The Kansas City Business Journal interviewed U.S. Engineering Company Holdings CEO Tyler Nottberg and his fellow co-founders of the C19KC Task Force in this week’s issue. In the article Nottberg, MTAR LLC CEO Taimoor Nana, Russell Stover Chocolates CEO Andy Deister and NorthPoint Development CEO Nathaniel Hagedorn discuss their collaborative effort to push back against COVID-19’s encroachment into the area.

Beginning with a fast-tracked acquisition of PPE for local health workers, the team of businessmen decided to formalize their partnership and take intentional strides to help find solutions to the problems the Kansas City area faces as a result of the novel coronavirus.

“If you were to say, ‘Who better to lead through a crisis than someone who has a mechanical construction firm, someone who designs and manufactures surf clothing, someone who makes chocolates and then someone who has a big real estate portfolio?’ I’m not sure that’s the type of group that you would maybe throw together to deal with a public health emergency,” Nottberg remarked in the interview, reflecting on the team’s lack of experience in healthcare. But that didn’t stop their drive to find ways to apply their expertise.

As the KCBJ reports, Nottberg and company brought knowledge of supply chain management and worldwide connections to the table, offering their services to members of local health and government teams. From there, relationships and cooperation ultimately delivered a flood of masks, tests and tracing capabilities into the Kansas City area.

The C19KC Task Force hopes for a more unified Kansas City after this crisis passes. As Nottberg notes, “if we collectively keep our heads focused on how to make things better for a broader group of individuals, then we’ll come out of this on the back end proud as a community.”

Read the article at the Kansas City Business Journal.

*Header image from the Kansas City Business Journal article.