Proposal for a Community Adaptive Leadership Program

MAY 2018

_____________________________________________________
Organization: GVAHIM NGO

Registration Number: 580512390

Address: 68 Einstein St., PO Box 39311, Tel Aviv 61392, ISRAEL

Contact: Lea Elbaze | Director Strategic Development
leael@gvahim.org.il
+972 (0)58-426-2655
Office Number: (+972) 3-7768100
Website: www.gvahim.org.il

Dear Shawna,
We are honored to solicit the Morris & Rosalind Goodman Family Foundation as a strategic
partner for our community development program.
Gvahim is a game changer non-profit organization for highly skilled immigration to Israel.
Gvahim’s mission is to strengthen the Israeli human capital by maximizing the impact of skilled
new immigrants through their professional fulfillment and growth. With the increased mobility
of the global workplace and the global competition for attracting talents, Israel has to cope with a
‘brain drain’, the loss of human capital, which has a direct impact on the economic, social and
cultural development of the country. Highly-skilled new immigrants are an economic and
cultural asset to Israel, they bring with them a wealth of knowledge and experience in an array of
industries. Approximately 10,000 skilled new immigrants move every year to Israel; however, the
state of Israel does not necessarily know how to maximize their potential and employment
remains their number one obstacle to a successful integration into the country.
Gvahim was established to provide skilled new immigrants with the essential platforms and
tools for finding employment relevant to their experience and qualifications through its Career
Programs or for turning their idea into a successful business through its Start-Up Accelerators &
Small Businesses Programs.
With more than 3,000 alumni, 800 corporate partners, 700 mentors, a success rate of 91% for
our general career program, 130 start-ups accelerated and more than 250 new jobs created by
our alumni entrepreneurs, Gvahim is the leading organization in its field, helping skilled
immigrants to integrate the Israeli job market & entrepreneurship ecosystem.
We hope that our proposal will convince you of the opportunity to support the Gvahim
community development program in order to facilitate the creation of an Adaptive Leadership
Community for the benefit of new immigrants and for the greater benefit of Israel’s society.
Best regards,
Lea Elbaze |Director, Strategic Development

Table of Contents
1. About Gvahim Community........................................................................................................... 2

2. Leveraging Gvahim Community to maximize Gvahim’s Impact...................................................2

2.1. Building a Leadership Community....................................................................................... 3

2.2. Pillars of the Program.......................................................................................................... 3

3. The Impact.................................................................................................................................... 5

4. Budget.......................................................................................................................................... 5

1. About Gvahim Community

Gvahim is a community-oriented organization who believes in the power of community

as a key factor for boosting new immigrants' integration into the country. Our
community is made of more than 3,000 Alumni from 60 different countries, 800
corporate partners and 700 volunteer mentors, making of Gvahim the largest
international talents community in Israel.

Our current community management model enables interaction between our members
through the sharing of knowledge and the connecting of talents via professional
networking activities including events, meet-ups, social media presence, newsletters,
one-on-one engagements. In particular, our community members can enjoy
professional networking events & connections, job opportunities, monthly social and
professional events.

2. Leveraging Gvahim Community to maximize Gvahim’s Impact

Altogether the activities described above contribute in a practical way to connecting our
community, creating engagement and a sense of belonging but does not allow yet to
maximize Gvahim’s impact through its community.

2.1. Building a Leadership Community

 The goal of this Network & Leadership Community program is to create
and maintain a thriving international professional community where: (i)
skilled new immigrants create meaningful and sustained relationships
with local professionals, (ii) where they are empowered through training
and projects and (iii) where they positively influence the Israeli social and
economic landscape.
 The program’s main objectives are:
- Empowering Gvahim community and becoming a “Community of
Leaders & Influencers” ;
- Creating a sustainable model, becoming a “Community for Life” for our
members.
 The target audience: Gvahim programs alumni, mentors, consultants,
partners, members of the board, staff, and other skilled new immigrants
that attend our events, and are interested in Gvahim’s activities.

