When Dr. Joseph O’Brien became Executive Director of Chester County Intermediate Unit in 2007 he became Chester County’s highest profile public education official.

With an annual budget of $203 million and a staff of 1,514 serving 38,115 students across all twelve Chester County school districts, leading the Chester County Intermediate Unit is not a job for the faint of heart.

VISTA Today sat down with Dr. O’Brien recently to find out how he got to Chester County and what made him think he could lead such a large and diverse organization.

VISTA Today: What was your first Job Dr. O’Brien?

Joe O’Brien:  When I was a kid growing up at the corner of 57th and Elmwood in southwest Philly I sold donuts and worked a bit at the corner store near our house.  My first real job however, was cleaning bathrooms at the PECO operations center at 23rd and Oregon in South Philly.  I worked that job for two summers when I was 16 and 17 years old.

VT: What lessons did you take from that job?

JO: What stuck with me, stuck with me a lot, in fact, was how people treated custodians.  People had no clue what custodians did.  Cleaning linemen’s bathrooms was very different than cleaning the restrooms for senior management on the fifth floor.  After a hard days work linemen were filthy but they were friendly and easy to work with.  The executives on the fifth floor on the other hand were cleaner but not nearly as nice to be around.   They made me feel invisible at times. As a result, even today, I try to treat people in lower jobs as real people not just cogs in the wheel.

VT: How did you get into education?

JO: I started college wanting to be an engineer.  I had great grades and had my pick of co-op jobs at Drexel University.  I tried several engineering jobs and found I loved the people but hated the work.  My advisor suggested I try accounting only to find I hated that too.  More than a little frustrated with me, my advisor placed me with a couple of Philadelphia-based publishers, and I discovered I liked the education environment.  Finally, in my junior year the same advisor placed me with a crime prevention summer program in North Philadelphia.  I loved working with the kids, and the kids loved me.  I found my calling that summer.

VT: So you discovered your calling, what did you do about it?

JO: Based on my summer camp experience in North Philly, my advisor suggested I go into teaching and put me into a crash teacher prep program at Drexel. My student teaching gig went well, and when I graduated I took what was supposed to be a practice interview with Springfield (Delco) School District.  By the time I got home from the interview Springfield’s HR manager was on the phone with a job offer. So I went to work teaching English at what is now E. T. Richardson Middle School. My starting salary of $7,400 per year was $400 a year less than I made at my first six-month co-op job at Sun Oil.  I ended up spending 3o years at Springfield rising to the rank of assistant principal, then principal and finally Superintendent of the district before retiring in 2004.

VT: How did you get to Chester County?

JO: I needed a new challenge, so after leaving Springfield I went to work for Haddonfield School District in New Jersey as that district’s superintendent.  During my second year at Haddonfield, John Bailey, the then Executive Director of CCIU, called to say he was retiring and invited me to apply for the job.  I said thanks, but no thanks.  A couple of days later however I changed my mind and decided to apply after all.

VT:  What caused you to change your mind?

JO: The CCIU executive director position had always been my dream job.  When I was a principal of Springfield High School, the CCIU worked miracles with a tough kid in my school no one else would work with. I knew what a quality organization Dr. Bailey ran. But I never thought I could get the job of executive director of such a great organization.  After thinking about it and recognizing that if I got the job it would mean a big pay cut, I decided I wanted the job so bad I would apply and see what happened.  That was February. By April, I was hired.

VT: Eight years later, are you glad you applied?

JO: Yes! I am very proud of the IU, the people who work for us and especially our customer service.  We always make the joke we want to be the place that everybody calls when they have a problem.  We make it a practice of never saying, ‘no.’  In fact, our reputation across is the CCIU is the, “can do IU.”  So yes, I’m glad I applied, happy I got the job and loving working with the people here.

VT: Last question.  What is the best piece of advice you ever received?

JO: The best piece of advice I ever got was the guidance my Drexel advisor gave me in college when he urged me to stop thinking about math and science and find a way to work with people. That advice changed my life. I like helping people, and I always pay it forward.

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Top Photo Via West Chester Does