Rabbi Avraham Edelstein

This blog draws on Antony Jay, How To Run a Meeting, Harvard Business Magazine (March 1976), except where otherwise stated. Don’t Have Meetings at All: Meetings should not be your default option. Resolve what you can through one-on-ones or twos, or phone calls rather than group meetings. Sometimes five minutes spent with six people separately... Read more »

Most meetings that organizations run either waste enormous amounts of time, or are a waste in their entirety. People come late, there often isn’t a clear goal to the meeting (even if there is an agenda), individuals are more or less allowed to speak freely, including off-topic and without limits, and as a result, other... Read more »

The American system does not have an entry bar – a character or wisdom test or an ethics bar that has to be passed to be eligible for President. There is a strong feeling that you can have a bad character and still be a good President. In our previous post, we contrasted this with... Read more »

President Trump’s deeply flawed character resulted in a massive failure this week, the failure of the President of the United States to take timely and vigorous steps to prevent the taking of five lives and many more injured.

(For this blog I am drawing on Michael Lewis, in the Undoing Project, his book on Daniel Kahneman – pp. 181-211). Last week, I dealt with cognitive biases and hence the need to follow a methodical approach in decision making. This week, I want to discuss another aspect of Daniel Kahneman and Amos Tversky’s research:... Read more »

One of the books that made an enormous impact on me is Thinking Fast and Slow, by former Israeli Nobel prize winner, Daniel Kahneman (I am on my fourth reading). Kahneman shows how most of our decisions are made intuitively or with little or no processing, relying on experience and presumptions we have built up... Read more »

In the kiruv world, we have so misused and dumbed down the “leadership” word that it is now virtually meaningless. It is an extra adjective that we slap onto programs when we want them to sound good. We call students who are recruiters “leaders.” We call Israel trips, summits and other events as leadership events,... Read more »

Steven Covey once said that no one puts on his tombstone, “Stayed at the office late every night.” In business, it is clear that someone who did that sacrificed family, Torah learning and other meaningful aspects of his life. What about kiruv? We see our lives not as a parnasah – it is pretty lousy... Read more »

1. Expose students first to the positive experiences of Shabbat meals before talking about melachos: Did not David HaMelech say סור מרע ועשה טוב? First get out of the isurim before engaging positive mitzvos? However, Rav Tzadok HaCohen points out that the first of the עשרת הדברות are then written in the wrong order. HaSh-m... Read more »

The following is based on an article by Sergio DellaPergola in the American Jewish Year Book, 2019 as well as the London-based Institute for Jewish Policy Research. (DellaPergola was also a co-author of that study.) In 2019, the Core Jewish population estimate of global Jewry was 14,707,400, an increase of 100,000 over 2018. The Jewish population is expanding... Read more »

Pages By: Rabbi Avraham Edelstein

The Science of Successful Team Meetings, Part 2

The Science of Successful Team Meetings, Part I

A Jewish Ethic of Protest

A Jewish View of the Recent Events in Washington

Do We Continuously Fool Ourselves?

Decision Making Theory

Leadership – Making a Hackneyed Word Meaningful Again

Making Kiruv Your Life: Are You a Success Addict?

Is Our Approach to Kiruv Based on Torah Principles?

World Jewish Demography

Top 50 Resource Topics