Real Estate and Development | Real Estate
President and CEO
GRAEF | Milwaukee
John Kissinger built his career working on prominent projects such as the Quadracci Pavilion at the Milwaukee Art Museum, the renovation of Lambeau Field and the expansion of Chicago’s McCormick Place. He leads Milwaukee-based GRAEF, a civil engineering, planning and design firm with nearly 300 employees in 10 offices. The firm has done work on projects throughout the state including Milwaukee Tool’s corporate headquarters in Brookfield, University of Wisconsin-Madison’s Southeast Recreational Facility and the Bradley Symphony Center in Milwaukee.
Education: Bachelor’s, UW-Milwaukee; masters, UW-Madison
Fun fact: “I like to dance!”
Business leaders you’d like to have dinner with: “(The late) Bill Shook and (the late) Michael Cudahy. Bill Shook was a construction executive with Clark Construction and a great mentor of mine. Michael Cudahy was trained as an engineer and I always found him to be an interesting conversationalist.”
Top of your bucket list: “Visit Machu Picchu.”
Nonprofit cause that has special meaning to you: “The GRAEF Foundation, which was formed by our founders. The GRAEF Foundation annually awards college scholarships to engineering majors at five universities including the Milwaukee School of Engineering, UW-Milwaukee, UW-Platteville, UW-Madison, and Marquette University. We also fund a scholarship for underrepresented engineering students through the ACE mentor program of Chicago. We also fund a variety of other STEM programs.”
