THEY LISTEN BUT THEY DO NOT HEAR...WAIT...THEY DON'T EVEN LISTEN

Let's imagine you are one of countless Federation CEOs and the few lay persons who travel to NYC with the hope that JFNA professional leaders are will be listening and understanding what you have to say. And, you are increasingly frustrated because...

• You and most of your colleagues reject the Global Planning Table as it is being implemented; you have been communicating your objections in private and in confidence at meeting-after-meeting and you have come to believe that your and your colleagues' concerns aren't even reaching those further up the food chain or they could care less;
• You have been asked to "consult" on matters pending before JFNA. You have spent either your good money or, in the case of CEOs, your communal dollars to come to 25 Broadway for multiple meetings. You learn that you and other leaders have been totally ignored in a "final report" that reads as if you and your federation colleagues have been totally ignored; or
• You and your colleagues have pled with JFNA leaders not to hold this November's GA in Jerusalem -- not because you don't want to be there, it's where you desperately want to be. The costs have become prohibitive and are a bar to participation, etc. But, you and your colleagues have been totally ignored. When you advise JFNA that you or your communal leaders can't be there this November, there is no introspection on JFNA's part, those with whom you speak are just angry with you and your community.

How do you know you will be ignored, among the ways:

• When you see the JFNA "leaders" with whom you hoped were listening looking over your shoulder for someone else to talk to;
• On those ubiquitous whiteboards, JFNA staff doesn't even write down your ideas (or, they do, but you see them erasing your thoughts off the board even before you leave the meeting room);
• When you enter the meeting room for the meeting after the one at which you offered thoughts other than JFNA's accepted wisdom, you find that there is no chair for you;
• You grab a Report before a meeting called to "discuss your thoughts" and it bears the imprint "Final Report"

JFNA -- we don't want your ideas, just your Dues and your vote. Many thanks.

Rwexler