THE SEVEN HABITS OF HIGHLY EFFECTIVE PEOPLE

燕鸥and小蟹UID: 199804

The Other End of the Stick
Before we totally shift our life focus to our Circle of Influence, we need to consider two things in our
Circle of Concern that merit deeper thought -- consequences and mistakes.
While we are free to choose our actions, we are not free to choose the consequences of those actions.
Consequences are governed by natural law. They are out in the Circle of Concern. We can decide to
step in front of a fast-moving train, but we cannot decide what will happen when the train hits us.
We can decide to be dishonest in our business dealings. While the social consequences of that
decision may vary depending on whether or not we are found out, the natural consequences to our
basic character are a fixed result.
Our behavior is governed by principles. Living in harmony with them brings positive
consequences; violating them brings negative consequences. We are free to choose our response in any
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situation, but in doing so, we choose the attendant consequence. "When we pick up one end of the
stick, we pick up the other."
Undoubtedly, there have been times in each of our lives when we have picked up what we later felt
was the wrong stick. Our choices have brought consequences we would rather have lived without. If
we had the choice to make over again, we would make it differently. We call these choices mistakes,
and they are the second thing that merits our deeper thought.
For those filled with regret, perhaps the most needful exercise of proactivity is to realize that past
mistakes are also out there in the Circle of Concern. We can't recall them, we can't undo them, we can't
control the consequences that came as a result.
As a college quarterback, one of my sons learned to snap his wristband between plays as a kind of
mental checkoff whenever he or anyone made a "setting back" mistake, so the last mistake wouldn't
affect the resolve and execution of the next play.
The proactive approach to a mistake is to acknowledge it instantly, correct it, and learn from it.
This literally turns a failure into a success. "Success," said IBM founder T. J. Watson, "is on the far
side of failure."
But not to acknowledge a mistake, not to correct it and learn from it, is a mistake of a different order.
It usually puts a person on a self-deceiving, self-justifying path, often involving rationalization (rational
lies) to self and to others. This second mistake, this cover-up, empowers the first, giving it
disproportionate importance, and causes far deeper injury to self.
It is not what others do or even our own mistakes that hurt us the most; it is our response to those
things. Chasing after the poisonous snake that bites us will only drive the poison through our entire
system. It is far better to take measures immediately to get the poison out.
Our response to any mistake affects the quality of the next moment. It is important to immediately
admit and correct our mistakes so that they have no power over that next moment and we are
empowered again.
Making and Keeping Commitments
At the very heart of our Circle of Influence is our ability to make and keep commitments and
promises. The commitments we make to ourselves and to others, and our integrity to those
commitments, is the essence and clearest manifestation of our proactivity.
It is also the essence of our growth. Through our human endowments of self-awareness and
conscience, we become conscious of areas of weakness, areas for improvement, areas of talent that could
be developed, areas that need to be changed or eliminated from our lives. Then, as we recognize and
use our imagination and independent will to act on that awareness -- making promises, setting goals,
and being true to them -- we build the strength of character, the being, that makes possible every other
positive thing in our lives.
It is here that we find two ways to put ourselves in control of our lives immediately. We can make
a promise -- and keep it. Or we can set a goal -- and work to achieve it. As we make and keep
commitments, even small commitments, we begin to establish an inner integrity that gives us the
awareness of self-control and the courage and strength to accept more of the responsibility for our own
lives. By making and keeping promises to ourselves and others, little by little, our honor becomes
greater than our moods.
The power to make and keep commitments to ourselves is the essence of developing the basic habits
of effectiveness. Knowledge, skill, and desire are all within our control. We can work on any one to
improve the balance of the three. As the area of intersection becomes larger, we more deeply
internalize the principles upon which the habits are based and create the strength of character to move
us in a balanced way toward increasing effectiveness in our lives.
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Proactivity: The 30-Day Test
We don't have to go through the death camp experience of Frankl to recognize and develop our own
proactivity. It is in the ordinary events of every day that we develop the proactive capacity to handle
the extraordinary pressures of life. It's how we make and keep commitments, how we handle a traffic
jam, how we respond to an irate customer or a disobedient child. It's how we view our problems and
where we focus our energies. It's the language we use.
I would challenge you to test the principle of proactivity for 30 days. Simply try it and see what
happens. For 30 days work only in your Circle of Influence. Make small commitments and keep
them. Be a light, not a judge. Be a model, not a critic. Be part of the solution, not part of the
problem.
Try it in your marriage, in your family, in your job. Don't argue for other people's weaknesses.
