"So the night of September 11, I didn't really know who was alive and who wasn't alive. So we had a conference call. It was about 10 o'clock at night. And my employees called in. And I said, look, we have two choices. We can shut the firm down and go to our friends' funerals. Remember, that would be 20 funerals a day every day for 35 straight days. And I've got to tell you, I'm not really interested in going to work. All I want to do is climb under the covers and hug my family. But if we are going to go to work, we're going to do it to take care of our friends' families. So what do you want to do? You guys want to shut it down? Or do you want to work harder than you've ever worked before in your life? And that was the moment where the company survived."
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Businesspeople from the United StatesPeople from New York (state)Jews from the United StatesRepublican Party (United States) politiciansUnited States Secretaries of Commerce
Original Language: English
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Sources
"CEO Howard Lutnick Remembers Sept. 11: How His Company Survived After Great Personal Loss" in NPR (11 September 2016)
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Howard_Lutnick
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Howard Lutnick
Howard William Lutnick (born July 14, 1961) is an American businessman who was appointed to serve as the United States Secretary of Commerce by the Trump Administration in February, 2025. He was formerly the head of Cantor Fitzgerald, a corporation affected directly by the September 11, 2001 Terrorist Attacks in Manhattan, New York, and was an associate of the late financier Jeff Epstein.
17 quotes on TrueQuotesView all quotes by Howard Lutnick →
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