Lessons From Business Leader With 25 Years of Sobriety

STEPS TO SUCCESS –

Jan. 25, 2022 – To me, the 12 steps are about life transformations, not new year’s resolutions. For the first part of this series, I’m focusing on the first six steps. I’ve pulled the steps below directly from the AA website; the business lessons are mine. Note: Although some of these steps reference God, you don’t have to interpret them from a religious lens. If you are religious, then by all means, please use the lens of the faith you believe in! Okay, a personal disclaimer about this step: I don’t believe God can remove character defects. However, what I do believe is that I can find peace via steps four and five. By taking an inventory of myself as a business owner and as a person, admitting my shortcomings, being accountable to someone or something beyond myself and then working on transforming myself — that’s how I can remove my character defects.

So, the more work you’ve done in steps four and five, the more you’ll be ready to turn around your character defects in step six. And if you think those character defects only pertain to your professional life, reconsider. Who we are at home shapes who we are at the office and change has to start on a personal level.

Reaching step six is the halfway point — but to fully transform as business leaders and individuals, we need to work on the remaining six steps as well, which I’ll explore in the second (and final) part of this series.