Honor and Respect

During my time at Second Wind, I have spoken to thousands of small business owners and entrepreneurs of every conceivable stripe and manner. Pet store proprietors and concrete foundation men. Hair stylists and chemical engineers. Some are doing just fine in this gruesome economy, thank you very much. Many others, of course, are struggling. Some are at the brink. Some bear full weight of the situation, you can hear it in their voices. Others let it roll off them with a more c’est la vie attitude.

But each and every business owner has a story to tell. There are details and circumstances that make each story unique. Different market forces at play. Unique personal dramas. There are a million stories in The Naked City.

But one element is consistent–in fact, loud and clear –within all of these narratives. I am amazed anew each week at the honor and consistency that small business owners demonstrate when it comes to honoring their business commitments. And more specifically, the commitments they make after taking out a loan for the business.

Small business owners move heaven and earth to make that monthly loan payment. They go without paychecks. They risk the ire of the IRS or local government by deferring tax payments. They cut their staffs to the point of gutting the business. They empty personal savings accounts. They re-fi their homes. They work fifty, sixty, and even seventy-hour weeks out in the field. They do the work that they used to pay someone else to do–just to keep the business afloat to the point that they can cut that monthly loan check. They made the commitment and, by God, they will honor it.

One can have nothing but respect for such honorable behavior. I can only imagine how much better our economy would be if such honor were practiced up and down the economic food chain. If the largest corporations behaved with such integrity I beleive many of our present woes would not exist and would merely be the imaginary stuff of doomsayers and chronic complainers.

But this honor and integrity can come at a great cost to the small business owner. They perform financial gymnastics each month to meet their loan commitments and then –suddenly — there is nothing left. There’s no more wiggle room. Personal funds are gone. There are no more cuts to make in the business. The chasm looms.

Convincing small business owners that there is another path, a path that can relieve them of their debt burden, save their business and avert personal bankruptcy is the greatest challenge we face at Second Wind. The deeply-ingrained sense of integrity and honor small business owners possess is one of their greatest strengths and –paradoxically — the largest challenge to pursuing a workout solution that could keep their business alive and avert personal bankruptcy. “Going down with the ship” is an honorable decision — perhaps even heroic — but one that does not have to be.

We understand — and deeply respect — the integrity of small business owners. But we also seek to remind them that taking out a loan in good faith, with every intention of servicing that loan faithfully, is not a commitment to put themselves in the poorhouse. The business owner did not sign a pledge to drive themselves into poverty. They did not sign a contract requiring them to live in a cardboard box.

Second Wind offers an alternative. One that honors the integrity of business owners and their right to have a fair shot at succeeding in the worst economy this country has faced in generations.

That’s who we are. That’s what we do.