2008 40 Under Forty: Patrick Lynch
Patrick Lynch
Age: 35
Title: Executive Director
Company: Destination Worcester
Company location: Worcester
Residence: Framingham
Career highlights:
I’m the executive director of Destination Worcester which promotes Worcester as a meeting and event destination. I started in the hospitality industry at 14 working at Nashawtuc Country Club in Concord. During and after college I worked as an EMT, but left that and worked briefly for Sue & John Zahner at Tastings Catering until I started at the Sheraton Commander Hotel in Cambridge as food and beverage manager. From Boston I went to the Crowne Plaza in Natick as the director of sales and marketing and then to the Providence Warwick CVB as director of national accounts.
Community involvement:
While attending college in Vermont I became a firefighter and advanced Emergency Medical Technician and have worked as a volunteer EMT for St. Michael’s College Fire and Rescue for the 16 years since. During that time I also worked as a paid EMT, but volunteering or paid, assisting someone in a desperate time of need has always been rewarding. Locally, I work with the Massachusetts Urban Search & Rescue Task Force (MATF1).
Biggest professional success:
I just completed my term as chapter president of the New England Chapter of Meeting Professionals International (MPI). In 2002, I started volunteering on committees and was placed on the board of directors in 2004. Through my time as a volunteer leader I gained experience and an education I could not have paid for.
Dream job:
I think as I approach retirement my wife and I would like to open a seasonal bed and breakfast somewhere in Maine or Vermont.
Businessperson he admires most:
My in-laws. In 1981 they left England and headed to the Caribbean island of Anguilla, BWI based on a letter they received from a friend that said there were opportunities for young driven individuals there. Having managed pubs in northern England for many years the two opened a fish & chips shack on the beach that has grown into Roy’s Bayside Grill, a well known island restaurant visited by everyone from local islanders to celebrities and royalty from around the world. Their journey was not an easy one; they worked extremely hard rebuilding after several hurricanes and putting in countless hours to build a successful business.
If you weren’t doing the job you’re doing now, what would you do?
I took the job at the Sheraton Commander Hotel as a stopover while I tried to get hired as a firefighter in and around the Boston area, but stopped taking firefighter exams after I took the job at the Greater Boston CVB, so if I wasn’t doing this, it would be because I had gotten a job as a firefighter.
Favorite movie:
White Christmas, it reminds you of what’s really important.
If you were stuck on a desert island what book would you want to have with you?
“The SAS Survival Handbook” by John Wiseman and “The Great Gatsby,” by F. Scott Fitzgerald.
WBJ Web Partners
Most Recent
Most Recent
0 Comments