Have you ever heard of Irena Sandler?
She was a Catholic social worker who rescued 2,500 Jewish children in the Warsaw Ghetto from certain extinction during World War II. Her story was essentially unknown until the 1980s, when it was discovered by three Kansas high school students as part of a history project. Their efforts and Irena’s story was finally written in 2011 in a book by Jack Mayer called Life in a Jar.
The title of the book came from a play the three Kansas students – all females - wrote about Irena Sandler’s efforts. Irena used jars to store the names of the 2,500 Jewish children she and her network saved by smuggling them out of the Warsaw Ghetto. Each child’s birth name and Jewish parents’ names were recorded on paper, along with their new Polish name and “adopted” family. The papers were sealed in jars and buried in the yard where Irena lived.
The plan was that once the war was over, the jars would be retrieved and parents and children would be reunited. Irena and the birth parents knew that, for most, this would never happen, as the parents were shipped to Treblinka, a prison camp, where over 800,000 perished.
What drives someone like Irena to get involved in such a situation and make a difference? Part of it is nurture. Her father was a physician who died of typhus at an early age. He reached out to the sick, so much so that he often knowingly put himself in danger to help others. It was a drive that ultimately cost him his life.
The book recounts pivotal bits of advice Irena’s father told her. He taught her that “people are the same - there are only good people and bad people.” He said, “‘If you see someone drowning, you need to rescue them even if you can’t swim.’” Irena said, “‘If I can’t swim, won’t we both drown?’” Her father replied, “‘You must do something.’”
Given her upbringing and actions during World War II, Irena displayed numerous leadership traits as she worked in the face of death every day.
Many of these traits and skills are transferable to the business world, including:
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