I’m okay with President Trump’s plan to build a wall to help keep out illegal aliens, but I don’t think it will have much of an impact on drug smuggling as long as the demand for drugs exists.
The United States tried for 12 years to keep Americans from drinking alcohol by making it a crime and a violation of the Constitution, but gave up in 1934.
The focus should instead be on reducing the nation’s demand for drugs, a tall order but doable, and I am glad to see the President’s interest in doing something about it. As long as he focuses on reducing the demand for drugs, he is likely to have a degree of success.
As it happens, the nation already has a great program in place, Alcoholics Anonymous, which has helped sober up millions since its founding in Akron Ohio in 1935. Narcotics Anonymous and Cocaine Anonymous have also made significant contributions.
For validation, I refer readers to an article by business consultant, Keith Ferrazzi, in the Harvard Business Review (HBR) three years ago. It makes the case that Alcoholics Anonymous provides an excellent model for business CEO’s to follow.
“When it comes to modifying deeply ingrained behavior,” Ferrazzi said, “the Alcoholics Anonymous 12-step program has a superior track record and one that businessmen can use and learn from.”
President Trump may want to contact Ferrazzi. N.J. Governor Christie seems to have a heart for the project, but it’s not clear that he has the savvy.
As an AA member for more than 35 years, a Harvard MBA graduate (1953) and the founder of One Day at Time, a non profit company in Little Rock in 2004, I was thrilled by Ferrazi’s observations and the thinking that brought him to his conclusions.
“At the simplest level,” Ferrazi wrote, “the comparison is this: organizations can’t change their culture unless individual employees change their behavior—and changing behavior is hard. Many “change” programs focus on providing strategies, technologies, and training. But often that’s not enough.”
In his article, Frerrazi notes that AA and others like it, use incentives, celebration, peer pressure, coaching to adopt new habits, negative reinforcement, and role models—things organizations can draw on.”
To Change the Culture, Change the Habits
Lisa Buckingham, the chief human resources officer at Lincoln Financial-a client of Ferrazzi’s – had this to say about overcoming harmful habits.
“I’ve never been to AA, but Keith’s insights about how their methodologies translate to company change initiatives are really profound. Systemic change can’t happen without changes in individual behavior.
“Twelve Step groups create a safe environment that allows people to be authentic, and we try to do the same thing. We strive for openness and candor. We begin our meetings with a “personal and professional check-in” during which people talk for a few minutes about what’s going on in their lives. It requires us to be vulnerable, it helps build our relationship as a team—and very often it gives us an opportunity to ask how we can help one another.
“We try to take a moment to celebrate every single success,” Buckingham continues. “Many of our managers send handwritten thank-you notes. We might send congratulatory e-mails to individual team members and copy our CEO. Those things make people feel appreciated—and that matters when competitors try to recruit them away. We aim to show gratitude. Sending flowers to a valued employee on a random day is never a bad idea.”
In his article, Ferrazzi comments that, “Analogies are never perfect, and there are clearly points where the comparison doesn’t hold. For instance, AA relies heavily on spirituality, asking participants to put their faith in a higher power and to declare themselves powerless—sentiments that are generally not appropriate for driving corporate change.
“Still, in our work with clients including eBay, Dow Chemical, Accenture, AOL, and Lincoln Financial, we have found the comparison useful. Even people who have never attended a 12-step program know some of the basics from pop culture portrayals.
Nothing happens without a readiness to change.
John Kotter, the preeminent change management expert at the Harvard Business School, has written: “People don’t change a minute before they’re ready.
“In the AA canon, ‘hitting rock bottom’ is often the catalyst, but for companies, change readiness doesn’t require failure. Sometimes a leader’s admission of vulnerability helps others recognize and address their failings (think of the sharing done in AA meetings).
“You can’t force people to change—you can only help them want to. AA’s process recognizes this truth; few managers do.”
It’s important to replace old habits with new ones.
