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"Miriam is a fabulous consultant. She is calm, thorough, and strategic. She’s great at designing and implementing processes that solicit input from a broad range of people, resulting in expanded thinking, new approaches, and a more cohesive team. I count on her as a great “thought partner” and highly value her perspective. I would absolutely recommend her."
"I have participated in several strategic planning efforts for various organizations, and I think Miriam is one of the best consultants with whom I have worked. She is a very strong and skillful meeting facilitator and elicits and carefully records productive discussion. She is excellent at guiding and managing the planning process while encouraging participants to actively participate. Even staff who were skeptical of the value of a strategic planning process came away from it strongly positive. The end result was a plan document that is being used by BAM/PFA to make short and long-term improvements in operations."
"I have worked with a number of strategic planning and organizational development consultants over the years. I think Miriam is absolutely one of the best. She organized and led a very comprehensive strategic planning process for our synagogue which laid the groundwork for subsequent organizational growth in a number of ways - we bought our own building, set up new committees, expanded our staff, etc."
"I felt so fortunate to have Miriam as a planning partner in our effort to productively blend two large and well-established groups into a new organization focused on increased collaboration and innovation, with shared and limited resources. She is organized, experienced, and thoughtful, and consistently challenged us to think of the desired goals of the process. With her guidance, we began to think about our external stakeholders in new ways that will help us plan for the future. She also runs highly effective meetings--clearly specified outcomes, keeping the group on task while also letting us explore critical tangents for a productive amount of time (but no more than needed), and ending on time with key points concluded and summarized. You'd be lucky to work with her! She's got a great sense of humor."
"Working with Miriam Abrams for our strategic planning process was like working with an artist painting our portrait. Miriam learned our agency culture, goals and mission and tailored her approach to us, making the process painless and thorough. We engaged Miriam for our second 5-year plan and I plan to have Miriam work with us for the third 5-year plan!"
"Miriam Abrams and Kayla Kirsch provided support to the Alameda County Alliance for Arts Learning Leadership to include community members and educators in a year long strategic planning process. The broad based community experience was iterative, visual, thoughtful and resulted in a comprehensive three year strategic plan. This plan is now being enthusiastically implemented by stakeholders and collaborators as a result of good communication practices suggested by our facilitators during a year of planning and development. We carry around the implementation plan - and it amazes us how much gets done when you have a plan that everyone knows about, has bought into, and can refer to as the work unfolds. We owe a great debt of gratitude to these amazing facilitators and wise, caring friends that mid-wifed us through a comprehensive, and what might have otherwise been overwhelming, process."
"Designing a long-range plan for such a large, multi-disciplined, multi-dimensional presenting program such as ours seemed almost daunting at the start, but Miriam Abrams assiduously focused our attention on each and every facet of the organization—from artistic programming, to facilities, to volunteer leadership and beyond--and methodically advanced the planning process toward a highly successful conclusion. It was especially rewarding for me personally to observe her methodology and watch the plan come together in a logical and sound manner. Additionally, and perhaps most importantly, Ms. Abrams guided us through a well-defined network of exercises to arrive at mission, vision and value goals, as well as top actionable priorities, which were embraced by all stakeholders. I would not hesitate to recommend Miriam Abrams to any non-profit, of any size, for leadership in the organizational planning process."
"Not only did Miriam lead us through a thorough strategic planning process, she helped us navigate through the retirement of an executive director and the hiring of a new one, half way through the process. Both our external and internal environments were changing significantly and Miriam’s calm, encouraging, and motivating leadership style allowed us to look carefully at ourselves, not only reaffirming our strengths but revealing the tremendous additional potential of the organization. Her knowledge and ability to bring the best out of an organization was amazing. We look forward to working with Miriam in varying capacities for years to come."
"Miriam Abrams worked ably with our staff of more than 300, making sure that no voice was lost. She drew out the staff’s primary goals and gently but effectively kept them on track. Her encouragement of creative thinking and moving past old issues was particularly welcome . From the library veterans to our newest staff members, Miriam won respect and warm feelings."
"Miriam Abrams has played a critical role in helping to shape the direction of our organization through two consecutive 3-year strategic planning processes. Not only does our organization have a strong, clear vision moving forward, but our strategic plan is one that is utilized and reviewed on a daily basis by our staff to help provide tactical goals that will help us accomplish our mission."
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