Clients

WHAT CLIENTS ARE SAYING

Ryan,

Thank you for your patience. I sat down a few times to write a short testimonial, but just couldn’t properly articulate what I wanted to say until this afternoon. 

I had a remarkable thing happen today. One of our middle school students walked in this morning and handed me an envelope filled with nearly $900 that he raised for Maor. His eyes were shining with pride as he told me how he went around his community raising money because he wanted to give back to Maor because of what we have done for him. I sat truly in awe, realizing the greatness that is possible when a student feels understood and supported. These are the kids who, when given the right encouragement and direction, will go on to change the world. 

Later in the day, I went back to him and told him how I was so very impressed with him, and we spoke about how he raised the money. He said it was because he was cute and friendly and not afraid to ask. We then had a lively discussion about the words cute and charming, as we defined them both and discussed their different meanings. I asked if he would be comfortable if I shared his story with David Suissa of the Jewish Journal, who had been at our event and talked to me about coming to speak to the middle school boys’ class and perhaps giving them the opportunity to write something for the Journal. He loved the idea.

The day passed, and I was heading home and then started to draft my email to David. I started with my normal, “I hope this finds you well.” I was then going to say I was following up with my prior email to him and wanted to know if he was still interested in coming to speak to the boy’s class. I was going to follow that up with the story from earlier today about the student and the money raised. I was midway through my email when your voice popped into my head. While working together, you kept stressing the importance of telling the story of Maor. My job is to tell the community about Maor and what we do through the power of storytelling. Tell them about the impactful stories of individual students and how their lives have been changed by Maor, you mentioned on numerous occasions. 

I am a writer. I use my writing skills daily as an attorney, an advocate and as co-founder and Executive Director of Maor. I know the power of words and of being a good writer and clear communicator. We came to you at a very late date to help us execute our first Community Awareness Event. While working together, you kept editing our language on copy and brochures, using simple words and sentences, and filling the page with italics and bolds and exclamation points (the double ones drove me crazy!!) All I wanted to do was edit the language and take out the excessive punctuation. You kept saying writing for fundraising is different. You want to use simple language, captivate people’s attention, and give them stories. I followed your advice with regard to the writing, as well as the other suggestions for how to best pull together our event. Your help in all areas was invaluable, and our event was a total success.

When I heard your voice earlier today, I stopped my email midsentence and completely rewrote it turning it into a story, even having a little fun while writing it. That is when I realized the power of your guidance, both before and after our event. I think there is quote that says, “Teaching is more than imparting knowledge; it is inspiring change.” Your expertise in advising us on creating and promoting our event, as well as guiding us on overall fundraising principles was invaluable. You helped us execute an extremely successful event in a limited timeframe. You were accessible, responsive, and added immense value. More importantly, you helped me to focus my goal and understand how to craft my language and my outreach in a way that will help MAOR grow into a successful and lasting organization. Thank you for your guidance and support. I look forward to the opportunity to work together again soon and would highly recommend your services to anyone looking to grow and support their organization. 

Best regards,

Sarah

“We worked with Ryan on our recent Legacy Dinner Campaign. The campaign posed a tremendous challenge for us as the honoree had a very wide reach of parents, grandparents, alumni, as well as community members. His professional guidance during the campaign was invaluable and he became much more than a consultant and more of an integral member of our team. We have worked with other consultants who gave us instructions of what to implement and then moved on. Every suggestion Ryan made was followed up on and he always helped make sure we stayed focused and on target. The most impressive thing of all was that Ryan came to our event and immediately asked what he could do to help out! Shulamith will definitely be calling him for our next campaign!”

What a pleasure and good fortune to have had Ryan work with us on behalf of Project SARAH.  He is an impressive professional who is very skilled, diligent, and dedicated to successful work.  His encouragement, and clear guidance throughout our collaboration, has been instrumental in accomplishing our objectives.  He has been a great asset to our program, and we look forward to continuing to work with him.

Shira Pomrantz, LCSW
Director
Project SARAH
An Initiative of Jewish Family Service and Children’s Center of Clifton/Passaic

We are fortunate to have worked this past school year with rh Strategic. Ryan’s years of diverse experience helped craft our tailor-made vision and path to creating a Culture of Philanthropy. The end result was a dinner that achieved financial success AND incredible positive feedback. More importantly, Ryan provided us with the tools to sustain and grow that culture.

Rabbi Yehudah Abrams
Executive Director, Torah Day School of Dallas

As founder and executive director of ETTA, the largest special needs provider in the Los Angeles Jewish community, it is my great pleasure to share my thoughts about working with Ryan Hyman.

ETTA is an established organization, with a large staff, and a strong history of successful planning and fundraising.

We retained Ryan to help us re-imagine our fundraising approaches and to become even stronger.

Ryan is an exceptional listener who took careful stock of our agency’s needs before offering guidance and direction. Once he felt comfortable with our specific focus, Ryan’s knowledge of the nonprofit field and a wide variety of fundraising and marketing approaches, he provided sage advice.  Respectful of the many stakeholders – Board, executive staff, clients, and community – Ryan’s ideas and suggestions were always both imaginative and realistic.

For a person of his experience, Ryan also has a refreshing personal sense of humility which informs his work. It may be a cliché to say the highest praise is to call a person a “mensch,” but Ryan truly earns the title to go alongside his considerable professional talents.

He is truly a pleasure to work with. Although our current engagement has ended, I would gladly resume with Ryan should the need arise.