In New York, people adjust their behavior before companies adjust their policies.

After October 7, I started seeing it in the people I work with. Small changes. Quieter ones. Jewish employees walking into offices are a little more aware of who is around them. Some stopped wearing visible symbols during the workday. Some chose different routes to and from the office. Others began asking questions they had never asked before. Not about policy. About what they would actually do if something happened.

These are not dramatic shifts. They are practical ones.

At the same time, companies continued operating within the same structure. Policies remained in place. HR trainings continued. Statements were issued. From the outside, nothing seemed broken.

From the inside, something had changed.

In recent months, Jewish employees across major companies have reported feeling isolated, targeted, or pressured to stay silent in their own workplaces. Internal tensions at Google became public when protests over the company’s involvement with Israeli cloud contracts led to arrests inside company offices and widespread internal conflict, as reported by CNBC and The New York Times. Employees described workplace channels turning hostile and trust in internal systems weakening.

At the same time, lawsuits and formal complaints have begun to reflect a similar pattern. Reports covered by Business Insider describe Jewish employees alleging hostile work environments and inconsistent enforcement of workplace standards after October 7. These are not isolated incidents. They point to a broader shift inside organizations that were not built to handle this kind of pressure.

I saw a version of this from the other side. Companies in New York that had previously scheduled training began to hesitate. Some delayed decisions. Some stopped responding. In a few cases, the hesitation became clear once they understood that the training was coming from Israelis.

That decision has nothing to do with safety. It has everything to do with perception.

So the question becomes simple.

What are companies in New York actually doing to keep their Jewish employees safe?

Most organizations will point to policy. Anti-harassment guidelines, reporting systems, escalation procedures. These are necessary. They create structure and accountability.

They do not operate in real time.

When a situation develops, there is no time to navigate a document. There is no structured process that unfolds step by step. There is only a moment where a person has to decide how to respond.

That decision depends on preparation.

A study that examined workplace risk for women in hospitality environments showed a consistent pattern. Safety practices were in place. Employees understood them. The sense of exposure remained high, and there was strong support for practical self-defense training.

This is not limited to one industry.

People can understand risk and still not be ready to act.

Rules depend on compliance. Situations often begin when someone chooses not to comply. A boundary is ignored. Behavior escalates. The structure no longer holds.

What remains is the individual.

After October 7, many Jews began to take that responsibility more seriously. There is a growing recognition that awareness alone is not enough. People are paying attention. They are also asking themselves whether they are capable of acting if something happens.

That question deserves a direct answer.

Capability is built. It comes from repetition, exposure, and structured self-defense training that reflects real conditions rather than controlled ones.

This is where many organizations are still behind.

Most corporate safety programs focus on information. Employees are taught how to recognize inappropriate behavior and how to report it. This creates awareness. It does not prepare someone for the moment when they are alone, under pressure, and need to make a decision.

There is also a second layer that has become more visible since October 7. In some environments, anything connected to Israel has become sensitive. Decisions that should be based on effectiveness are influenced by perception.

Safety should not be filtered through that lens.

If a company is serious about protecting its employees, the question should be whether the training works, not where it comes from.

The environment employees are moving through has already changed. The level of awareness is higher. The expectation that individuals will be able to respond is higher as well, even if it is not stated openly.

Organizations need to decide how they are going to respond to that shift.

Some will continue to rely on policies and assume that they are enough. Others are starting to look at how to prepare employees in a more practical way, integrating corporate safety training and team-building programs into how their teams operate and support each other.

This is not about turning employees into fighters. It is about giving them the ability to recognize early signs of risk, maintain awareness, and create distance before situations escalate.

These are basic skills. They can be trained. They can be practiced.

The question is not whether risk exists. That is already understood.

The question is whether companies are willing to prepare their employees for it in a way that holds up when the structure is no longer there to guide them.

In New York, that moment is not theoretical.

It is already part of daily life.

Do something amazing, Tsahi Shemesh

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