“I have this great idea for a business but have no clue how to make it happen.” That’s what Rena Yudkowsky shared at her first Temech networking meeting. Within a year, her amorphous idea was a robust business.
Rena’s a geriatric social worker and a memory coach. For years, she worked part-time as the director of development for a senior program. Occasionally, she’d teach a course on memory improvement for Yad Sarah. It was a valuable course with content she repeatedly improved — but with negligible advertising, few even knew about it.
“I was itching to be my own boss, and I knew this course, if it would be taken online and marketed properly, could go far. But I didn’t know where to begin.”
In May 2019, she joined a Temech networking group. And she learned how to grow a business step by step. “We had fabulous speakers, and I learned so much about business, marketing, mindset, and more.”
In September, Rena went big: she hired a top-notch digital marketing coach. With her guidance, she created a website, started a Facebook group, built an email list, and prepared to launch.
Then Covid hit. And suddenly the entire world was online, including seniors who had never been there before. Rena launched her Memory Matters course and people from three different countries took that beta version.
Since then, her program expanded into fourteen live modules, a forty-page digital workbook packed with exercises, and a private memory assessment for each participant.
“The Temech group gave me recourses, suggestions, support, motivation — they held my hand throughout. I want to build Rome in a day. Leora Gruen, our group leader, helps me pace myself. And when I struggle with the bitachon/hishtadlus balance, she’s there to give me perspective.”
When her networking group ended, Rena enrolled in another one. That group focused on collaboration. Rena created a mini-program with a mentor and continued to expand.
She offers eight webinars on memory enhancements, is a frequent podcast guest, creates Facebook Live programs for her now robust Facebook group of over 1,000 seniors. She’s presented over 100 times, to people from across the world, including Spain, Ethiopia, and India. She’s done joint programs with Kate Kunkel, a dementia expert from Ecuador.
Now she’s in her third group. “Temech keeps pushing forward. I get so many excellent ideas from the brainstorming sessions we do. And if there’s a failure, the group offers support.
“I also love going to the yearly Temech conferences. The room rocks with talent. I gain valuable information, and it’s an incredible networking opportunity. My first testimonial came from a former client I met at a Temech conference.”
Rena’s more recent offers are a three-month ReMembership that offers a weekly training video and brain exercise, and monthly group coaching. Then there’s Monday Memory Motivation — a 45-minute live Zoom meeting teaching brain exercises on the first Monday of every month.
She’s ready to scale up yet again. And now she has the skills and confidence to do so.
