The 9/11 Business: Survival and Service


I can’t help but think about disaster planning, survival tactics, financial recovery and a giving spirit. It’s hurricane season and many cities and countries have been ripped apart during this time of year and stitched back together by their hearts and willingness to help each other.

It’s the power of compassion and it has a place in business.

It’s also September and with the 10-year anniversary of 9/11 just behind us, I think about tragedy and hope…how things are ripped apart and how we piece them back together.

It’s called survival and there is a place for it in business.

helping hands

In “The News Business Changed After 9/11” Joe Marren says, “The heat and the angst and the emotion still burn because I still feel some of the memories. I guess we all do in some way, but I was trying to lead a newsroom…” His words make me think of the fact that we are trying to lead our businesses (and our lives) on the other side of 9/11 and in a lot of ways things have changed. I’m not sure we are fully aware of how much it has changed yet, because time often exposes new perspectives. And in some ways 10 years ago feels like yesterday.

I know this: Some things were reborn or renewed that day: service and survival.

Running a company doesn’t mean that we lose our heart–just the opposite. Our business can be a platform to show how much we care about our clients and our community.  Our clients are the people we solve problems for, and our community reaps the financial impact of our business and the resources and the income that our companies bring back into our cities.

In my opinion,  the best gift that we can give 10 years later, in the middle of hurricane season (and, for some, in the wake of their own personal tragedies) is to succeed at what we do, no matter the odds, and to support the people and services around us, because there is always a way and a reason to give back.

May we never lose the spirit of survival and the spirit of service that leaped forward that day.

How has 9/11 impacted your business?

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Jamillah Warner Jamillah Warner (Ms.J), a poet with a passion for business, is a Georgia-based writer and speaker and the Marketing Coordinator at Nobuko Solutions. She also provides marketing and communication quick tips in her getCLEAR! MicroNewsletter.

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