Firms need to ensure that their ability to provide effective

Host: The office lights burned late into the night — sterile, white, unwavering. Through the high glass windows, the city skyline shimmered like circuitry — each window a glowing pixel in the digital sprawl of ambition. The hum of computers, the distant whir of elevators, and the echo of keyboard taps filled the silence like mechanical rain.

At the end of the corridor, the glass-walled conference room glowed like an aquarium. Inside, two figures lingered after hours — Jack, his tie loosened, sleeves rolled to his elbows, and Jeeny, calm, poised, a laptop open before her, its blue light flickering across her face. Between them lay a pile of reports, coffee cups, and the tension of competing philosophies.

Jeeny: (reading from her screen) “Arthur Levitt once said, ‘Firms need to ensure that their ability to provide effective customer service keeps pace with their growth. If you're marketing your firm to new customers, you better be able to provide them service when they do business with you.’”

Jack: (leaning back, half-smirking) “That’s the problem with growth — it’s like fire. Everyone wants more of it until it burns their hands.”

Jeeny: “Or their reputation.”

Jack: “Same thing these days.”

Jeeny: “No, Jack. Reputation is harder to rebuild than infrastructure. People forgive broken systems faster than broken trust.”

Jack: “You sound like a brand consultant.”

Jeeny: “And you sound like a man who thinks customers are statistics.”

Jack: (grinning) “They are. Without data, they’re just noise.”

Jeeny: “Without empathy, they’re just leaving.”

Host: The air conditioner hummed, its steady rhythm the only applause to their sparring. The city below pulsed like a living organism — a million transactions, promises, and betrayals passing in silence.

Jack: “You know what growth really is? Hunger. You can’t slow down and pet every customer when you’re starving for expansion.”

Jeeny: “Then you’ll choke on your own appetite. Growth without care is cancer, Jack.”

Jack: “You’re comparing capitalism to disease now?”

Jeeny: “No. I’m comparing indifference to decay.”

Host: Her words lingered, slicing clean through the hum of the machines. Jack’s jaw tightened — not out of anger, but recognition. He looked out through the window, the reflection of skyscrapers shimmering against his own.

Jack: “You ever wonder if maybe good service doesn’t scale? That the moment a company gets big enough, empathy becomes… automated?”

Jeeny: “That’s not inevitability. That’s laziness dressed as logic. Empathy isn’t lost in scale — it’s lost in ego.”

Jack: “So what’s the solution? Handwritten thank-you notes to every customer?”

Jeeny: “No. Just the humility to remember that customers aren’t interruptions to business. They are the business.”

Host: The coffee machine clicked, empty. The smell of burnt espresso clung faintly to the air. Jeeny closed her laptop halfway, as though punctuating her thought.

Jeeny: “Arthur Levitt knew this. He came from finance, a world addicted to numbers. But even he understood that trust — not profit — is what keeps a firm alive.”

Jack: “Trust doesn’t show up on a balance sheet.”

Jeeny: “Neither does character. But both decide your future.”

Host: The neon signs outside bled faint red and blue across the glass, painting their faces in alternating light — warmth, coldness, warmth again.

Jack: “You talk like service is morality.”

Jeeny: “Isn’t it? Every act of service is a choice between convenience and conscience.”

Jack: “And conscience doesn’t scale either.”

Jeeny: “It does when it’s culture.”

Host: The silence between them thickened. Outside, a plane passed across the skyline — small, distant, its blinking light tracing a slow arc toward somewhere far from the city’s chaos.

Jack: “You know what the irony is? Every company starts small enough to care — and then grows just enough to forget why it mattered.”

Jeeny: “Because they start thinking ‘growth’ means ‘greatness.’ It doesn’t. Growth is quantity. Greatness is quality.”

Jack: “You really believe that in this economy?”

Jeeny: “Yes. Because markets forget, but people remember. Every bad experience becomes a story — and stories spread faster than ads.”

Jack: (nodding) “So Levitt wasn’t warning firms about profit. He was warning them about pride.”

Jeeny: “Exactly. He understood that the bigger you get, the smaller your humanity tends to become — unless you fight for it.”

Host: The clock ticked on the wall, marking the late hour. The building’s other lights had gone dark. Only this room still glowed — two figures in the machinery of ambition, searching for something moral in the mechanics.

Jack: “You know, I once ran a team that scaled fast — doubled our client list in six months. We celebrated like kings. Then came the complaints, the refunds, the cancellations. We didn’t fail because we lost efficiency. We failed because we lost attention.”

Jeeny: “Attention is the first casualty of speed.”

Jack: “And speed’s the only thing investors care about.”

Jeeny: “Until your reputation slows you down.”

Host: The city lights flickered outside — one building at a time shutting down, as though the skyline itself was exhaling after a long day.

Jeeny: “Do you know why architects design foundations deeper than the visible structure?”

Jack: (smirking) “So the building doesn’t collapse?”

Jeeny: “Exactly. Service is that foundation. You can market a skyscraper, but if your base is cracked, it’ll crumble under its own growth.”

Jack: “So what you’re saying is — Levitt was less a businessman and more a moralist.”

Jeeny: “He was both. He knew that capitalism without conscience eats itself.”

Jack: “And service is conscience?”

Jeeny: “Service is gratitude made practical.”

Host: The last of the light shifted across their faces. Jeeny’s voice softened, the edge of debate melting into reflection.

Jeeny: “Think about it, Jack — why do we serve? Not just customers, but each other? Because service humbles us. It reminds us that success isn’t a solo climb; it’s a shared ascent.”

Jack: (quietly) “And when we forget that?”

Jeeny: “We mistake empire for excellence.”

Host: A long pause — the kind filled not with silence, but with realization. The city had gone dark now, save for the faint blue glow of their screen.

Jack: (after a beat) “Maybe that’s what he really meant — that growth without empathy is just expansion of emptiness.”

Jeeny: “And service without growth is stagnation. You need both — wings and roots.”

Host: The clock struck midnight. The rain began again, gentle and deliberate, streaking across the glass like falling ink.

Jeeny: “You know what I love about Levitt’s quote? It’s not about business. It’s about balance. The ability to expand without forgetting the small.”

Jack: “Like remembering the name of the first customer when you have ten thousand.”

Jeeny: “Exactly.”

Host: The rain fell harder now, drumming softly against the window, a sound like applause from the universe for the quiet truth just spoken.

And in that stillness, Levitt’s words seemed to glow on the screen — no longer corporate advice, but a timeless reminder:

That growth without service is greed.
That expansion without empathy is collapse.
That the greatest firms — like the greatest people — rise not by reaching more, but by caring deeper.

Host: Jeeny closed her laptop. The light dimmed, leaving their reflections in the glass — two figures surrounded by the pulse of the sleeping city.

Jeeny: (softly) “You can’t market what you can’t maintain.”

Jack: “And you can’t maintain what you don’t respect.”

Host: The rain eased once more, the city exhaling.

And as they stood to leave — tired but grounded —
the world outside seemed to whisper its agreement,
that true success isn’t about how high you climb,
but who you lift along the way.