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How My Dogs Taught Me to Be a Better Leader and a Better Human Being

Kelly Reeves
5 min readAug 1, 2019
Photo by Drew Hays on Unsplash

Owning a business can be tricky to navigate. It requires certain skills and traits for it to be successful.

As a serial entrepreneur who has founded both for profit and nonprofit organizations over the past 17 years, I can say that I have picked up a thing or two along the way.

Yes, I’ve had mentors and colleagues who have been instrumental to my success. I’ve certainly made plenty of mistakes from which I’ve learned.

However, some of the most important entrepreneurial lesson I’ve learned have come from an unexpected source: My dogs.

One of my business endeavors is a nonprofit animal rescue. We save pets no one else wants — abused, abandoned, and neglected. Many have serious medical and/or behavioral issues. Needless to say, it takes certain qualities to provide care for and rehabilitate pets that come from a very difficult background.

Like with entrepreneurship and running a business, not many are up for the task.

I came to realize that the qualities required for taking care of and rehabilitating once mangy, bedraggled dogs are not much different than those required for running a business and leading people.

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Kelly Reeves
Kelly Reeves

Written by Kelly Reeves

I write about self-defense, cybersecurity, marketing, entrepreneurship, human stuff, and the occasional dog post.

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