Remembering the impact of Stephen Covey and the 7 Habits of Highly Successful People

Remembering the impact of Stephen Covey and the 7 Habits of Highly Successful People

Every generation has its thought leaders.  Mine had Stephen Covey and the 7 Habits of Highly Successful People.

Hearing of Stephen’s death this week I looked at my bookcase to see a copy of his seminal work.  I don’t think this was the original copy of his book that I read as a young man in the late 1980’s.  I think I had given that original copy away, but such was the power and sagacity of this work that I got another copy at some point.

This is one of the few books that I thought important enough to have its physical presence near me through all the office cleaning campaigns.

Stephen’s work influenced a generation of leaders.  It brought into our lexicon the concepts of ‘paradigm shifts’, ‘quadrant 2 activities’, ‘circle of influence’ and ‘sharpening the saw’.  His work was universally applicable, simple and presented in an authentic and approachable way.

The issues he addressed in the late 80’s were the same issues we face today two generations removed and his guidance is still valid.  He saw a generation of leaders that were busy but not effective.  He asked the question “How do we take these smart, engaged and well-meaning people and make them more effective?”

Like Napoleon Hill before him he researched the question and found what the people who had mastered the skills of effectiveness were doing.  He codified his findings into a simple, readily applicable methodology.  He presented this in his book ‘The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People’.

What made his work different was that he didn’t just preach. He built a bridge for us to become more effective.  He showed us how to understand our current state.  He showed us and gave us simple tools to transition to another, higher state.  Then he painted his vision of a sustainable effective life.

Yes, he built a bridge for us and then he took us by the hand and led us across it.

His first three habits admonished us to look inward and showed us how to fix our own houses.

He told us to ‘Be Proactive’.  This meant that we shouldn’t see ourselves as victims – we had free will.  We shouldn’t worry about things we couldn’t change but focus on the one thing that we controlled – ourselves.  If we focused on being the best we could be then others would be drawn into our circle of influence.

He continued by asking us to ‘Begin with the End in Mind’ where it asked us to consider our purpose, construct our own personal mission statement. He reasoned that before you can do anything you need to know what is important to you and where you are going.

His third powerful habit was ‘First Things First’.  If you took nothing away from the book this was the golden nugget. This was where he gave us the 4-box matrix to classify all our tasks as important/non-important and urgent/non-urgent.  This powerful way of looking at your life made you realize that you spent most of your time and energy working on things that were not important and showed you how to fix that.

In the second half of the book he transitioned from a focus on self to a focus on how we interact within our communities and companies.

The 4^th habit was “Think Win/Win”.  This shared with us the theory of abundance where instead of life being how to get a bigger piece of a finite pie, we work to make the pie bigger and everyone wins.  He showed how to move from competition to cooperation.

Stephen schooled us on how to listen in ‘Seek First to Understand and then to be Understood’.  This is a powerful interpersonal tool that uses empathic listening, or REALLY listening.  We learned to diagnose before we prescribe.  This one practice if truly applied in our world could change hearts and minds through understanding.

In the 6^th habit he discoursed on how to take the variety amalgam of all businesses and create from the natural chaos of organizations a ‘Synergy’ that would use everyone’s different strengths to lift the entire organization.

Finally, to complete the journey Stephen told us that we need to remember to renew ourselves emotionally, psychologically and physically by ‘Sharpening our Saw’.  Many the harried and driven salaryman heaved a great sigh of relief as Stephen announced that taking a restorative break every once in awhile, proactively, made us more effective.  Constantly hacking away at problems eventually wore a person out and was not the way to cultivate long term effectiveness.

My generation of leaders owes a great debt to Stephen Covey for his seminal work.  I remember reading it on an airplane on one of my constant business trips.  I remember how the pure, simple truth of what he said struck me.  How it changed the way I looked at myself, my life and my career from that day forward.

It was a change for the better.

How many millions of other souls have Stephen’s words inspired since?

Thank you Stephen Covey for contributing a work that changed the world in a very effective way.