Stephen Deason is the founder and CEO of The OPARASA Group in Roswell, Georgia, a family of businesses that ties healthcare staffing and home care to helping people in recovery build worth. The group includes OPA Home Care, a Georgia-licensed private home care provider serving the elderly, the disabled and veterans across metro Atlanta, OPA Staffing, and the OPA RASA foundation, which runs an earn-as-you-learn path from apprentice to journeyman for people in long-term recovery. He has spent more than 30 years building healthcare and technology companies and was previously CEO of the martech firm GRYYT.In this Founder Talk conversation with Caleb Pedosiuk, Stephen explains what happens after addiction treatment ends, when the formal stages of recovery stop and a person who has learned to stay sober is told to go forth and prosper. He describes OPA RASA's staged path into work the world will pay for, why the tenacity and resilience people bring out of addiction are exactly what employers value, and why OPA deliberately keeps its recovery workforce and its elderly clients apart. He walks through the four ways companies put people to work and how a licensed home care provider differs from an agency, makes the case that an entrepreneur and a person in early recovery share the same first job, being the guardian of what they have been entrusted with, and shares his plan to franchise the model. Asked what he needs most to grow, he says more veterans to serve, after OPA Home Care was approved to provide care through the Veterans Administration.Stephen is exactly the kind of founder, innovator, and problem solver this series exists to put a light on. He has built a business that does well by doing good, and he can show the stages it takes for a life to be rebuilt. Authority is earned by building things worth talking about, and an honest account of that work is what makes a brand understood, trusted, and findable by the systems people now ask for answers.Learn more about OPA Home Care: https://opahomecare.comOPA RASA: https://oparasa.orgOPA Staffing: https://opastaffing.comStephen Deason on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stephendeason/What We Need to Grow is Caleb Pedosiuk's founder conversation series from 79 Development, on growth, judgment, and the thinking behind building great companies. It exists to shine a light on the founders, innovators, problem solvers, and pioneers building things that matter.Listen on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/5O6IiwVl4tHyhegQafVZLaPodcast sponsored by 79 Development Inc | 79dev.com#addictionrecovery #socialenterprise #homecare #veterans #workforcedevelopment #recoveryworks #founders #podcast