Women, Business & Torah: Temech Conference 2015

Running your own business can be an isolating experience. Whether you work from a home office or with employees, there aren’t many opportunities to talk to other businesswomen about the unique challenges you face on a daily basis. This issue was clearly in evidence at this year’s Temech Conference, where both the presentations and informal networking focused on questions such as: How do I price my goods and services? How can I differentiate my business from others doing similar things? How can I reach my target audience on and offline?

Religious women in particular are concerned with balancing rich family lives with business and managing their companies ethically according to Jewish law. Temech Conference provided strategies for these issues as well, so that everyone was able to take home lessons both in business and in Torah.

I’m sure each participant has her own list of important lessons from the conference. Here I share some of my favorite lines from the very talented speakers:

• Idit Neuderfer: Talk to your client’s inner child. We all still love stories. But don’t bore them with bedtime stories.
• Rabbi Issamar Ginzberg: Explain incongruence instead of letting people find out for themselves.
• Hilary Faverman: The three reasons you need to blog: ranking, establishing expertise, to be approachable and relatable.
• Laura Ben-David: All the information you need is out there and nothing is set in stone.
• Eli Shine: You’re a genius but fear makes you dumb.
• Rabbi Nachman Seltzer: Take the first step and ideas will come to you. Then it’s your job to make them happen.
• Rabbi Dovid Kaplan: Lashon hara will deprive you of your livelihood.
• Debra Kodish: It doesn’t matter if you have a company of 2 or 5 or 50, you define success as a balance of what you want to achieve personally and financially. (Thanks to Lily Aronin for her help with this one!)

This was the sixth annual Temech Conference and every year the organizers find a new way to network. This year, participants raffled off services and products in exchange for the contact info of everyone interested. There were consulting services, clothes, children’s games, books, art, workshops and more offered at this auction. The creativity and professionalism of the businesswomen was clearly in evidence.

The conference was attended by a diverse group of women, ranging from ultra-Orthodox to secular, all of whom were focused on one thing: business. They learned how tell their story in a way that makes them interesting and different, how to write and market that story and how to avoid common pitfalls. They networked, networked and networked, to gain new ideas, connect with potential customers and find new business partners. At the end of the event, most of the women were already talking about next year!