Don't argue for your own. When you make a mistake, admit it, correct it, and learn from it --
immediately. Don't get into a blaming, accusing mode. Work on things you have control over.
Work on you. On be.
Look at the weaknesses of others with compassion, not accusation. It's not what they're not doing
or should be doing that's the issue. The issue is your own chosen response to the situation and what
you should be doing. If you start to think the problem is "out there," stop yourself. That thought is
the problem.
People who exercise their embryonic freedom day after day will, little by little, expand that freedom.
People who do not will find that it withers until they are literally "being lived." They are acting out the
scripts written by parents, associates, and society.
We are responsible for our own effectiveness, for our own happiness, and ultimately, I would say,
for most of our circumstances.
Samuel Johnson observed: "The fountain of content must spring up in the mind, and he who hath so
little knowledge of human nature as to seek happiness by changing anything but his own disposition,
will waste his life in fruitless efforts and multiply the grief he proposes to remove."
Knowing that we are responsible -- "response-able" -- is fundamental to effectiveness and to every
other habit of effectiveness we will discuss.
Application Suggestions
1. For a full day, listen to your language and to the language of the people around you. How
often do you use and hear reactive phrases such as "If only," "I can't," or "I have to"
2. Identify an experience you might encounter in the near future where, based on past experience,
you would probably behave reactively. Review the situation in the context of your Circle of Influence.
How could you respond proactively? Take several moments and create the experience vividly in your
mind, picturing yourself responding in a proactive manner. Remind yourself of the gap between
stimulus and response. Make a commitment to yourself to exercise your freedom to choose.
3. Select a problem from your work or personal life that is frustrating to you. Determine whether
it is a direct, indirect, or no control problem. Identify the first step you can take in your Circle of
Influence to solve it and then take that step.
4. Try the 30-day test of proactivity. Be aware of the change in your Circle of Influence.

燕鸥and小蟹UID: 199804

Habit 2: Begin with the End in Mind TM
What lies behind us and what lies before us are tiny matters compared to what lies within us
-- Oliver Wendell Holme
*
Please find a place to read these next few pages where you can be alone and uninterrupted. Clear
your mind of everything except what you will read and what I will invite you to do. Don't worry
about your schedule, your business, your family, or your friends. Just focus with me and really open
your mind.
In your mind's eye, see yourself going to the funeral parlor or chapel, parking the car, and getting
out. As you walk inside the building, you notice the flowers, the soft organ music. You see the faces
of friends and family you pass along the way. You feel the shared sorrow of losing, the joy of having
known, that radiates from the hearts of the people there.
As you walk down to the front of the room and look inside the casket, you suddenly come face to
face with yourself. This is your funeral, three years from today. All these people have come to honor
you, to express feelings of love and appreciation for your life.
As you take a seat and wait for the services to begin, you look at the program in your hand. There
are to be four speakers. The first one is from your family, immediate and also extended -- children,
brothers, sisters, nephews, nieces, aunts, uncles, cousins, and grandparents who have come from all
over the country to attend. The second speaker is one of your friends, someone who can give a sense
of what you were as a person. The third speaker is from your work or profession. And the fourth is
from your church or some community organization where you've been involved in service.
Now think deeply. What would you like each of these speakers to say about you and your life?
What kind of husband, wife, father, or mother would you like their words to reflect? What kind of son
or daughter or cousin? What kind of friend? What kind of working associate?
What character would you like them to have seen in you? What contributions, what achievements
would you want them to remember? Look carefully at the people around you. What difference would
you like to have made in their lives?
Before you read further, take a few minutes to jot down your impressions. It will greatly increase
your personal understanding of Habit 2.
What it Means to "Begin with the End in Mind"
If you participated seriously in this visualization experience, you touched for a moment some of
your deep, fundamental values. You established brief contact with that inner guidance system at the
heart of your Circle of Influence
Consider the words of Joseph Addison:
When I look upon the tombs of the great, every emotion of envy dies in me; when I read the
epitaphs of the beautiful, every inordinate desire goes out; when I meet with the grief of parents upon a
tombstone, my heart melts with compassion; when I see the tomb of the parents themselves, I consider
the vanity of grieving for those whom we must quickly follow: when I see kings lying by those who
deposed them, I consider rival wits placed side by side, or the holy men that divided the world with
their contests and disputes, I reflect with sorrow and astonishment on the little competitions, factions,
and debates of mankind. When I read the several dates of the tombs, of some that died yesterday, and
some six hundred years ago, I consider that great Day when we shall all of us be Contemporaries, and
make our appearance together.
