Food Initiatives to advance citywide efforts on farmers markets, urban agriculture, food trucks, and healthy school food.  At the Mayor’s Office, he also helped design and support public-private initiatives to grow financial empowerment, boost college completion, foster school-community partnerships, and build family economic security.  Stephen has also held a number of consulting roles, including advising the Boston Public Schools Office of Human Resources on the district’s teacher recruitment strategy and conducting research for a healthcare distribution industry association at Booz & Co.

He is a board member of the Massachusetts LGBT Chamber of Commerce, ACLU of Massachusetts, Bunker Hill Community College, Philanthropy Massachusetts, and Asian American Pacific Islanders in Philanthropy where he serves as national board chair.  He also serves on the advisory board of the Harvard Rappaport Institute for Greater Boston.  In 2006, he co-founded Saffron Circle, Boston’s first Asian giving circle and a Donor-Advised Fund at the Boston Foundation.

Stephen received his MBA from Harvard Business School, MPA from Harvard Kennedy School, and BA with Honors in Public Policy from Stanford University.  He is a member of the LeadBoston class of 2020 and recognized in 2018 on the GK100 Most Influential People of Color in Boston and in 2019 on the GK25 Most Influential LGBTQ+ People of Color in Boston.

He lives in Boston with his husband and two children.