Employee Spotlight: Brendan Kelly

Job Title: Digital Content & Web Services Administrator
Location: Harrisonburg Branch
Tenure: Nearly 4 years 
Are you involved in any other clubs or organizations? I'm heavily involved in Scouting. I am an Eagle Scout, serve on and was a long-time Committee Chair of my local Cub Scout pack, am the Advancement Chair of my son's Scouts BSA troop and I serve as the Shenrapawa District Advancement Chair of the Shenandoah Area Council, where my duties include the honor of sitting on Eagle Scout Boards of Review. I have also been involved in my local Little League, serving on its board for several years, coaching and umpiring many, many games.

Tell us about your family. My wife, Jessica, and I have been married for 23 years and have two children – Kris, 18, and John, 15. Jessica is the Senior Director, Research and Web Technology at The Urban Institute, a nonprofit research organization; Kris is a first-year student studying Environmental Horticulture at Virginia Tech; and John is a sophomore in high school with an eye on sports statistics/analytics.
Where did you grow up? I'm originally from eastern Ohio/western Pennsylvania (I was born in, and went to school in, PA, but we lived in OH about a mile from the state line). Then we moved to Maryland (between Baltimore and D.C.) when I was about 10 years old, but I maintained family ties to OH/PA and would go back and spend time there during the summers.
What is your favorite personal mantra or motto? "Delay is preferable to error." –Thomas Jefferson. Although Jefferson was talking about a slow bureaucratic process of reviewing a letter, I've found the quote to be helpful many times throughout my career with technology upgrades and transitions. However, it does need to be balanced with, "Perfect is the enemy of good."
What is your favorite food? This is going to sound either gross or weird to most people, but it's what my mother's family calls, "Meat Pie." It was something my grandmother's family made during the Depression, and all it consists of is sliced potatoes, ground beef and onion boiled together (plus salt and pepper). When the potatoes are done, you bake it with a biscuit topping. My wife tried to add vegetables to it once and got in big trouble. If it doesn't taste good, you just need to add more salt.
Tell us about your hobbies. With two kids, my hobbies were their hobbies for a long time. Scouting and Little League have taken up a good part of my time for about the last 10 years. That said, our family loves to travel, and we try to do a big trip at least once a year (the last couple of years we've gone to Iceland, Denmark and the Faroe Islands).

Have you ever collected anything? The only thing I've seriously collected is memorabilia signed by Pittsburgh Pirates. I now have an extensive autograph collection of Pirates Hall of Famers, as well as Pirates players who aren't in the Hall of Fame but have had a significant impact on my fandom. I'm only missing a couple of players from the 1800s that are nearly impossible to obtain.
What was your dream job as a child? My dream job as a child was to be a stockbroker. I went to a business-centric college and majored in Finance, but found out that wasn't for me and ended up in Business Communication.
What is the most interesting or favorite aspect of your job? My favorite aspect of my job is that I get to work with people across the organization. I love having different things to do every day and interacting with the different departments.
What are your favorite weekend activities? Some weekends I just want to relax and do basically nothing, but others we book solid with sports, marching band competitions and adventures. Baseball is a huge part of our life, so during the spring and summer, we're usually at a ballpark. We're also Pittsburgh Steelers season ticket holders, so we go to a few Steelers games a year, too.

What is one random fact you'd like to share? I am an award-winning home brewer, Recognized beer judge with the Beer Judge Certification Program, as well as a trained professional brewer, although I haven't brewed anything in quite some time. Maybe now with a kid in college (and one going soon), I'll be able to get back to it.
What is your favorite childhood memory? My favorite memory is a collection of them. My parents, aunt and grandparents bought a small cottage in Ohio on Lake Erie in 1976 for $6,000, and because my mother was a teacher and my grandmother was retired, we used to live there in the summer. Days were filled with time at the beach, running around and playing with the neighborhood kids. We continued to go for at least a week every summer until my mom and aunt sold the place about 5 years go. There are too many memories there to pick just one.
What are three words your friends would use to describe you? My friends would describe me as loyal, generous and fun.