Although Habit 2 applies to many different circumstances and levels of life, the most fundamental
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application of "Begin with the End in Mind" is to begin today with the image, picture, or paradigm of
the end of your life as your frame of reference or the criterion by which everything else is examined.
Each part of your life -- today's behavior, tomorrow's behavior, next week's behavior, next month's
behavior -- can be examined in the context of the whole, of what really matters most to you. By
keeping that end clearly in mind, you can make certain that whatever you do on any particular day
does not violate the criteria you have defined as supremely important, and that each day of your life
contributes in a meaningful way to the vision you have of your life as a whole.
To Begin with the End in Mind means to start with a clear understanding of your destination. It
means to know where you're going so that you better understand where you are now and so that the
steps you take are always in the right direction.
It's incredibly easy to get caught up in an activity trap, in the busy-ness of life, to work harder and
harder at climbing the ladder of success only to discover it's leaning against the wrong wall. It is
possible to be busy -- very busy -- without being very effective.
People often find themselves achieving victories that are empty, successes that have come at the
expense of things they suddenly realize were far more valuable to them. People from every walk of
life -- doctors, academicians, actors, politicians, business professionals, athletes, and plumbers -- often
struggle to achieve a higher income, more recognition or a certain degree of professional competence,
only to find that their drive to achieve their goal blinded them to the things that really mattered most
and now are gone.
How different our lives are when we really know what is deeply important to us, and, keeping that
picture in mind, we manage ourselves each day to be and to do what really matters most. If the ladder
is not leaning against the right wall, every step we take just gets us to the wrong place faster. We may
be very busy, we may be very efficient, but we will also be truly effective only when we Begin with the
End in Mind.
If you carefully consider what you wanted to be said of you in the funeral experience, you will find
your definition of success. It may be very different from the definition you thought you had in mind.
Perhaps fame, achievement, money, or some of the other things we strive for are not even part of the
right wall.
When you Begin with the End in Mind, you gain a different perspective. One man asked another
on the death of a mutual friend, "How much did he leave?" His friend responded, "He left it all."
All Things Are Created Twice
"Begin with the End in Mind" is based on the principle that all things are created twice. There's a
mental or first creation, and a physical or second creation to all things
Take the construction of a home, for example. You create it in every detail before you ever hammer
the first nail into place. You try to get a very clear sense of what kind of house you want. If you want
a family-centered home, you plan a family room where it would be a natural gathering place. You
plan sliding doors and a patio for children to play outside. You work with ideas. You work with
your mind until you get a clear image of what you want to build.
Then you reduce it to blueprint and develop construction plans. All of this is done before the earth
is touched. If not, then in the second creation, the physical creation, you will have to make expensive
changes that may double the cost of your home.
The carpenter's rule is "measure twice, cut once." You have to make sure that the blueprint, the first
creation, is really what you want, that you've thought everything through. Then you put it into bricks
and mortar. Each day you go to the construction shed and pull out the blueprint to get marching
orders for the day. You Begin with the End in Mind.
For another example, look at a business. If you want to have a successful enterprise, you clearly
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define what you're trying to accomplish. You carefully think through the product or service you want
to provide in terms of your market target, then you organize all the elements -- financial, research and
development, operations, marketing, personnel, physical facilities, and so on -- to meet that objective.
The extent to which you Begin with the End in Mind often determines whether or not you are able to
create a successful enterprise. Most business failures begin in the first creation, with problems such as
undercapitalization, misunderstanding of the market, or lack of a business plan.
The same is true with parenting. If you want to raise responsible, self-disciplined children, you
have to keep that end clearly in mind as you interact with your children on a daily basis. You can't
behave toward them in ways that undermine their self-discipline or self-esteem.
To varying degrees, people use this principle in many different areas of life. Before you go on a
trip, you determine your destination and plan out the best route. Before you plant a garden, you plan
it out in your mind, possibly on paper. You create speeches on paper before you give them, you
envision the landscaping in your yard before you landscape it, you design the clothes you make before
you thread the needle.
To the extent to which we understand the principle of two creations and accept the responsibility for
both, we act within and enlarge the borders of our Circle of Influence. To the extent to which we do
not operate in harmony with this principle and take charge of the first creation, we diminish it.

