H eadlines
Balaban Continued from Page 1
the challenges you’ve found
since you came on?
Michael Balaban: From a
worldwide challenge, there are
three core areas that keep me
up at night — and likely keep
many in the Jewish world up
at night:
First, the rise of antisem-
itism. No matter what
direction you turn, it seems
to be approaching us, whether
it’s from domestic issues to
global issues. It raises the
question of, will we be safe
as Jews, especially in a land
that we thought we were pretty
secure in? I would encapsu-
late with that the anti-Zionism,
anti-Israel and anti-Jewish
[sentiment] that has boiled up
over the most recent years. I
think we all knew it was under
the surface. Now it’s attacking
us in broad daylight in all sorts
of places in the world.

Second, Jewish Federation’s
purpose is to care for the needs
of the Jewish people and work
to build a more vibrant Jewish
future. In caring for the needs,
there’s greater disparity for
the vulnerable out there today.

And COVID has exacerbated
this, whether it’s aging popula-
tions, frail Holocaust survivors,
individuals with disabilities or
individuals who are financially
insecure. We’ve seen an explo-
sion of need transpire over the
course of the past 18 months.

Third, it’s really the question
— and maybe it’s because of
the age that I’m at, will my
grandchildren be Jewish? And
what does that look like? I
worry about the state of Jewish
vibrancy — how do we engage
more of our youth, the next
generation, to desire to join in
rather than opt out? How do
we ensure, in a world where
denominationalism has dissi-
pated, in a world where we’re
seeing far more interfaith
marriages going on, how do we
embrace as opposed to judge
and project?
JE: And how do you plan to
address all that?
MB: It starts with a
business plan. I don’t know
of a successful business that
operates by luck, or without
a plan. We’re a legacy insti-
tution, and like many legacy
institutions, you get caught
up in this trap of thinking
we’ve been here forever, we’ll
continue to be here forever.

But the world continues to
rotate on its axis. That means
we need to keep evolving and
changing. At some point, we
stopped evolving, we’re still
utilizing the age-old model
for philanthropy that we were
founded under. Yes, we made
tweaks along the decades, but
it is time for a major change
of how we do business. We’re
looking at all of our strategic
core operating elements in
order to retool.

The basic elements are to
move from a sales model to
a service model. To elabo-
rate, we typically pick up the
phone and ask a person the
following: “Last year you gave
X, will you renew your gift to
the community and give Y?”
That was a model that worked
for 100 years. We need to view
our customer, the donor, as
a philanthropic investor.

Investors look for a return, our
job, our service, is to provide
the best solutions and oppor-
tunities for their philanthropic
investment to make the most
impact in the Jewish world.

Jewish Federation of Greater Philadelphia President and CEO Michael
Balaban Courtesy Jewish Federation of Greater Philadelphia
JE: What’s your timeline?
MB: I am really excited
that Mark Fishman and Ben
Kirschner are chairing the
strategic plan for us. I antici-
pate being done with the plan
in six months, but the imple-
mentation is where the rubber
meets the road. My goal is for
us to have some quick wins for
the community, but for trans- and nonprofit world now for
formative change to take root, well over 30 years. There’s a
it will take time.

saying, where you stand
depends on where you sit. When
JE: What was your impres- I last worked in Philadelphia, I
sion of the Jewish Federation was a Director of Development
when you came aboard?
for Penn Medicine, so my
MB: While I may be a recent vantage point on the Jewish
returnee to Philadelphia, I’ve
See Balaban, Page 12
been in the Jewish Federation
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