The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People

Stephen Covey's Famous 7 Habits of Highly Effective People...or Teams....or Leaders

1. Be PRO-Active

Take responsibility for your reaction to your experiences, take the initiative to respond positively and improve the situation. Recognise your Circle of Influence and Circle of Concern. Focus your responses and initiates on the centre of your influence and constantly work to expand it. Don’t sit and wait in a reactive mode, waiting for problems to happen (Circle of Concern) before taking action

2. Begin with the end in mind

Envision what you want to achieve in the future so you can work and plan towards it. Understand how people make decisions in their life. To be effective you need to act based on principles and constantly review your mission statements. Are you – right now – who you want to be? What do I have to say about myself? How do you want to be remembered?

3. Put First things First

Matrix of importance vs urgency that Stephen Covey and Dwight Eisenhower used in deciding where to invest their efforts. Categorising our tasks into what is important and what is urgent. Learning the art of prioritisation and over-coming all those “time-stealers” which distract us from achieving our Goals.

Interdependence

The next three habits talk about Interdependence and how we work with others

4. Think Win-Win

Genuine feelings for mutually beneficial solutions or agreements in your relationships. Value and respect people by understanding a “win” for all is ultimately a better long-term resolution than if only one person in the situation had gotten their way. Think Win-Win isn’t about being nice, nor is it a quick-fix technique. It is a character-based code for human interaction and collaboration.

5. Seek first to understand, then to be understood

Use empathetic listening skills to genuinely understand a person, which compels them to reciprocate the listening and take an open mind to be influenced by you. This creates an atmosphere of caring, and positive problem-solving. Applying the skills of inter and intra personal skills of Emotional Intelligence.

6. Synergise

Combine the strengths of people through positive teamwork, so as to achieve goals that no one could have done alone.

Continuous Improvement Culture

The final habit is that of continuous improvement in both the personal and interpersonal spheres of influence.

7. Sharpen the Saw

Balance and renew your resources, energy and health to create a sustainable, long-term, effective lifestyle, optimising wellbeing and building stress resilience.

The application of neuro-science enables us to manage our behaviours and attitudes and in turn we can learn how to manage how to optimise our Heart-Brain Coherence.

In essence, one is always attempting to integrate and master the principles outlined in The 7 Habits at progressively higher levels at each iteration. Subsequent development on any habit will render a different experience and you will learn the principles with a deeper understanding.