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Former FDNY captain Brenda Berkman leads a 9/11 tribute at the Forbes Power Women Summit in New York on September 11, 2024.

“There’s nothing more attractive than an ambitious woman,” designer and entrepreneur Tory Burch told the Forbes audience Wednesday. “Never shy away from the word ‘ambition.’”

This was just one of many terrific pieces of encouragement and wisdom shared on stage during the 12th annual Forbes Power Women Summit, which was held in New York on Wednesday and featured conversations with activists (Amanda Nguyen, Tarana Burke and Cecile Richards, to name three), CEOs (J. Crew’s Libby Waddle was one), celebrities (I had the privilege of speaking to Kerry Washington about her production company, Simpson Street) and of course, entrepreneurs (Fawn Weaver and Joanna Strober, of Uncle Nearest and Midi Health, were there; you’ve read about them both on the Forbes Richest Self-Made Women list and the Forbes Next Billion-Dollar Startups list).

My colleague Zoya Hasan covered all the day’s developments in this live-blog, and you can read all about it here. I encourage you to do so, but in the meantime, I want to leave you with some remarks from former FDNY captain Brenda Berkman. As Wednesday also marked the 23rd anniversary of the 9/11 attacks, Berkman led a moment of silence and then shared her unique perspective on the day. Berkman was among the many brave first responders........

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