The Compassionate and Forgiving Organization

Doug Lennick and Fred Kiel

When it’s business as usual, acts of compassion are small or subtle in the great organizational scheme of things. But when a major crisis strikes, it is easy to see the difference between the truly compassionate organization and one that gives lip service to values. Aaron Feuerstein is the former president and CEO of Malden Mills, a company best known for producing the revolutionary fabric, Polartec. On a cold December night in 1995, a devastating fire tore through his factory in Lawrence, Massachusetts. In a time of corporate downsizing, many of his peers urged him to re-open operations overseas—a decision that would lead to the loss of 3,000 jobs at home. Shunning their ...