Business Excellence Blog

Statistics show that 70% of all unemployed people in Israel during the third Coronavirus quarantine were women. The lack of symmetry between men and women in unemployment statistics has gotten worse over the pandemic.

Aviv was the owner and CEO of a company, and led marketing and business development. Most sales and growth were in overseas markets, and Aviv personally managed activity in key countries. He spent a lot of time on marketing trips and knew all the overseas clients and distributors.

One of the first stages of personal coaching is identifying personal goals. Not defining, but identifying. We don’t choose pretty words and decide those are our values only because they look good. Personal values are an inherent part of us.

When you get into a cab, the first question the driver asks you is - where are you going? You probably always have an answer to that. After all, you wouldn't get in a cab without a destination in mind. Yet I meet people, and even businesses, with no goals. And without goals, you can’t have purposeful progress.

While hiking the Israel Trail near Dimona, we often use Patrick’s services, to drive us to the starting point, and from the end point. We found Patrick a year ago, when we were looking for a driver and compared prices. But now we don’t compare the prices Patrick quotes us with other offers. Patrick has excellent customer service. Comes anywhere, always a few minutes early, and is flexible enough to change the time if we’re early or late.

The Coronavirus hit us like an apocalyptic vision. I think that if anyone had raised the possibility of such an event, even in November 2019, we’d have all treated them like a fool. Despite the surprise, globally people adjusted remarkably quickly. It’s enough to look at the parallel development of vaccines, and their approval by health authorities, within 10 months, to understand the revolution in tends of behaviors and thought patterns that occurred over the last year.

I don’t know about your specific company, but usually the first step is layoffs. Most often, labor costs aren’t the biggest expense, but it always seems simplest, fastest, and easiest to fire employees - and if and when sales are back up, recruit new ones. Furthermore, we know there is always latent redundancy, so we assume any reduction in the workforce will lead to greater efficiency.

In the past, when I managed Osem-Nestle’s factory in Yokne’am, we often had improvement teams working with internal leaders. For four years, we had a yearly workshop teaching employees how to lead improvements teams. The woman leading these workshops then led and managed the improvement teams, and coached the leaders. After four years, we transitioned to doing that internally as well.

It might seem odd, but some businesses and people benefited from the global effects of the pandemic. For example, let's say you're a manufacturer of a niche product like facemasks, and suddenly it becomes the most sought after product worldwide, sold for exorbitant prices. It can seem as if luck fell out of the sky, into your lap. What will you do?

At 6:15 I started riding my bicycle towards Ramat Ha'Nadiv and we started making our way up to Mansur el-Aqeb. We were supposed to meet Uri there. When we reached the top, there was no sign of Uri. We waited. Uri didn’t arrive, nor call. We tried calling him, and there was no answer. After about fifteen minutes, we started riding again, heading north. A short while later, Uri came riding towards us, smiling.