The Seven Habits - An Overview

SUMMARY OF THE SEVEN HABITS

Habit 1: Be Proactive
hange starts from within, and highly effective people make the decision to improve their lives through the things that they can influence rather than by simply reacting to external forces.

Habit 2: Begin with the End in Mind
Develop a principle-centered personal mission statement. Extend the mission statement into long-term goals based on personal principles.

Habit 3: Put First Things First
Spend time doing what fits into your personal mission, observing the proper balance between production and building production capacity. Identify the key roles that you take on in life, and make time for each of them.

Habit 4: Think Win/Win

Seek agreements and relationships that are mutually beneficial. In cases where a "win/win" deal cannot be achieved, accept the fact that agreeing to make "no deal" may be the best alternative. In developing an organizational culture, be sure to reward win/win behavior among employees and avoid inadvertantly rewarding win/lose behavior.

Habit 5: Seek First to Understand, Then to Be Understood
First seek to understand the other person, and only then try to be understood. Stephen Covey presents this habit as the most important principle of interpersonal relations. Effective listening is not simply echoing what the other person has said through the lens of one's own experience. Rather, it is putting oneself in the perspective of the other person, listening empathically for both feeling and meaning.


Habit 6: Synergize
Through trustful communication, find ways to leverage individual differences to create a whole that is greater than the sum of the parts. Through mutual trust and understanding, one often can solve conflicts and find a better solution than would have been obtained through either person's own solution.

Habit 7: Sharpen the Saw

Take time out from production to build production capacity through personal renewal of the physical, mental, social/emotional, and spiritual dimensions. Maintain a balance among these dimensions.

the 7 habits of highly effective people

Dr Stephen Covey's inspirational book - 7 Habits Of Highly Effective People®

Dr Stephen Covey is a hugely influential management guru, whose book The Seven Habits Of Highly Effective People, became a blueprint for personal development when it was published in 1990. The Seven Habits are said by some to be easy to understand but not as easy to apply.

Don't let the challenge daunt you: The 'Seven Habits' are a remarkable set of inspirational and aspirational standards for anyone who seeks to live a full, purposeful and good life, and are applicable today more than ever, as the business world becomes more attuned to humanist concepts. Covey's values are full of integrity and humanity, and contrast strongly with the process-based ideologies that characterised management thinking in earlier times.

Stephen Covey, as well as being a renowned writer, speaker, academic and humanist, has also built a huge training and consultancy products and services business - Franklin Covey which has a global reach, and has at one time or another consulted with and provided training services to most of the world's leading corporations.


habit 1 - be proactive®
This is the ability to control one's environment, rather than have it control you, as is so often the case. Self determination, choice, and the power to decide response to stimulus, conditions and circumstances

habit 2 - begin with the end in mind®
Covey calls this the habit of personal leadership - leading oneself that is, towards what you consider your aims. By developing the habit of concentrating on relevant activities you will build a platform to avoid distractions and become more productive and successful.

habit 3 - put first things first®
Covey calls this the habit of personal management. This is about organising and implementing activities in line with the aims established in habit 2. Covey says that habit 2 is the first, or mental creation; habit 3 is the second, or physical creation. (See the section on time management.)

habit 4 - think win-win®
Covey calls this the habit of interpersonal leadership, necessary because achievements are largely dependent on co-operative efforts with others. He says that win-win is based on the assumption that there is plenty for everyone, and that success follows a co-operative approach more naturally than the confrontation of win-or-lose.

habit 5 - seek first to understand and then to be understood®
One of the great maxims of the modern age. This is Covey's habit of communication, and it's extremely powerful. Covey helps to explain this in his simple analogy 'diagnose before you prescribe'. Simple and effective, and essential for developing and maintaining positive relationships in all aspects of life. (See the associated sections on Empathy, Transactional Analysis, and the Johari Window.)

habit 6 - synergize®
Covey says this is the habit of creative co-operation - the principle that the whole is greater than the sum of its parts, which implicitly lays down the challenge to see the good and potential in the other person's contribution.

habit 7 - sharpen the saw®
This is the habit of self renewal, says Covey, and it necessarily surrounds all the other habits, enabling and encouraging them to happen and grow. Covey interprets the self into four parts: the spiritual, mental, physical and the social/emotional, which all need feeding and developing.


Stephen Covey's Seven Habits are a simple set of rules for life - inter-related and synergistic, and yet each one powerful and worthy of adopting and following in its own right. For many people, reading Covey's work, or listening to him speak, literally changes their lives. This is powerful stuff indeed and highly recommended.

This 7 Habits summary is just a brief overview - the full work is fascinating, comprehensive, and thoroughly uplifting. Read the book, or listen to the full tape series if you can get hold of it.

In his more recent book 'The 8th Habit', Stephen Covey introduced (logically) an the eighth habit, which deals with personal fulfilment and helping others to achieve fulfilment too. The book also focuses on leadership. Time will tell whether the The 8th Habit achieves recognition and reputation close to Covey's classic original 7 Habits work.

Various phrases on this page are registered trade marks belonging to Stephen Covey.

