Never Say Sell

Foreword

A Place in Time

Outside, a new day dawns in the east, the sky daubed with great washes of purple and orange. It is May 1st, and today is the day our manuscript is due. We are just putting our final touches on the draft, numbering pages, and adding in the endnotes as puffed-up robins strut through the newly green grass.

Yet on what should be a day of celebration, we feel somewhat melancholy; the moment is stained by the COVID-19 pandemic that hangs over the world like a shroud.

We don't have to tell you – the news washes over us every day in unrelenting waves from all corners. Healthcare workers are overtaxed. There's not enough personal protective equipment. There's more death. It is a sobering time – a time when all of us have our heads down and are just a little more focused on our work, if we are lucky enough to be decamped at our kitchen tables taking Zoom calls.

It is against this backdrop that this project has taken on a fresh urgency for us. During a time when our institutions and mores are being stressed, we need the help of smart people to navigate through and beyond our current raft of challenges. To us, this is the essence of why we have written this book – to help all of us build more durable bridges between our experience and insight and the challenges that this expertise can help.

Although we're not on the front lines with the nurses in Queens or the ER doctors in Kirkland, we should still be asking ourselves each day, “How can we help?” As experts of ...