It has been a year since the Jewish Foundation for Group Homes announced that it was rebranding — changing its name to “Makom,” Hebrew for “place.” The 42-year-old organization made the change in order to better communicate its mission of providing care for people with intellectual or developmental disabilities (IDD), whether they need to live in a group home or are looking for at-home support, said David Ervin, Makom’s CEO.
In addition to helping people with IDD find group homes and in-home supports, Makom also offers the MOST (Meaningful Opportunities for Successful Transitions) Program, which trains young adults with IDD for potential future careers, as well as MyPad, which helps them find affordable housing options.
Ervin spoke with WJW about how things have changed at the agency since the rebrand, and how other Jewish organizations can go about changing their own branding.
How are things going at Makom after the rebrand?
In a word, fantastic. I’d never gone through a company rebrand before this, so after 36 years in the industry, you do learn something new every day. And I don’t know how long it’s supposed to take for people to get used to the rebrand. We still have folks in the Jewish community who recall us as the Jewish Foundation for Group Homes. And when we say “Makom,” they still aren’t quite sure what that is, although there’s been such amazing progress over the last year. The brand itself has settled so nicely even among folks who have known us for decades. The new name speaks to the brand’s core message that everyone has a place in the community.
But people are curious about what “Makom” means. In a simple elevator pitch, it means a place in the larger gestalt of community. And that idea resonates with people.
Have there been any difficulties with reestablishing the agency after changing its name and branding?
Inevitably, yes. We’re still correcting contracts that we get, but that’s very natural and normal, and I expect we’re going to have to be doing that sort of thing for several years. But we catch it and we change it, and everyone is the wiser for it. But making those corrections helps open up conversations about our work and what we believe in.
Has Makom made any substantial changes to its programming to reflect the rebrand?
We’ve grown quite a bit. And the way in which we’re delivering support has, in many fundamental ways, changed fairly substantially. But it’s sort of hard to accurately describe changes in ideology.
Something you might know about Makom is that our mission statement is “supporting self-determined lives.” It’s a radical change from the way things had long been done, not just when we were the JFGH [Jewish Foundation for Group Homes], but really across the [disability support] industry. We want to put people with IDD in the driver’s seat of their own lives. We offer support to help them do that, so they can make their own choices, but they have all the accommodations necessary to do so.
Human beings are funny creatures, we want to control our own lives as much as possible. Our system emphasizes the fact that people with IDD are fundamentally no different. For so long, it’s been not only Makom, but the system, that has protected people with IDD from themselves instead of helping them grow. This commitment to self-determination allows people to make their own mistakes and learn from them, and to exercise their own autonomy.
Do you have any tips for other Jewish organizations looking to change their branding?
We talked to a lot of people in our community and in the broader IDD community. We asked them questions that allowed them to reflect on the brand and what it meant to them, what the old name meant to them and what they hoped we would stand for and represent moving forward.
My number one recommendation for other Jewish organizations who want to rebrand is to talk to as many people as possible, ask them hard questions. Prepare yourself, because it might be difficult to hear the answers. But lean into understanding what the current brand represents and what the new brand needs to represent.
Of course, don’t forget to change your name with the secretary of state, don’t forget to amend your articles. There are thousands of little details that are required for any name change.
As much as I want everybody to immediately know us as Makom, that takes a lot of work. It doesn’t happen overnight. It just takes persistence and patience. People still refer to us as JFGH, but that’s an opportunity for us to engage them and introduce them to our new brand. You’ll probably have to do it with a lot of people, over and over again, but that’s all good. ■
