Meet Jonathan T.M. Reckford: A Biographical Sketch

It has been said that if we take on God-sized tasks, then it is clear to everyone who deserves the credit. Habitat for Humanity’s ultimate goal—a world where everyone has a decent place to live—certainly is a God-sized task. It is humbling to serve alongside the thousands of committed supporters of this ministry of building not only houses, but hope, dignity and communities.
-- Jonathan T.M. Reckford

With professional experience ranging from Wall Street to corporate suite to church ministry, Jonathan T.M. Reckford brings to his role as chief executive officer of Habitat for Humanity International a passion for serving those in need and the business skills required to lead an effective, efficient international nonprofit organization.

A native of North Carolina, Reckford earned his undergraduate degree in political science from the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill. He earned an MBA, with a certificate in public and nonprofit management, from Stanford University Graduate School of Business.

Reckford began his career as a financial analyst from 1984-86 at Goldman, Sachs & Co. in New York. Regularly working 80 hours a week, he found the position professionally stimulating but ultimately determined that investment banking was not the career for him. Perhaps, he says, the decision had to do with living in Times Square that year and walking by scores of street people on his way to the subway each morning.

“The magnitude of the misery was overwhelming,” he recalls, particularly against the backdrop of the megadeals he was working on in the business world, and the lessons he had taken to heart growing up in a family long involved in justice and civil rights work. His parents were active in the civil rights struggle in North Carolina and his grandmother, the late New Jersey congresswoman Millicent Fenwick, was widely known for her commitment to justice issues. She drafted the legislation that resulted
in formation of the Helsinki Commission to monitor compliance with the Helsinki Accord on human rights.

Not sure what his next career step should be, Reckford applied for a Henry Luce Scholarship, a program designed to give future leaders the opportunity to live and work for a year in Asia. As a Luce Scholar, he worked for the Olympic Organizing Committee, preparing for the 1988 Olympic Games in Seoul, Korea. With experience in competitive rowing, he also was asked to coach the Korean national rowing team.

It was during that year that his serious faith journey began. While he characterizes himself as a Christian in name before that time, it was in Korea that he began meeting weekly with a friend to explore issues of faith in depth. They spent the year, Reckford explains, “walking through the Bible,” an exploration that led to a decision to begin a personal relationship with Jesus Christ.

“That was in March of ’87,” he says, “and nothing has been the same since.”

At the conclusion of his Olympic duties, and following an eye-opening, three-month journey through Southeast Asia, Reckford returned to the United States and began work on his MBA degree. While he was acquiring the skills needed to succeed in the business world, a professor’s words struck home with him: “The same skills that will make you a success in the for-profit world also are desperately needed in the not-for-profit world.”

With that idea planted in his mind, and degree in hand, he set off to ply his skills in the for-profit world with the goal “some day” of using his business experience in the nonprofit arena.

His immediate goal, though, was landing a position in Washington, D.C., where his soon-to-be fiancée Ashley was practicing law. His search led him to the Marriott Corp. and a position as manager of service group strategy and business development.

Reckford’s next career stop was the Walt Disney Co. in Orlando, Fla., where he worked in a variety of management and executive roles from 1991-95. In 1995, he joined Circuit City Stores Inc. as vice president, earning a promotion to senior vice president for corporate planning and communications in 1997. Two years later, he was recruited to become president of stores for Musicland. In that position, he led 1,330 Sam Goody, Suncoast Motion Picture Co., Media Play and On Cue stores, delivering record earnings for the company.

When Musicland was acquired by Best Buy Inc. in 2001, Reckford helped lead the division through the integration process. But he began thinking it might be time to take his experience from the business world to not-for-profit work.

Active in local faith communities wherever he had lived, Reckford had found an avocation helping to coach pastors in dealing with the management side of church life. As he prayed and went through a period of discernment about what he should be doing next in life, it was natural that he would continue actively volunteering with his church, Christ Presbyterian in Edina, Minn. Eventually, in 2003, that volunteer service turned into full-time ministry as executive pastor of the 4,300-member church.

As much as he enjoyed that work, “God has this way of showing up at unexpected times with surprises,” he says. This time, the surprise was a call informing him of Habitat’s search for a CEO. A longtime admirer of Habitat’s “empowering approach to ministry” in helping low-income families build and buy homes, Reckford believed the organization was a good fit with his personal faith and values, and that his business career had honed the skills needed to lead a nonprofit with excellence.

“The chance to serve Habitat combines many of the things I am most passionate about, with the potential to put my skills and gifts to use for a greater purpose,” he says.

He was unanimously elected chief executive officer by the board of directors of Habitat for Humanity International in August 2005.

Since that time he has authored a book titled “Creating a Habitat for Humanity: No Hands but Yours.” Framed around Reckford’s life verse of Micah 6:8*, the book explores the need for decent, affordable shelter in the world and the notion of a personal call to action. The transformation of individuals, families and communities is a recurring theme in the book as well. To order, contact Augsburg Fortress Publishers at (800) 328-4648 or online at www.augsburgfortress.org. The book also is available at www.amazon.com and at Borders and Barnes & Noble book stores. To read more about “Creating a Habitat for Humanity,” visit www.creatingahabitat.org .

Reckford lives in Atlanta, Ga., with his wife Ashley and their children Alexander, Grace and Lily.

*“He has showed you, O man, what is good. And what does the Lord require of you? To act justly, and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God.” NIV