燕鸥and小蟹UID: 199804

By Design or Default
It's a principle that all things are created twice, but not all first creations are by conscious design. In
our personal lives, if we do not develop our own self-awareness and become responsible for first
creations, we empower other people and circumstances outside our Circle or Influence to shape much
of our lives by default. We reactively live the scripts handed to us by family, associates, other people's
agendas, the pressures of circumstance -- scripts from our earlier years, from our training, our
conditioning
These scripts come from people, not principles. And they rise out of our deep vulnerabilities, our
deep dependency on others and our need for acceptance and love, for belonging, for a sense of
importance and worth, for a feeling that we matter.
Whether we are aware of it or not, whether we are in control of it or not, there is a first creation to
every part of our lives. We are either the second creation of our own proactive design, or we are the
second creation of other people's agendas, of circumstances, or of past habits
The unique human capacities of self-awareness, imagination, and conscience enable us to examine
first creations and make it possible for us to take charge of our own first creation, to write our own
script. Put another way, Habit 1 says, "You are the creator." Habit 2 is the first creation.
Leadership and Management -- The Two Creations
Habit 2 is based on principles of personal leadership, which means that leadership is the first
creation. Leadership is not management. Management is the second creation, which we'll discuss in
the chapter on Habit 3. But leadership has to come first.
Management is a bottom-line focus: How can I best accomplish certain things? Leadership deals
with the top line: What are the things I want to accomplish? In the words of both Peter Drucker and
Warren Bennis, "Management is doing things right; leadership is doing the right things." Management
is efficiency in climbing the ladder of success; leadership determines whether the ladder is leaning
against the right wall.
You can quickly grasp the important difference between the two if you envision a group of
producers cutting their way through the jungle with machetes. They're the producers, the problem
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solvers. They're cutting through the undergrowth, clearing it out.
The managers are behind them, sharpening their machetes, writing policy and procedure manuals,
holding muscle development programs, bringing in improved technologies, and setting up working
schedules and compensation programs for machete wielders.
The leader is the one who climbs the tallest tree, surveys the entire situation, and yells, "Wrong
jungle!"
But how do the busy, efficient producers and managers often respond? "Shut up! We're making
progress."
As individuals, groups, and businesses, we're often so busy cutting through the undergrowth we
don't even realize we're in the wrong jungle. And the rapidly changing environment in which we live
makes effective leadership more critical than it has ever been -- in every aspect of independent and
interdependent life.
We are more in need of a vision or designation and a compass (a set of principles or directions) and
less in need of a road map. We often don't know what the terrain ahead will be like or what we will
need to go through it; much will depend on our judgment at the time. But an inner compass will
always give us direction.
Effectiveness -- often even survival -- does not depend solely on how much effort we expend, but on
whether or not the effort we expend is in the right jungle. And the metamorphosis taking place in
most every industry and profession demands leadership first and management second.
In business, the market is changing so rapidly that many products and services that successfully met
consumer tastes and needs a few years ago are obsolete today. Proactive powerful leadership must
constantly monitor environmental change, particularly customer buying habits and motives, and
provide the force necessary to organize resources in the right direction.
Such changes as deregulation of the airline industry, skyrocketing costs of health care, and the great
quality and quantity of imported cars impact the environment in significant ways. If industries do not
monitor the environment, including their own work teams, and exercise the creative leadership to keep
headed in the right direction, no amount of management expertise can keep them from failing.
Efficient management without effective leadership is, as one individual phrased it, "like
straightening deck chairs on the Titanic." No management success can compensate for failure in
leadership. But leadership is hard because we're often caught in a management paradigm.
At the final session of a year-long executive development program in Seattle, the president of an oil
company came up to me and said, "Stephen, when you pointed out the difference between leadership
and management in the second month, I looked at my role as the president of this company and
realized that I had never been into leadership. I was deep into management, buried by pressing
challenges and the details of day-to-day logistics. So I decided to withdraw from management. I
could get other people to do that. I wanted to really lead my organization.
"It was hard. I went through withdrawal pains because I stopped dealing with a lot of the pressing,
urgent matters that were right in front of me and which gave me a sense of immediate accomplishment.
I didn't receive much satisfaction as I started wrestling with the direction issues, the culture-building
issues, the deep analysis of problems, the seizing of new opportunities. Others also went through
withdrawal pains from their working style comfort zones. They missed the easy accessibility I had
given them before. They still wanted me to be available to them, to respond, to help solve their
problems on a day-to-day basis.
"But I persisted. I was absolutely convinced that I needed to provide leadership. And I did.
Today our whole business is different. We're more in line with our environment. We have doubled
our revenues and quadrupled our profits. I'm into leadership."