2.2. Pillars of the Program

We view our community members as the future of our organization, and as a central
means for achieving our ultimate mission and creating a social change.
This innovative Community Leadership program will empower Gvahim
community members to take an active role in shaping the social and economic
landscape of Israel and will be structured around three pillars:
1. Creation of a “GV Academy” offering personal professional advancement
courses. The purpose is to enrich our community members with
individual guidance and empowerment programs that would include an
executive course, a debate/public speaking course, a personal
development program, adaptive leadership course. The first stepping-
stone has been set with Gvahim’s recent initiative of “GV Plus”, a series of
workshops and lectures dedicated to Gvahim Alumni of all times and
programs. In this first meeting, Iris Bar Hava, a Gvahim Mentor since
2012, will present insights on how to advance your career in Israel (see
link to our event)
2. Volunteering and social involvement platform: Increasing the social
 involvement and volunteering among our community members by
making available to them volunteering opportunities, and encourage
them to utilize the tools they gained from our programs and from their
new social and professional networks to give back to their community
and to the Israeli society. Those activities will be done in partnership
with organizations such as One Day Social Volunteering, Leket Israel,
Latet and offer flexible & adaptable volunteering opportunities to our
community.
3. Leadership and involvement in Gvahim’s activities: Providing
opportunities for our community members to participate in our strategic
leadership, as well as increase our community members’ involvement in
our activities by giving lectures to current participants, serving as
personal mentors, using their networks to help participants find jobs
and to help Gvahim raise funds, enable them to become our
ambassadors.
A first stepping-stone has been set with the pilot program “Bring It
Forward” that was initiated and run by two Gvahim Alumni at the end of
2017. The “Bring It Forward” program provides an answer to one of the
community’s main objective – building a strong community of highly
talented leaders willing to empower the next generation of Olim and
inspire other alumni to “pay it forward”.
This pilot program was run with no financial support/budget & on
voluntary basis. The results and
interests were extremely encouraging Rafael Assal (volunteer & professional
and we would like to turn this program
coach) training the new GvahimMates.
into a permanent project within our
organization.

Twenty-two Gvahim alumni were

selected to be part of this pilot program
who answered to the following criteria:
In Israel for over 4 years and are
professionally settled, speak fluent Hebrew and English, willing to help a new ole
and are available within the framework of the program. Each GvahimMate was
paired with an ole/a from the Gvahim Career program #58. The program
spanned a 4 month period where each GvahimMate met with his ole/a once a
month and followed up on the ole/a’s development and adaptation needs in
Israel. The GvahimMates received trainings to support and enhance their skills
on a professional and personal level. You can access the video promoting this
 new pilot program for the community here:
https://fast.wistia.net/embed/iframe/abglj26nnv

Altogether, the three pillars described above of our community development plan will
help us provide an answer to the “WIIFM- what’s in it for me?” and will allow us to start
charging a membership fee to our community members.
The fee will be set at 1,800 NIS annually and will be the first stepping-stone to
generating income & creating a self-sustainable community.

3. The Impact

One of the objectives of Gvahim Community model is to increase Gvahim’s exposure and
impact on academic Olim in Israel. Networking events, professional lectures, volunteer
activities are aimed at preserving the existing community, but will also serve exposing
Gvahim and the contribution of new immigrants to the Israeli society, thus building &
expanding our circles of influence.

4. Budget

We budgeted our needs for this strategic community development plan on a 3-year
period and would like to request the partnership and financial support of the Morris &
Rosalind Goodman Family Foundation.

Year 1: 257,466 USD

Year 2: 246,827 USD
Year 3: 241,910 USD

[see budget on next page]

 Cost - USD Cost-USD Cost-USD
Year 1 - Training Year 2- Training of Year 3 - Training of
Program Component of 100 members 200 members 300 members
Program Management
Program director & coordinator 110,783 110,783 110,783
Events, PR, Marketing
Annual community event, meet ups, marketing 62,516 63,405 64,794
Community Adaptive Leaders Training
Webinars, conferences 80,556 138,889 194,444
Community Platform Management Tool
Technological tool 39,722 19,861 8,000

General & Administrative 36,338 36,338 36,338

Income (membership fee) 50,000 100,000 150,000

TOTAL EXPENSES 257,466 246,827 241,910

Cost Per Member 2,574.66 1,234.13 806.37

***