By Ben Vorspan
“Creativity” is an interesting word. For some, hearing about an opportunity for creativity makes their ears perk up and brings a smile to their face. For others, it causes sweaty palms and a deep sense of trepidation. So, how do you make a program focused on creativity as inclusive as possible? That’s exactly what we aim to do with Sulam for Imagineers.
We launched Sulam in November 2024 with a strong and varied cohort of synagogues, ranging from Congregation Beth Shalom—a 50-member shul in Palm Desert, CA—to Congregation B’nai Torah, a 930-member synagogue in Sandy Springs, GA. Each synagogue selected two team leaders, also known as “Innovation Champions,” and formed teams of 8–12 dreamers, affectionately called their “Dream Team.” With such diversity in participants and organizations, the only constant we could count on was that no one had ever done anything quite like this before.
And that was the point.
The only way to break free from the “we’ve always done it that way” mentality and innovate in unprecedented ways is to build a program from the ground up. Our approach involves a 6-session curriculum, requires the engaging of rarely-heard-from community members (some teams followed our instructions to a T and even included non-members!), and mandates experimentation. Counterintuitive as it may seem, we are taking a systematic approach to creativity.
We kicked off our first unit by defining Sulam for Imagineers goals, which center around learning new techniques and experimenting with untested ideas. We also redefined “success” as progress, new insights gained, and even failure. In fact, we fully expect failures along the way and look forward to learning and growing from them.
During this unit, we discussed and committed to The Sulam for Imagineers’ 10 Commandments of Creativity, and learned from a Disney-inspired case study.
We also focused on identifying the challenges our synagogues face. Unsurprisingly, many began with problem statements centered around membership engagement. Using an exercise called “The 5 Whys,” we dug deeper into these challenges. Each synagogue uncovered unique root causes, touching on topics like communication gaps and educational programming needs.
The most exciting part of Unit 1 was the feedback from our Innovation Champions after their initial team meetings. Across the board, every synagogue’s Dream Team reported feeling excited and energized. (When was the last time you heard that about a synagogue committee meeting?) Their discussions about challenges and opportunities were so engaging that many teams chose to meet again to dive deeper.
At our second cohort meeting, Innovation Champions shared feedback from their teams, enabling all of us to learn from their experiences. A critical component of The Sulam for Imagineers is the sharing of information, which is why I’ll be providing regular updates throughout the process. We want you to learn alongside our cohort, and when we get to the ideation and experimentation units, we hope you’ll join in and experiment too!
As you can see, there’s nothing particularly scary or nerve-wracking about the creativity we’re introducing to our cohort of synagogues and the USCJ (though there will be plenty of opportunities for “blue sky” brainstorming in units 3 and 4). After nearly a year of designing this program, it’s thrilling to see such an enthusiastic start. Perhaps you’d like to join us next time? Email Linda at [email protected] to add your synagogue to the interest list for the 2025–26 cohort.
Stay tuned for our next update, where we’ll share what our synagogues are learning about their “people”—the community members who are the heroes of our synagogue stories. Their journeys, both inside and outside our synagogues, will shape our path to success.