I'm convinced that too often parents are also trapped in the management paradigm, thinking of
control, efficiency, and rules instead of direction, purpose, and family feeling.
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And leadership is even more lacking in our personal lives. We're into managing with efficiency,
setting and achieving goals before we have even clarified our values.
Rescripting: Becoming Your Own First Creator
As we previously observed, proactivity is based on the unique human endowment of self-awareness.
The two additional unique human endowments that enable us to expand our proactivity and to exercise
personal leadership in our lives are imagination and conscience.
Through imagination, we can visualize the uncreated worlds of potential that lie within us.
Through conscience, we can come in contact with universal laws or principles with our own singular
talents and avenues of contribution, and with the personal guidelines within which we can most
effectively develop them. Combined with self-awareness, these two endowments empower us to write
our own script.
Because we already live with many scripts that have been handed to us, the process of writing our
own script is actually more a process of "rescripting," or Paradigm Shifting -- of changing some of the
basic paradigms that we already have. As we recognize the ineffective scripts, the incorrect or
incomplete paradigms within us, we can proactively begin to rescript ourselves.
I think one of the most inspiring accounts of the rescripting process comes from the autobiography
of Anwar Sadat, past president of Egypt. Sadat had been reared, nurtured, and deeply scripted in a
hatred for Israel. He would make the statement on national television, "I will never shake the hand of
an Israeli as long as they occupy one inch of Arab soil. Never, never, never!" And huge crowds all
around the country would chant, "Never, never, never!" He marshaled the energy and unified the will
of the whole country in that script.
The script was very independent and nationalistic, and it aroused deep emotions in the people. But
it was also very foolish, and Sadat knew it. It ignored the perilous, highly interdependent reality of the
situation.
So he rescripted himself. It was a process he had learned when he was a young man imprisoned in
Cell 54, a solitary cell in Cairo Central Prison, as a result of his involvement in a conspiracy plot against
King Farouk. He learned to withdraw from his own mind and look at it to see if the scripts were
appropriate and wise. He learned how to vacate his own mind and, through a deep personal process
of meditation, to work with his own scriptures, his own form of prayer, and rescript himself.
He records that he was almost loath to leave his prison cell because it was there that he realized that
real success is success with self. It's not in having things, but in having mastery, having victory over
self.
For a period of time during Nasser's administration Sadat was relegated to a position of relative
insignificance. Everyone felt that his spirit was broken, but it wasn't. They were projecting their own
home movies onto him. They didn't understand him. He was biding his time.
And when that time came, when he became president of Egypt and confronted the political realities,
he rescripted himself toward Israel. He visited the Knesset in Jerusalem and opened up one of the
most precedent-breaking peace movements in the history of the world, a bold initiative that eventually
brought about the Camp David Accord.
Sadat was able to use his self-awareness, his imagination, and his conscience to exercise personal
leadership, to change an essential paradigm, to change the way he saw the situation. He worked in the
center of his Circle of Influence. And from that rescripting, that change in paradigm, flowed changes
in behavior and attitude that affected millions of lives in the wider Circle of Concern.
In developing our own self-awareness many of us discover ineffective scripts, deeply embedded
habits that are totally unworthy of us, totally incongruent with the things we really value in life. Habit
2 says we don't have to live with those scripts. We are response-able to use our imagination and
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creativity to write new ones that are more effective, more congruent with our deepest values and with
the correct principles that give our values meaning.
Suppose, for example, that I am highly overreactive to my children. Suppose that whenever they
begin to do something I feel is inappropriate, I sense an immediate tensing in the pit of my stomach. I
feel defensive walls go up; I prepare for battle. My focus is not on the long-term growth and
understanding but on the short-term behavior. I'm trying to win the battle, not the war.
I pull out my ammunition -- my superior size, my position of authority -- and I yell or intimidate or I
threaten or punish. And I win. I stand there, victorious, in the middle of the debris of a shattered
relationship while my children are outwardly submissive and inwardly rebellious, suppressing feelings
that will come out later in uglier ways.
Now if I were sitting at that funeral we visualized earlier, and one of my children was about to
speak, I would want his life to represent the victory of teaching, training, and disciplining with love
over a period of years rather than the battle scars of quick-fix skirmishes. I would want his heart and
mind to be filled with the pleasant memories of deep, meaningful times together. I would want him to
remember me as a loving father who shared the fun and the pain of growing up. I would want him to
remember the times he came to me with his problems and concerns. I would want to have listened
and loved and helped. I would want him to know I wasn't perfect, but that I had tried with everything
I had. And that, perhaps more than anybody in the world, I loved him.
