n the wake of the terrorist attacks, many stories of heroism and outreach have involved so-called ordinary men and women at work. Firefighters go beyond human endurance in the continued rescue effort. A CEO quietly calls a voluntary prayer meeting and hundreds of employees show up. Financial houses stay in the market to buffet a recession. Employees everywhere are anteing up for companywide charities.
As we contemplate the symbolism of the WTC, one thing is clear: an underlying compassion and courage feared lost have been found again. Business has discovered its nobler self in this process - without the self-consciousness of a public relations squib.
336x280
Part of our national agenda should be extending and sustaining this sort of behavior. Ethical business conduct will be an essential ''glue'' in the reconstruction effort ahead, one of the ways by which we judge national character.
At the moment, events are evaluated in either extremely personal or heroic, larger-than-life frameworks. We ask large questions about the nature of hatred, or how a nation should defend itself. Action is contemplated in terms of waging a global war against an enemy without territorial borders or going home a bit earlier than usual to be with family and friends. As we move forward for the long ordeal President Bush has forecast, we will not need to change our values. Rather, we will have to shift what some philosophers call the horizon of our moral thinking - that is, the combination of facts, roles, and duties we perceive to be part of an essentially moral life.
For businesspeople, this involves more than writing checks or purchasing new machines. It means reconfiguring the everyday features of a free, diverse, and prosperous society. Five are offered here, drawn from the many stories that have come from the workplace in the past few weeks.
People are the critical reason for - and resource of - the enterprise. Make room for the human functions, from conversation to flexible family time. Treating customers and employees with uncommon dignity and respect creates a social citizenship we both need and value.
You cannot get everything perfect in an organization, but you must try to get it right. While we wish to set up perfect protection measures, attention to the mundane is also an essential contribution to moral and civic strength. Pricing, record-keeping, scheduling, tax records, safety measures - such activities are the first defense against chaos and terrorists alike.
Exploitation is not invisible. Just as New York City Mayor Rudolph Giuliani warned against price gouging in his first public speech after the attack, we must guard against free riders on a national and personal scale as patriotic passions wane.
Honesty is the bedrock of integrity. There will be many uncomfortable moments of reckoning over the few next months. Business will have its share. Safety, trust, and planning all require honest assessment and communication of what a company does and does not know, what it can or is not sure it can deliver, what it has or has not done.
Nurture the qualities of generosity and hope. We've learned that we still have these qualities. The trick now is to see their relevance to the ordinary conduct of business. This means expanding the boundaries of a company's normal range of concerns, whether that involves tuition for the children of WTC victims or jobs for unemployed airline workers. If we hold on to these lessons, we may be blessed with a level of awareness and sensitivity in our modern economic life that goes far beyond what we have ever experienced before.
Laura Nash is a senior research fellow at Harvard Business School and coauthor of ''Church on Sunday, Work on Monday'' (Jossey-Bass).
Dow:
