Last Sunday, January 11th, Cohort 2 met back up again for our fifth workshop. Our meeting started on a low note when we found out Jessica was sick and would not be able to attend. However, our spirits quickly rose when Amanda and Robby, our great JCs, expertly took the reins.
We kicked
off the meeting by discussing all of our fun experiences over winter break.
Many of us traveled around the United States to warmer locals like Arizona,
California, or Florida and other Fellows even traveled abroad. Others, myself
included, stayed in the Chicagoland area, where we got the chance to
relax with friends and family, study for midterms, or check out some of the
latest blockbusters.
After our
icebreaker and warm up event, we received anonymous partners who we passed
notes with to simulate the pen pal experience. I got the chance to learn some
interesting facts about my partner, like her favorite foods and colors!
However, I think because of how well we have gotten to know each other over the
last few months most of us were able to guess partners easily and they did not
remain anonymous for long.
To
further introduce the pen pal program our cohort is creating in conjunction
with our Israeli counterparts, Robby and Amanda shared with us some of their
experiences with their pen pals. They each showed off some fun snippets of
their first conversations with their partners and pictures of them together in
Israel. It was interesting to see them develop from awkward small talk to true
friends. I'm definitely excited to receive my pen pal!
Finally
we got to our main event, planning our second Shabbaton. Before we were able to
get to work though, we learned about self-management and the Diller approach to
it through an informative Prezi entitled “The Journey of Milk and Cookies.” We
discovered that the four sets of questions that are key to self management are
Mission, Vision, Goals, and Objectives. We learned that Mission is the big
“why,” the overall purpose of a project. Vision's question is “where to?” It is
the ultimate dream, the ideal realization of the Mission that the creators of
the project strive for. Goals, we learned, are the “how” questions and through
them, one determines the broad steps necessary to achieve the Vision.
Objectives practically and concretely answer the questions “who, what, where,
and when?” We learned that Objectives must be SMART: specific, measurable,
attainable, rewarding, and timed. Through Objectives a project's Goals can be
broken down from broad steps to smaller, more manageable tasks. Throughout the
presentation, we explored real life examples of Missions, Visions, Goals, and
Objectives in various companies and organizations like the JUF or LA Fitness.
As a reward for completing our “Journey of Milk and Cookies,” we got the chance
to take a short snack break with some Oreo cookies!
In the
next step of planning process, our cohort collaborated to create a Mission,
Visions, Goals, and Objectives for the upcoming Shabbaton. We decided that we
wanted to be sure the Shabbaton encouraged an open, accepting environment with
a Shabbat atmosphere where we could all learn from each other. Our logistics
managers, Fellows Josh and Colman, helped organize us into four different
committees to plan four different aspects of the weekend. I joined the games
and bonding committee while others joined the leadership or rituals committees.
In our committees we once again applied the Mission, Vision, Goals, and Objectives
outline to plan out our Shabbaton. I can't tell you what my group planned,
but you can be sure it's going to a ton of fun, especially because of the
valuable self-management skills gained in this workshop!
By: Matan Cutler
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