Benjain Gabbai
Ben Gabbai helps people live meaningfully, rapidly increase their capacities in new fields, and change habits.
My outcomes: I worked with Ben to develop and refine a research methodology for cultural ethnography.
The coach: Ben has been a teacher, home-schooling expert, and mentor to product leaders at major tech companies.
Who should work with Ben: Established executives stepping into new phases of life, and emerging leaders taking on new professional challenges.
I met Ben through his work at the School for Social Design, where he worked to help social network designers and community leaders embed values into meaningful social spaces and experiences.
I wanted to learn how to work with values better to deepen my cultural ethnography skills, so I hired Ben to help me learn the method of values elicitation he taught at SFSD. Through our experience working together I was impressed with the nuance with which Ben helped me learn the elicitation skills. We worked together while I was on the ground doing embedded research at Vitalia, and he helped me quickly iterate improvements to my interview methodology.
After I finished the project, we kept talking and started thinking of other ways to collaborate. That’s how we decided to put together our course, Values Lab.
Values and learning as methodology
Working with values is a cornerstone of Ben's coaching and mentorship practice. Ben and his colleagues at SFSD are the world's experts on helping people understand and live by their values. Product leaders and community builders alike have worked with Ben to develop new team cultures and practices that bring out the best in groups of people.
Education and learning are also core to Ben's approach. He has been a homeschooler, a teacher at elementary schools and at-risk-high-schools, and an instructor to product leaders at SFSD. Ben has a knack for articulating things simply and an eye for the next pragmatic steps people need to take to reach their goals. Because of his extensive background in education, he's able to create super personalized practices, missions, and approaches to help people increase their capacities and change habits.
Why I like working with Ben
One of Ben’s gifts is his ability to create super-personalized practices, missions, and tasks that help people on their specific growth journey. He can design a pedagogy and learning pathway that takes into account clients’ capacities, how to increase them, and recognizing many contributors to growth.
Ben’s multiculturalism and openness is part of what makes his practice special. Because of his engagements with both secular and orthodox life, it’s impossible to offend Ben with religious or political triggers. He’s a genuinely curious person, to whom everything is interested and exciting.
His deep and embodied understanding of Judaism brings him a powerful perspective and set of practices to draw from, from Jewish meditations to repentance and regret practices. For those who are drawn to Judeo-Christian social ideas or have roots in Abrahamic faiths, Ben is the person to work with.
Who should work with Ben
High performers and community leaders often face challenges presented by family life, a high-performance professional career, and deepening faith commitments. Ben is an incredible guide and source of wisdom when it comes to growing through these conflicts of duties and integrating them into a meaningful whole.
Educational leaders and homeschoolers working outside normal institutional structures will find in Ben an experienced coach who can help increase their creativity and work through educational challenges.
Courses & Links
To book an introductory session with Ben, send an email.
Take Ben's course:
Values Lab with Ben Gabbai
Bring clarity to values and learn to guide clients towards more meaningful lives in this 4 week live course.