My Wartime CEO Story

By Marina Peikova, President of Global Council for Business Resilience

(small.news) — Everyone lives their own story. Mine took a sharp turn in February 2022.

I was the CEO of one of Ukraine’s largest convenience store chains when, overnight, war redefined my role and purpose. Ordinary business became anything but ordinary.

For two years, I managed that business through wartime. I was part of the Food Safety Committee working directly with the Office of the President. I saw how things worked, and how they broke, at the very highest level. That experience became the foundation of my book, and eventually of everything I do now.

The Lesson No Process Can Teach

But the biggest lesson had nothing to do with supply chains.

Crisis management is not about operational processes. In a real crisis, those break down. The true challenge always appears where processes end.

In crisis, the real challenge is managing yourself—your fear and emotions, and those around you. People react unpredictably under pressure. To lead in a crisis, you must first control what’s inside before managing what happens outside.

This Personal Lesson Feeds Directly into a Broader Reality.

Here’s the hard truth: crisis is not a possibility but a certainty for all of us. Disruption is already here.

We live in a world of permanent disruption right now. Geopolitical instability. Cybersecurity threats. Economic shocks. Regulatory changes. Climate events. AI is reshaping industries faster than anyone can plan for. We are constantly firefighting — big fires and small ones — and that is simply the environment we operate in now.

Why Small Businesses Carry the Biggest Risk

After leaving my role as CEO, I became president of the Global Council for Business Resilience, a nonprofit focused on helping small and medium businesses become stronger before the next disruption hits.

Why SMEs? The math makes it painfully clear.

Large companies have reserves. Multiple suppliers. Legal teams. Risk consultants. Backup plans for their backup plans. Most small business owners have none of that. One supplier. One logistics route. One person who holds all the knowledge. One revenue stream. No buffer, because there was never time or money to build one.

When something breaks in that structure, it doesn’t bend. It collapses. And for many people, that business is not just a company. It’s fifteen or twenty years of their life. Their family’s security. Their identity. Losing it is not a business event. It’s a life event.

The Window Most Owners Never Use

Human nature doesn’t want to think about that. We’re wired to believe tomorrow will look like today. I understand that instinct completely. I had it too, until February 2022 made it impossible to hold onto.

Resilience is not built during a crisis. It’s built before — in the decisions you make when everything is fine, when the pressure is off, when it feels unnecessary. That’s the only window you actually have.

A Starting Point, Not a Sales Pitch

We built a free resilience assessment for SME owners. Go to our website, take the assessment honestly, and you’ll get a clear picture of your vulnerabilities with practical recommendations to strengthen your business now. Nobody checks your answers. Nobody audits you. It’s a social impact tool, built because we genuinely believe this matters.

Small businesses make up roughly 70% of the global economy. The resilience of economies, communities, and countries starts here. Strong SMEs build strong economies. Strong economies create stronger societies. The connection is real and immediate.

The real question isn’t if disruption will reach you—it’s whether you act before it does.

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