Season 2 Episode 6 with Avi Friedman, Productivity Coach
Avi Friedman, Productivity Coach
Transcript
change the world ep. 13
[:executives, and board members. We'll be addressing some of the big issues facing Jewish nonprofits today and brainstorming ways that we can come
together to address them.
Thanks for joining. [:Hi, everybody. Thanks for joining me today. I have with me a Friedman who is
a productivity coach. He works with individuals, businesses, and nonprofits, and I'm excited for the conversation today. I think this is gonna be a little bit of a different kind of conversation than we usually have here. Avi. Thank you so much for joining.
Sure, thanks
[: [:And, you know, I was definitely intrigued a productivity coach is not something that I am too familiar with, [00:01:00] but as we got to chatting and Avi started saying some of the things that he helps nonprofits do my ears kind of perked up because I'm thinking to myself, wow, these are things my clients really, really struggle with.
So let's get into it a little bit a first. Tell me , tell me your background. How did you get into. Sure. So
[:Going to graduate school for a second degree. And my little kids at home and my wife is of course, and I was completely swamped. I thought I was a
naturally organized person, but I quickly realized that just having that natural organization isn't sufficient for all the curve balls of life and all the different responsibilities I was having late payments on credit cards just to forgetting
when the deadline was.
more skills and tools that I [:And I realized that a lot of other people are dealing with the same things in their professional lives and their personal lives. So I wanted to help other people do the same thing that I went through. Wow.
[:So how did that turn into, I know you work with businesses as well, but how did that turn into working with nonprofit?
[:affinity towards nonprofits. I do work in a cure center as well. So I do have
ation, whether it's a school [:The general Jewish community and sometimes just fine tuning, little tips and
tricks or building a system that they can operate from, helps them find the space to be able to help their students and help impact cloud itself.
[:nonprofit clients with.
[: so we take a deep dive into [:Sometimes people are just lost in how to properly juggle and properly balance everything. And sometimes people have a general sense, but they
need some different tips and tricks to adjust or to. Pivot what their current system is to be able to accomplish all that they want to. I'm very
[: [: From my [:On the other hand, when you're dealing in the nonprofits, you're dealing with
complishment, that sense of, [:I think they're both pretty equal in that regard.
[: [: . What happens oftentimes is [: er a relationship just based [:So being able to, let's say, for example, track all the students and making sure that the ones that you want to follow up with in a timely manner and making sure that you're doing that appropriately. Making sure that you're finding time in your day to allow space for phone calls or for coffee dates or for things of that nature.
at will enable you to enable [: [:doing for. So
[:a specific software that they use, because again, you can choose and pick and choose what software works best for you.
very tech savvy and they use [: cit the donor? Do I want to. [:And people do journals. People use Excel sheets, nothing too fancy, but really just having the strategy in place. And then finding a tool afterwards that serves you and your person. Got
[:Whereas like for example, they'll have the same campaign every year around the same time yet. They'll only kind of remember to start scrambling, to plan for it like a month before. And, and that's when they'll call me and I'll have to tell them like, I'm really sorry. I can't help you. So, what do you do for clients?
nown to be dealing with them [: [: e do I need to secure prize? [:Or how long in advance do I need to start marketing or versus a dinner? Were you talking about how far in advance do I need to secure honoree secure a venue, things of that nature? So those are really, again, speaking to business strategists or nonprofit strategists in that space to be able to give the proper guidelines for what it entails and then utilizing your calendar in a way which serves that, which serves those deadlines, serves those timeframes for organizations.
Already have those timelines in place. They already know that for the last
couple [: e event that we're having, I [:November, I'm going to need to secure a venue for that Hanukah party or
whatever it's. So having it broken down by month will help you just navigate far in advance for the different programs that you're having, whether it's a
fundraiser, whether it's an actual program. And keeping track with folders or
whether it's digital folders or physical folders and knowing what needs to be
up at a proper pace to, uh, [: [:And that's something you help them with that like monthly. Okay. Yeah,
absolutely. I think that sounds very necessary. So anyone who works with
ke things to do with donors? [: [:And if they don't have proper guidance and proper structure, The [00:1 2:00] date that they wanna send the email, what kind of email they wanna send? Who's sending it. Is it something that needs to be a specific day or it could be over the length of a week? That again will play a role in how it's put on your calendar.
Cause what happens oftentimes is. People put on their calendar. And I had this experience myself that I've been trying to do this task for a week. I'm just gonna pick a day and I'm gonna do it on that day. Right. And what often happens if it's not time sensitive, it doesn't need to be that day. Then those things end up snoozing.
Like we [: hursday, I'm gonna make sure [:That really is helpful, both in regards to programming, but especially in terms of donors, when donors have that expectation that I'm gonna be professional. I'm going to make sure that I follow up with them properly, that I'm actually doing that in the effective way.
[:about their day to day operations?
you think it's, it's kind of [: [: that I help with my clients [:For example, if I know that I'm gonna be taking an hour drive and I have a list
of all the calls I need to make between all the projects, whether it's personal professional, and I have seven phone calls to make. In that hour drive, I'll be
able to get a lot done and be very productive in that regard.
a full to-do list, if I have [: d to discuss whether with my [:So that's really with the day to day, right? That's what I help people with the day to day manage their calendar, time blocks, et cetera. When it comes to, to larger scale, what those oftentimes fall into are more longer term projects and projects could be anything like fixing something at, at our office.
iring an assistant. It could [: meetings set up to. Go over [:Got
[:versa. [00:16:30]
Yeah. So
[: hen we just go through, it's [:And really just go through all the different things that are on our head, all the responsibilities we have at work. And I'm sure a lot of people, if you had an official resume within their nonprofit, Of all the tasks and responsibilities, it would be 15 pages long of all the different things that they do when you.
All bit written out and [: staff, towards volunteers or [:As opposed to spending my time with tasks that do not necessarily need, need my resources or my personality to do. Got
[:They can take away today. So
[:And just to, to at least have it in the front of our minds to be able to understand. What else? I would advise different tools that I use.
[: nd I'm trying to do, or that [:I'm like, no, I really should be changing that light bulb. I really should have someone change that light bulb and just passing by it that the cognitive load that it adds to us is that every time I'm looking by it, I'm like, you know, I really could do this quickly, but I'm just not gonna get to it right now.
So taking, finding those two minute tasks really is, is very beneficial. And then
the second thing is when you have a project, we have a larger project, right?
Oftentimes when we have [: s, like who has two hours in [:Does it mean. Call and making a phone call just to get guidance. Does it mean to spend 10 minutes researching? Does it mean spend 10 minutes in
brainstorming all the different parts of the project by breaking it down into small manageable tests will help us bring it from a theory to completion.
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