“Many former smokers chew gum or toothpicks. AA serves coffee to give attendees a beverage in place of the ones they’ve given up. In change management, the goal is to replace negative habits with positive ones. At one restaurant chain, store managers used to begin the day by going over the numbers from the previous shift.
“Although analyzing numbers isn’t inherently bad, it is an isolating behavior, usually done in an office with the door closed—and data alone often don’t explain why sales went up or down. So we helped managers start the day with a different routine: talking with crew members to learn whether anything unusual had happened on the previous shift and only then going through the numbers. This increased managers’ understanding of business conditions and boosted employee engagement—and sales rose.”
Peer support and pressure drive change.
“One of the best ways to change human behavior is to gather people with similar problems together. This was first recognized in 1905 by the Boston physician Joseph Pratt, who organized groups for tuberculosis patients that emphasized the need for rest, fresh air, and proper nutrition.
“In our work we find that bringing employees together in peer groups to discuss change initiatives can create accountability, mutual generosity, a judgment-free attitude, and increased pressure on reluctant employees to change.”
Sponsorship deepens commitment and sparks results.
“AA pairs experienced members, or sponsors, with newcomers for one-on-one support. Research has shown that these role model relationships increase both parties’ ability to stay sober. The corporate version, called peer coaching or mentorship, has been widely embraced: For example, 70% of Fortune 500 companies use it with their salespeople.”
Community without hierarchy is a catalyst for change.
“AA is famous for its organizational structure, in which local groups are self-directed. Addiction specialists sometimes raise concerns that groups without therapists or other formal leaders lack professionalism, but research has shown that this structure increases members’ security, comfort, and sense of mutuality in the relationships they form.”
You are the company you keep.
“Studies have shown that people with a close friend or relative who drinks heavily are 50% likelier to be heavy drinkers themselves. That is why AA discourages members from associating with their old drinking pals. Similarly, having an obese friend increases one’s own chances of becoming obese, and a person’s income can be estimated by averaging the income of his or her five closest friends. This knowledge can guide change managers, who should evaluate the ROI (Return on Investment) of helping particular employees to change in light of those employees’ potential to get others to follow suit.”
Continuous introspection is key.
“Early on in the AA program, members examine their past behavior and start trying to change. AA talks about continuously taking a moral inventory; we see this in effective corporate change initiatives as well. In the wake of the global financial crisis and General Motors’s bankruptcy filing, for example, the company practiced that kind of deep introspection, found its behavior wanting, and drew on its experience in total quality management to improve its relationships with dealers. Before the crisis, GM had managed those relationships by relying heavily on checklists, specifications, and mandated actions. Now it promised and demonstrated a new focus on listening and collaboratively solving problems.”
Changes in practice may represent breakthroughs.
“In the AA program, a profound transformation occurs when a participant shifts from an emotional framework of guilt, shame, remorse, and resentment toward a more positive, optimistic mind-set. But “mind-set” is hard to measure, and minds are hard to change; therefore, in our work we focus on identifiable shifts in practice. We coach new practices or habits that emphasize growth rather than cost-cutting, for example, or that grow profitability rather than revenue.”
It pays to acknowledge small wins.
“AA doesn’t ask members never to drink again—that goal would probably seem unreachable. It asks them not to drink that day, and it recognizes small milestones by awarding “sobriety coins,” usually monthly, for periods of abstinence. Change managers should take a lesson from this practice and find ways for employees to demonstrate and celebrate incremental achievements.”
The goal is progress, not perfection.
“Ninety percent of recovering alcoholics relapse at some point. That’s hardly surprising: The newly sober are bombarded with sensory cues that their brains associate with their addiction—the smell of beer, the sound of glasses clinking in a toast. In organizations, too, change doesn’t always follow a straight line. Neuroscience has shown that people’s emotional responses to work create their own chemical reactions, releasing powerful neurotransmitters such as adrenalin, dopamine, and serotonin. Successful change can be addictive in a positive way.”
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