Kairos Shen serves as the Chief of Planning for the City of Boston. He oversees the Planning Cabinet’s core missions of community-engaged planning, regulation of major real estate development, and management of the BPDA’s real estate property (over 20 million square feet). His work leading the Planning Department includes transitioning the city to a consistent and modernized zoning code, comprehensive short and long term planning, creating inclusive design standards, and making development review more streamlined and predictable. Shen was Executive Director of the MIT Center for Real Estate from 2020-2024, and currently teaches “City Making” at the MIT Center for Real Estate, drawing on knowledge, research, and practice across the fields of planning, design, public policy, finance, and real estate. As the Executive Director, he oversaw the Master of Science Real Estate Development degree program as well as the Center’s relationships and partnerships with the development, architecture, and design industries. Prior to his career in academia, Shen previously worked in City Hall in a number of different roles in planning and design over the course of two decades under Mayor Thomas Menino and Mayor Martin Walsh. Shen helped shape the City’s most pivotal planning initiatives and development projects from 1993-2015, a period of substantial growth and investment in the City. Shen is a graduate of Swarthmore College and has a Master of Architecture from MIT.