Stephen Covey's principles are protected intellectual property and feature strongly in the Franklin Covey organization's portfolio of products and services.

Tips For Effective Time Management

Spend time in Planning and Organizing:
– Think and Plan
– Organize in a way that makes sense to you

Set Goals:
– Decide what you want to do
– Take a “SMART” approach
– Goals give you required direction

Prioritize
– Prioritize and identify what you value
– Flagging/Highlighting can be very helpful
– Once prioritize, concentrate on those that would add value

Use a to do list:
– Find out what is urgent and important
– Put them in order of preferences
– One completed delete them from your list

Be Flexible:
– Allow time of interruptions and distractions
– Save larger block of time for priorities
– Ask yourself questions and get back to your goal

Consider your Biological Time:
– Find out which is the best time for you study
– Are you a morning person?
– A night owl?
– Late Afternoon?

Do Right Things Right
– Doing things right is Effectiveness
– Doing things right is Efficiency
– Focus first for Effectiveness
– Concentrate on Efficiency

Eliminate the Urgent:
– Urgent tasks have short term Consequences
– Important tasks are long term and goal related
– Flagging and or highlighting items are important
– Attach deadline to each of the items

Conquer Procrastination
– Learn to say “NO”
– Reward Yourself

Time Management matrix S. Covey

TIME MANAGEMENT MATRIX from Stephen Covey's book "First Things First"

The efficiency curve

• Self-Discipline Is The Key
• The True Test of Willpower
• Build Your Self-Confidence
• Action Exercises
• Recommended Brian Tracy Program

The more you discipline yourself to working non-stop on a single task, the more you move down the "Efficiency Curve." You get more and more high-quality work done in less and less time.
Each time you stop working however, you break this cycle and move back up the curve to where every part of the task is more difficult and time-consuming.

SELF-DISCIPLINE IS THE KEY
Elbert Hubbard defined self-discipline as "the ability to make yourself do what you should do, when you should do it, whether you feel like it or not."
In the final analysis, success in any area requires tons of discipline. Self-discipline, self-mastery and self-control are the basic building blocks of character and high performance.

THE TRUE TEST OF WILLPOWER
Starting a high-priority task and persisting with that task until it is 100 percent complete is the true test of your character, your willpower and your resolve.
Persistence is actually self-discipline in action. The good news is that the more you discipline yourself to persist on a major task, the more you like and respect yourself, and the higher your self-esteem is.
And the more you like and respect yourself, the easier it is for you to discipline yourself to persist even more.

By focusing clearly on your most valuable task and concentrating single-mindedly until it is 100 percent complete, you actually shape and mold your own character. You become a superior person.
You become a stronger, more competent, confident and happier person. You feel more powerful and productive.

BUILD YOUR SELF-CONFIDENCE
You eventually feel capable of setting and achieving any goal. You become the master of your own destiny. You place yourself on an ascending spiral of personal effectiveness on which your future is absolutely guaranteed.
And the key to all of this is for you to determine the most valuable and important thing you could possibly do at every single moment and then, "Eat That Frog!"

ACTION EXERCISES
Once you start your most important task, discipline yourself to persevere without diversion or distraction until it is 100 percent complete. See it as a “test” to determine whether you are the kind of person who can make a decision to complete something and then carry it out. Once you begin, refuse to stop until the job is finished.

Create large chunks of time

• Schedule Your Time In Advance
• Start Immediately on Number One
• Create Specific Amounts of Time
• Create Preplanned Periods
• Action Exercises
• Recommended Brian Tracy Program

SCHEDULE YOUR TIME IN ADVANCE
This strategy requires a commitment from you to work at scheduled times on large tasks. Most of the really important work you do requires large chunks of unbroken time to complete. Your ability to create and carve out these blocks of high-value, highly productive time, is central to your ability to make a significant contribution to your work and to your life.

START IMMEDIATELY ON NUMBER ONE
Successful salespeople set aside a specific time period each day to phone prospects. Rather than procrastinating or delaying on a task that they don’t particularly like, they resolve that they will phone for one solid hour between 10 a.m. and 11 a.m. and they then discipline themselves to follow through on their resolutions.
Many business executives set aside a specific time each day to call customers directly to get feedback.

CREATE SPECIFIC AMOUNTS OF TIME
Some people allocate specific 30-60 minute time periods each day for exercise. Many people read in the great books 15 minutes each night before retiring. In this way, over time, they eventually read dozens of the best books ever written.
The key to the success of this method of working in specific time segments is for you to plan your day in advance and specifically schedule a fixed time period for a particular activity or task.

You make work appointments with yourself and then discipline yourself to keep them. You set aside 30-, 60- and 90-minute time segments that you use to work on and complete important tasks.

CREATE PREPLANNED PERIODS
Many highly productive people schedule specific activities in preplanned time slots all day long. These people build their work lives around accomplishing key tasks one at a time. As a result, they become more and more productive and eventually produce two times, three times and five times as much as the average person.

ACTION EXERCISES
1. Organize each day to create large chunks of time you can use for key task completion;
2. Make a written appointment with yourself to work on a key task at a specific time.