The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People: Powerful Lessons in Personal Change

by Stephen R. Covey

Many people with secondary greatness—that is, social recognition for their talents—lack primary greatness or goodness in their character.

The more aware we are of our basic paradigms, maps, or assumptions, and the extent to which we have been influenced by our experience, the more we can take responsibility for those paradigms, examine them, test them against reality, listen to others and be open to their perceptions, thereby getting a larger picture and a far more objective view.

It becomes obvious that if we want to make relatively minor changes in our lives, we can perhaps appropriately focus on our attitudes and behaviors. But if we want to make significant, quantum change, we need to work on our basic paradigms.

And this requires emotional strength. Listening involves patience, openness, and the desire to understand—highly developed qualities of character.

But borrowing strength builds weakness.

Fear replaces cooperation, and both people involved become more arbitrary and defensive.

My experience has been that there are times to teach and times not to teach. When relationships are strained and the air charged with emotion, an attempt to teach is often perceived as a form of judgment and rejection.

I’ve seen unhappy marriages where each spouse wants the other to change, where each is confessing the other’s “sins,” where each is trying to shape up the other.

We must not cease from exploration and the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we began and to know the place for the first time.

We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.

Our character, basically, is a composite of our habits. “Sow a thought, reap an action; sow an action, reap a habit; sow a habit, reap a character; sow a character, reap a destiny,” the maxim goes.

I call the P/PC Balance. P stands for production of desired results, the golden eggs. PC stands for production capability, the ability or asset that produces the golden eggs.

The PC principle is to always treat your employees exactly as you want them to treat your best customers.

Effectiveness lies in the balance. Excessive focus on P results in ruined health, worn-out machines, depleted bank accounts, and broken relationships. Too much focus on PC is like a person who runs three or four hours a day, bragging about the extra ten years of life it creates, unaware he’s spending them running. Or a person endlessly going to school, never producing, living on other people’s golden eggs—the eternal student syndrome.

“No one can persuade another to change. Each of us guards a gate of change that can only be opened from the inside. We cannot open the gate of another, either by argument or by emotional appeal.”

“That which we obtain too easily, we esteem too lightly. It is dearness only which gives everything its value. Heaven knows how to put a proper price on its goods.”

In making such a choice, we become reactive. Reactive people are often affected by their physical environment. If the weather is good, they feel good. If it isn’t, it affects their attitude and their performance.

“No one can hurt you without your consent.”

It’s not what happens to us, but our response to what happens to us that hurts us.

Many people wait for something to happen or someone to take care of them.

Seven Habits. As you study the other six habits, you will see that each depends on the development of your proactive muscles. Each puts the responsibility on you to act. If you wait to be acted upon, you will be acted upon. And growth and opportunity consequences attend either road. *** At one time I worked with a group of people in the home improvement industry, representatives from twenty different organizations who met quarterly to share their numbers

They feel increasingly victimized and out of control, not in charge of their life or their destiny. They blame outside forces—other people, circumstances, even the stars—for their own situation.

Work on things you have control over. Work on you. On be.

We are responsible for our own effectiveness, for our own happiness, and ultimately, I would say, for most of our circumstances.

Put another way, Habit 1 says, “You are the creator.” Habit 2 is the first creation.

In the words of both Peter Drucker and Warren Bennis, “Management is doing things right; leadership is doing the right things.”

But how do the busy, efficient producers and managers often respond? “Shut up! We’re making progress.”

Succeed at home first. Seek and merit divine help. Never compromise with honesty. Remember the people involved. Hear both sides before judging. Obtain counsel of others. Defend those who are absent. Be sincere yet decisive. Develop one new proficiency a year. Plan tomorrow’s work today. Hustle while you wait.

Maintain a positive attitude.

Keep a sense of humor. Be orderly in person and in work. Do not fear mistakes—fear only the absence of creative, constructive, and corrective responses to those mistakes. Facilitate the success of subordinates. Listen twice as much as you speak. Concentrate all abilities and e...

Since many factors affect these economic foundations, I become anxious and uneasy, protective and defensive, about anything that may affect them. When my sense of personal worth comes from my net worth, I am vulnerable to anything that will affect that net worth.

“The work will come again, but childhood won’t.”

WORK CENTEREDNESS. Work-centered people may become “workaholics,” driving themselves to produce at the sacrifice of health, relationships, and other important areas of their lives. Their fundamental identity comes from their work—“I’m a doctor,” “I’m a writer,” “I’m an actor.”

By centering our lives on correct principles, we create a solid foundation for development of the four life-support factors.

The only real limitation of power is the natural consequences of the principles themselves. We are free to choose our actions, based on our knowledge of correct principles, but we are not free to choose the consequences of those actions. Remember, “If you pick up one end of the stick, you pick up the other.”

And finally, you’ll feel comfortable about your decision. Whatever you choose to do, you can focus on it and enjoy it.

One of the main things his research showed was that almost all of the world-class athletes and other peak performers are visualizers. They see it; they feel it; they experience it before they actually do it. They begin with the end in mind. You can do it in every area of your life. Before a performance, a sales presentation, a difficult confrontation, or the daily challenge of meeting a goal, see it clearly, vividly, relentlessly, over and over again. Create an internal “comfort zone.” Then, when you get into the situation, it isn’t foreign. It doesn’t scare you.

[eytan] 2 important concepts so far: 1) be proactive 2) start with the end in sight Re: 2 It is important to have a set of principles (paradigms) that guide our decisions and values. It is almost like a personal constitution. Come up with these set of principles and think through if they would help you live a life you are proud of. think through before living Takeaways: - Write a personal constitution - Be more introspective

You may find that your mission statement will be much more balanced, much easier to work with, if you break it down into the specific role areas of your life and the goals you want to accomplish in each area.

An effective goal focuses primarily on results rather than activity. It identifies where you want to be, and, in the process, helps you determine where you are. It gives you important information on how to get there, and it tells you when you have arrived. It unifies your efforts and energy. It gives meaning and purpose to all you do. And it can finally translate itself into daily activities so that you are proactive, you are in charge of your life, you are making happen each day the things that will enable you to fulfill your personal mission statement.

But when people become more mature and their own lives take on a separate meaning, they want involvement, significant involvement. And if they don’t have that involvement, they don’t buy it. Then you have a significant motivational problem which cannot be solved at the same level of thinking that created it.

Things which matter most must never be at the mercy of things which matter least. GOETHE

Management, remember, is clearly different from leadership. Leadership is primarily a high-powered, right brain activity. It’s more of an art; it’s based on a philosophy. You have to ask the ultimate questions of life when you’re dealing with personal leadership issues.

“The Common Denominator of Success,”

“The successful person has the habit of doing the things failures don’t like to do,” he observed. “They don’t like doing them either necessarily. But their disliking is subordinated to the strength of their purpose.”

Quadrant II is the heart of effective personal management. It deals with things that are not urgent, but are important. It deals with things like building relationships, writing a personal mission statement, long-range planning, exercising, preventive maintenance, preparation—all those things we know we need to do, but somehow seldom get around to doing, because they aren’t urgent.

effective people are not problem-minded; they’re opportunity-minded. They feed opportunities and starve problems.

The objective of Quadrant II management is to manage our lives effectively—from a center of sound principles, from a knowledge of our personal mission, with a focus on the important as well as the urgent, and within the framework

of maintaining a balance between increasing our production and increasing our production capability.

In my opinion, the best way to do this is to organize your life on a weekly basis.