GET TO KNOW UPSTART’S CULTURE
Bring Bold Jewish Ideas to Light
April 2026
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BRING BOLD �JEWISH IDEAS �TO LIGHT
UpStart accelerates growth, nurtures ideas, and advances new experiences for the Jewish community.
UpStart is building the permanent home for Jewish social entrepreneurship.
We equip leaders, embed innovation in institutions, align funders, and ensure bold ideas endure.
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A STORY OF EVOLUTION AND RISK
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2008: UpStart Bay Area emerged, connecting West Coast Jewish leaders with the resources, training, and guidance to get their ideas off the ground.
2017: Bikkurim, Joshua Venture Group, the U.S. programs of PresenTense, and UpStart merged into one organization–UpStart, bringing together a collective 18 years of experience partnering with the Jewish community’s boldest leaders to make Jewish life thrive.
2008-2017: Broadened our focus from ventures to include institutions and the larger field, growing from the Bay Area to Chicago–blazing the way for change across the country.
2021: Engaged in a strategic planning process where we narrowed in on where we could have the greatest impact. This resulted in a decision to put social entrepreneurs at the center of everything we do.
And every day, we’re taking small, bold steps to create, adapt, and even scrap, our approaches to the work.
2027: Launched new strategic plan positioning UpStart as a field catalyst building the shared infrastructure that helps those entrepreneurs - and the entire sector - go further through entrepreneurship.
THIS DECK IS ABOUT UPSTART’S CULTURE
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The behaviors, systems, and practices �that make us who we are.
WHAT WE DO
HOW WE ORGANIZE
HOW WE ACTIVATE OUR VALUES
Organizations can ignore, dictate, or wish for positive culture, or it can be intentionally co-created and owned by the team. We opt for the latter.
UpStart’s culture is what brings our bold Jewish ideas to light.
It’s about how we partner with each other to do our best and brightest work.
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IT’S ABOUT BEING TRAILBLAZERS, TOGETHER.
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A SNAPSHOT OF OUR CULTURE
Values + Culture Code
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Powered by Jewish
wisdom, ethics, and values
We believe these elements of Judaism help shape diverse, inclusive, equitable and vibrant communities.
Remain radically human-centered.
Achieving our mission depends
upon putting people (team members, clients, and stakeholders) first by prioritizing their uniqueness, well-being, and dignity.
Embrace change.
We believe that by remaining agile and ideating wildly in the face of uncertainty, we can stay relevant, competitive, and impactful.
Balance shared accountability with individual agency.
We create the conditions for individuals to thrive while being accountable for shared goals and each other.
Intentionally celebrate ourselves and others.
We believe that joy can be found in showing up for the good and the bad. We own our outcomes, celebrate ourselves and others, and believe in the power of working through challenges.
Catalyze collaboration.
We believe that activating the combined wisdom of our network and
community creates opportunities to push the boundaries of what is possible.
OUR VALUES
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CULTURE CODE
How we activate our values
and philosophy
AT UPSTART, WE:
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COMMITMENT TO BELONGING
UpStart's vision is that Jewish communities will be thriving hubs of innovation, building a more just, vibrant, and inclusive future. Belonging is central to how we get there.
We define Belonging as more than access or representation. It is having a voice and the power to use it to co-create the structures that shape our community. With that definition as our foundation, we commit to developing innovative, entrepreneurial leaders who can acknowledge and disrupt systemic barriers as they build new Jewish initiatives.
Within our own organization, we hold ourselves to the same standard, modeling the Belonging we seek to build within the broader ecosystem.
Belonging is not something we achieve once. It is something we practice every time.
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SO HOW DO WE ACTIVATE �THIS CULTURE?
We believe that our culture
is co-created - it’s up to all of us to create and maintain our workplace culture.
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AT UPSTART,
we believe in the power
of Jewish traditions
and communities.
We create space to connect our work to Judaism’s diverse textual, ritual, philosophical, and communal traditions.
WHAT THAT LOOKS LIKE:
Whenever we meet as a whole team, we ground our gathering in Jewish wisdom and tradition before beginning our work. This serves as a gentle yet constant reminder that our purpose is larger and greater than ourselves.
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AT UPSTART,
we strive to model our vision of a just, vibrant, and inclusive future.
We engage in deep and honest self-reflection and fuel our own evolution towards our highest aspirations for Jewish life.
WHAT THAT LOOKS LIKE:
We have both internal and external systems in place to ensure we are consistently upholding the a culture of Belonging. We perform routine audits of all operational and human resource systems, applications, and processes as part of our ongoing efforts to ensure that Belonging is not only a metric, but a lens through which we’re filtering all of our work.
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AT UPSTART,
we hold ourselves accountable to high standards, even when we know failure is possible and iteration is essential.
We push ourselves to step outside our comfort zone, celebrate our successes, and act on our missed opportunities.
WHAT THAT LOOKS LIKE:
We engage in self-reflection, peer reflection, upward feedback, and semi-annual reflections with our supervisors to ensure progress towards goals and growth.
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AT UPSTART,
we value and respect one another’s time
We develop work and communication systems that prioritize autonomy, efficiency, and respect for each other’s personal and professional needs.
WHAT THAT LOOKS LIKE:
We give our staff US & Jewish holidays off, our offices close up at 3pm local on Fridays, and we have a discretionary time off policy. As a remote workforce, we support a healthy work-life balance for our team, and encourage flexible scheduling.
We also have an internal calendaring rhythm designed to create greater consistency for everyone, maintain a shared meeting cadence amongst the team, and increase personal work time.
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AT UPSTART,
we stay at the cutting edge by perpetually investing in our own learning.
We put the time and dollars towards our growth as entrepreneurial leaders.
WHAT THAT LOOKS LIKE:
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AT UPSTART,
we remain agile and entrepreneurial, supporting each other and our network as we take bold steps towards the future we want to see.
We dare to blaze new trails and to evolve with the needs of those we serve. And, we support each other when it gets hard.
WHAT THAT LOOKS LIKE:
Our new strategic plan focuses on making our work more aligned, more accessible, and able to reach more people. We are organizing our programs around a shared approach to Jewish social innovation and entrepreneurship, and shifting to work more through partners so our tools and support can be used across the field. This includes training and equipping leaders and educators, sharing practical frameworks and resources, and strengthening the networks that help ideas grow.
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upstartlab.org
/upstartlab
@upstartlab
/upstartlab
BRING BOLD �JEWISH IDEAS �TO LIGHT