As with AA, there was a time when WA did not yet exist and had to be created. In the early 1980s, a number of people began to recognize that their work behavior was pathological – impacting their lives much how a substance does when it overtakes the will of the addict. Individuals in search of a solution found each other in the workplace, at home, and on the playing field. Those who were willing to be first in service formed groups modeled after those of other Twelve-Step programs. In April 1983, one of the first formal efforts to create a fellowship around workaholism began in New York, when a corporate financial planner and a schoolteacher met. They formed a group in an effort to stop working compulsively and to help others who suffered from the disease. In their earliest meetings, spouses participated as well. These pioneers hoped to reclaim the strength that they had previously experienced through the AA and Al-Anon fellowships. In retrospect, the related family and friends were perhaps better suited to a Work-Anon group – albeit they did not form a separate organization for their recovery at that point. WA literature was initially drafted meeting-by-meeting or adapted from other Twelve-Step programs. Many of the early writings were authored by V. M. – one of the leaders who gave life and structure to the first WA groups.
Within the next several years, others (without knowledge of the New York effort) also started to label work addiction as an illness and to hold meetings in their communities. Several Recovery groups were established in Southern California. Eventually, the workaholics from Los Angeles and San Diego merged with those in New York to collaborate on the creation of new literature and to carry the Twelve Steps to those still struggling with the addiction. Meetings also started up in several areas in the Northeastern and Southwestern United States. Magazine and newspaper articles helped to announce their existence. In the late 1980s, a number of groups developed in the San Francisco Bay Area when a nurse – previously acquainted with AA – noticed that her compulsive, intense working behavior was impacting her health and relationships even more severely than alcohol had. She sought help at the Dry Dock, San Francisco’s AA Recovery center. In 1987, she established WA as a nonprofit California corporation to represent that first official Intergroup.
Requests for information came in from other countries as meetings began around the world. Despite all being based on the Twelve Steps, however, groups often had different definitions of the Problem, as well as unique ideas for the Tools and other literature. As more workaholics discovered each other’s existence – and their striking similarities – many pushed for sharing of concepts, including the development of a standard meeting format and an approach for responding to public inquiries about workaholism. On March 31, 1990 – after an exchange of letters among several of the first WA groups – four workaholics and two of their spouses met in the basement of St. John’s Presbyterian Church basement in West Los Angeles. Representing the groups of New York, Los Angeles and San Diego, they titled their meeting the “Workaholics Anonymous First World Service Conference.” At this initial gathering, they shared the history, progress, and hopes for the future of their respective groups as well as identified a number of common problems they had encountered. Issues included dealing with referrals from concerned spouses, dealing with referrals from medical doctors and psychologists, dealing with inquiries from those with no Step experience, developing a meeting format for very small groups, substituting telephone support where meeting attendance was impractical, and how to confront the cultural fact that workaholism was not yet accepted as a widespread and serious disease. The workaholic conference attendees assumed the responsibilities of the new organization and mutually pledged to hold their offices until elections could be held at the next convention. During such period, the newly formed Workaholics Anonymous World Service Organization (WA-WSO) sought permission from AA to adapt the Preamble, Twelve Steps, and Twelve Traditions; began to develop new Articles of Incorporation and Bylaws; assembled a starter kit for new meetings, including a suggested meeting format and other core readings; began compiling a list of relevant literature and gathering stories of recovery; developed a roster of all the known WA meetings worldwide; and communicated with each WA group.
On November 7, 1992, enthusiasm was high as about thirty participants gathered to represent many of the sixty-three existing WA groups – including those from Canada, Germany, and Japan – at the Second World Service Conference at Summit Medical Center in Oakland, California. The conference attendees ultimately placed all WA-WSO authority in the hands of five co-chairpersons:
- for the registration of groups
- for answering mail and telephone inquiries
- for outreach
- for managing the treasury, and
- for facilitating communication among the co-chairs and committees.
Committees were then established to reexamine and officially file the Bylaws, develop a list of suggested literature, publish a newsletter, circulate announcements, and raise funds. The early nonprofit incorporation of WA in Northern California continued to provide Intergroup services for those ten meetings until a decrease in attendance led to insufficient donations for the continued support of such efforts. Later, in the 1990s, that original corporation was disbanded and the small residual treasury was donated to the new international organization.
A few years later, the growing consensus that WA establish an internet presence and start using email encouraged efforts to further structure service within the Fellowship. A WA member from Boston created an unofficial WA webpage, including some WA literature and providing a reply address. This attracted interest as newcomers used it to look for meetings and gather information. It eventually became too much for one person to maintain. The WA-WSO Board ultimately embraced electronic media, and – with the help of members of the Boston meeting and others – a URL was obtained and the website launched at www.workaholics-anonymous.org.
Since 2002 WA has benefitted from the service of a full Board of Trustees and the WA Fellowship has continued to grow internationally. It now includes many online and telephone meetings, in addition to those that are in-person. Our literature has also increased, with the publishing of the Book of Recovery (2005, expanded into a second edition in 2015), the Book of Discovery, WA’s Twelve-Step study guide and workbook (2010), the fifty-two meditation Book of Serenity (2018), and a series of useful, single-topic pamphlets.
Service to others fuels the organization’s evolution, as well as helps to maintain individual recovery. WA is comprised of the efforts of all members – the collective result of many small acts of service done one at a time – proving that a Higher Power can guide workaholics to serve in a balanced way. Many WA members have been relieved of the perfectionism and procrastination that often characterized past attempts at helping others. Every member is welcome and encouraged to surrender grandiosity and provide service in whatever capacity that individual recovery allows, however humble it may be to start. Such service enables WA members to practice setting abstinence boundaries in a safe environment and to ensure that the organization continues to exist for current members and for all others who wish to recover in the future.
(Adapted from the Workaholics Anonymous Book of Recovery, ed. 2, 2015, pp. 198-201)