7 Habits of Highly Effective

People
In his #1 bestseller, Stephen R. Covey presented a framework
for personal effectiveness. The following is a summary of the
first part of his book, concluding with a list of the seven habits.
Inside-Out: The Change Starts from Within
While working on his doctorate in the 1970's, Stephen R.
Covey reviewed 200 years of literature on success. He noticed
that since the 1920's, success writings have focused on
solutions to specific problems. In some cases such tactical
advice may have been effective, but only for immediate issues
and not for the long-term, underlying ones. The success
literature of the last half of the 20th century largely attributed
success to personality traits, skills, techniques, maintaining a
positive attitude, etc. This philosophy can be referred to as the
Personality Ethic.
However, during the 150 years or so that preceded that period,
the literature on success was more character oriented. It
emphasized the deeper principles and foundations of success.
This philosophy is known as the Character Ethic, under which
success is attributed more to underlying characteristics such
as integrity, courage, justice, patience, etc.
The elements of the Character Ethic are primary traits while
those of the Personality Ethic are secondary. While secondary
traits may help one to play the game to succeed in some
specific circumstances, for long-term success both are
necessary. One's character is what is most visible in long-term
relationships. Ralph Waldo Emerson once said, "What you are
shouts so loudly in my ears I cannot hear what you say."
To illustrate the difference between primary and secondary
traits, Covey offers the following example. Suppose you are in
Chicago and are using a map to find a particular destination in
the city. You may have excellent secondary skills in map
reading and navigation, but will never find your destination if
you are using a map of Detroit. In this example, getting the
right map is a necessary primary element before your
secondary skills can be used effectively.
The problem with relying on the Personality Ethic is that
unless the basic underlying paradigms are right, simply
changing outward behavior is not effective. We see the world
based on our perspective, which can have a dramatic impact
on the way we perceive things. For example, many
experiments have been conducted in which two groups of
people are shown two different drawings. One group is shown,
for instance, a drawing of a young, beautiful woman and the
other group is shown a drawing of an old, frail woman. After
the initial exposure to the pictures, both groups are shown one
picture of a more abstract drawing. This drawing actually
contains the elements of both the young and the old woman.
Almost invariably, everybody in the group that was first shown
the young woman sees a young woman in the abstract drawing,
and those who were shown the old woman see an old woman.
Each group was convinced that it had objectively evaluated the
drawing. The point is that we see things not as they are, but as
we are conditioned to see them. Once we understand the
importance of our past conditioning, we can experience a
paradigm shift in the way we see things. To make large
changes in our lives, we must work on the basic paradigms
through which we see the world.
The Character Ethic assumes that there are some absolute
principles that exist in all human beings. Some examples of
such principles are fairness, honesty, integrity, human dignity,
quality, potential, and growth. Principles contrast with
practices in that practices are for specific situations whereas
principles have universal application.
The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People presents an
"inside-out" approach to effectiveness that is centered on
principles and character. Inside-out means that the change
starts within oneself. For many people, this approach
represents a paradigm shift away from the Personality Ethic
and toward the Character Ethic.

The Seven Habits - An Overview Our character is a

collection of our habits, and habits have a powerful role in our
lives. Habits consist of knowledge, skill, and desire.
Knowledge allows us to know what to do, skill gives us the
ability to know how to do it, and desire is the motivation to do
it.
The Seven Habits move us through the following stages:

1. Dependence: the paradigm under which we are

born, relying upon others to take care of us.
 2. Independence: the paradigm under which we can
make our own decisions and take care of ourselves.

3. Interdependence: the paradigm under which we

cooperate to achieve something that cannot be
achieved independently.
Much of the success literature today tends to value
independence, encouraging people to become liberated and do
their own thing. The reality is that we are interdependent, and
the independent model is not optimal for use in an
interdependent environment that requires leaders and team
players.
To make the choice to become interdependent, one first must
be independent, since dependent people have not yet
developed the character for interdependence. Therefore, the
first three habits focus on self-mastery, that is, achieving the
private victories required to move from dependence to
independence. The first three habits are:

 Habit 1: Be Proactive

 Habit 2: Begin with the End in Mind

 Habit 3: Put First Things First

Habits 4, 5, and 6 then address interdependence:

 Habit 4: Think Win/Win

 Habit 5: Seek First to Understand, Then to Be

Understood
  Habit 6: Synergize
Finally, the seventh habit is one of renewal and continual
improvement, that is, of building one's personal production
capability. To be effective, one must find the proper balance
between actually producing and improving one's capability to
produce. Covey illustrates this point with the fable of the goose
and the golden egg.
In the fable, a poor farmer's goose began laying a solid gold
egg every day, and the farmer soon became rich. He also
became greedy and figured that the goose must have many
golden eggs within her. In order to obtain all of the eggs
immediately, he killed the goose. Upon cutting it open he
discovered that it was not full of golden eggs. The lesson is that
if one attempts to maximize immediate production with no
regard to the production capability, the capability will be lost.
Effectiveness is a function of both production and the capacity
to produce.
The need for balance between production and production
capability applies to physical, financial, and human assets. For
example, in an organization the person in charge of a
particular machine may increase the machine's immediate
production by postponing scheduled maintenance. As a result
of the increased output, this person may be rewarded with a
promotion. However, the increased immediate output comes
at the expense of future production since more maintenance
will have to be performed on the machine later. The person
who inherits the mess may even be blamed for the inevitable
downtime and high maintenance expense.
Customer loyalty also is an asset to which the production and
production capability balance applies. A restaurant may have a
reputation for serving great food, but the owner may decide to
cut costs and lower the quality of the food. Immediately,
profits will soar, but soon the restaurant's reputation will be
tarnished, the customer's trust will be lost, and profits will
decline.
This does not mean that only production capacity is important.
If one builds capacity but never uses it, there will be no
production. There is a balance between building production
capacity and actually producing. Finding the right tradeoff is
central to one's effectiveness.
The above has been an introduction and overview of the 7
Habits. The following introduces the first habit in Covey's
framework.

FROM DEPENDENCE TO INDEPENDENCE

Habit 1: Be Proactive
A unique ability that sets humans apart from animals is self-
awareness and the ability to choose how we respond to any
stimulus. While conditioning can have a strong impact on our
lives, we are not determined by it. There are three widely
accepted theories of determinism: genetic, psychic, and
environmental. Genetic determinism says that our nature is
coded into our DNA, and that our personality traits are
inherited from our grandparents. Psychic determinism says
that our upbringing determines our personal tendencies, and
that emotional pain that we felt at a young age is remembered
and affects the way we behave today. Environmental
determinism states that factors in our present environment
are responsible for our situation, such as relatives, the national
economy, etc. These theories of determinism each assume a
model in which the stimulus determines the response.
Viktor Frankl was a Jewish psychiatrist who survived the
death camps of Nazi Germany. While in the death camps,
Frankl realized that he alone had the power to determine his
response to the horror of the situation. He exercised the only
freedom he had in that environment by envisioning himself
teaching students after his release. He became an inspiration
for others around him. He realized that in the middle of the
stimulus-response model, humans have the freedom to choose.
Animals do not have this independent will. They respond to a
stimulus like a computer responds to its program. They are
not aware of their programming and do not have the ability to
change it. The model of determinism was developed based on
experiments with animals and neurotic people. Such a model
neglects our ability to choose how we will respond to stimuli.
We can choose to be reactive to our environment. For example,
if the weather is good, we will be happy. If the weather is bad,
we will be unhappy. If people treat us well, we will feel well; if
they don't, we will feel bad and become defensive. We also can
choose to be proactive and not let our situation determine how
we will feel. Reactive behavior can be a self-fulfilling prophecy.
By accepting that there is nothing we can do about our
situation, we in fact become passive and do nothing.
The first habit of highly effective people is proactivity.
Proactive people are driven by values that are independent of
the weather or how people treat them. Gandhi said, "They
cannot take away our self respect if we do not give it to them."
Our response to what happened to us affects us more than
what actually happened. We can choose to use difficult
situations to build our character and develop the ability to
better handle such situations in the future.
Proactive people use their resourcefulness and initiative to
find solutions rather than just reporting problems and waiting
for other people to solve them.
Being proactive means assessing the situation and developing
a positive response for it. Organizations can be proactive
rather than be at the mercy of their environment. For example,
a company operating in an industry that is experiencing a
downturn can develop a plan to cut costs and actually use the
downturn to increase market share.
Once we decide to be proactive, exactly where we focus our
efforts becomes important. There are many concerns in our
lives, but we do not always have control over them. One can
draw a circle that represents areas of concern, and a smaller
circle within the first that represents areas of control.
Proactive people focus their efforts on the things over which
they have influence, and in the process often expand their area
of influence. Reactive people often focus their efforts on areas
of concern over which they have no control. Their complaining
and negative energy tend to shrink their circle of influence.

In our area of concern, we may have direct control, indirect

control, or no control at all. We have direct control over
problems caused by our own behavior. We can solve these
problems by changing our habits. We have indirect control
over problems related to other people's behavior. We can solve
these problems by using various methods of human influence,
such as empathy, confrontation, example, and persuasion.
Many people have only a few basic methods such as fight or
flight. For problems over which we have no control, first we
must recognize that we have no control, and then gracefully
accept that fact and make the best of the situation.

SUMMARY OF THE SEVEN HABITS

Habit 1: Be Proactive
Change 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.