The reason I would want those things is because, deep down, I value my children. I love them, I
want to help them. I value my role as their father.
But I don't always see those values. I get caught up in the "thick of thin things." What matters most
gets buried under layers of pressing problems, immediate concerns, and outward behaviors. I become
reactive. And the way I interact with my children every day often bears little resemblance to the way I
deeply feel about them.
Because I am self-aware, because I have imagination and conscience, I can examine my deepest
values. I can realize that the script I'm living is not in harmony with those values, that my life is not
the product of my own proactive design, but the result of the first creation I have deferred to
circumstances and other people. And I can change. I can live out of my imagination instead of my
memory. I can tie myself to my limitless potential instead of my limiting past. I can become my own
first creator.
To Begin with the End in Mind means to approach my role as a parent, as well as my other roles in
life, with my values and directions clear. It means to be responsible for my own first creation, to
rescript myself so that the paradigms from which my behavior and attitude flow are congruent with my
deepest values and in harmony with correct principles.
It also means to begin each day with those values firmly in mind. Then as the vicissitudes, as the
challenges come, I can make my decisions based on those values. I can act with integrity. I don't
have to react to the emotion, the circumstance. I can be truly proactive, value driven, because my
values are clear.

燕鸥and小蟹UID: 199804

A Personal Mission Statement
The most effective way I know to Begin with the End in Mind is to develop a personal mission
statement or philosophy or creed. It focuses on what you want to be (character) and to do
(contributions and achievements) and on the values or principles upon which being and doing are
based
Because each individual is unique, a personal mission statement will reflect that uniqueness, both in
content and form. My friend, Rolfe Kerr, has expressed his personal creed in this way:
Succeed at home first.
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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 efforts on the task at hand, not worrying about the next job or
promotion.
A woman seeking to balance family and work values has expressed her sense of personal mission
differently:
I will seek to balance career and family as best I can since both are important to me.
My home will be a place where I and my family, friends, and guests find joy, comfort, peace, and
happiness. Still I will seek to create a clean and orderly environment, yet livable and comfortable. I
will exercise wisdom in what we choose to eat, read, see, and do at home. I especially want to teach
my children to love, to learn, and to laugh -- and to work and develop their unique talents.
I value the rights, freedoms, and responsibilities of our democratic society. I will be a concerned
and informed citizen, involved in the political process to ensure my voice is heard and my vote is
counted.
I will be a self-starting individual who exercises initiative in accomplishing my life's goals. I will
act on situations and opportunities, rather than to be acted upon.
I will always try to keep myself free from addictive and destructive habits. I will develop habits
that free me from old labels and limits and expand my capabilities and choices.
My money will be my servant, not my master. I will seek financial independence over time. My
wants will be subject to my needs and my means. Except for long-term home and car loans, I will seek
to keep myself free from consumer debt. I will spend less than I earn and regularly save or invest part
of my income.
Moreover, I will use what money and talents I have to make life more enjoyable for others through
service and charitable giving.
You could call a personal mission statement a personal constitution. Like the United States
Constitution, it's fundamentally changeless. In over 200 years, there have been only 26 amendments,
10 of which were in the original Bill of Rights.
The United States Constitution is the standard by which every law in the country is evaluated. It is
the document the president agrees to defend and support when he takes the Oath of Allegiance. It is
the criterion by which people are admitted into citizenship. It is the foundation and the center that
enables people to ride through such major traumas as the Civil War, Vietnam, or Watergate. It is the
written standard, the key criterion by which everything else is evaluated and directed.
The Constitution has endured and serves its vital function today because it is based on correct
THE SEVEN HABITS OF HIGHLY EFFECTIVE PEOPLE Brought to you by FlyHeart
principles, on the self-evident truths contained in the Declaration of Independence. These principles
empower the Constitution with a timeless strength, even in the midst of social ambiguity and change.
"Our peculiar security," said Thomas Jefferson, "is in the possession of a written Constitution."
A personal mission statement based on correct principles becomes the same kind of standard for an
individual. It becomes a personal constitution, the basis for making major, life-directing decisions, the
basis for making daily decisions in the midst of the circumstances and emotions that affect our lives. It
empowers individuals with the same timeless strength in the midst of change.
People can't live with change if there's not a changeless core inside them. The key to the ability to
change is a changeless sense of who you are, what you are about and what you value.
With a mission statement, we can flow with changes. We don't need prejudgments or prejudices.
We don't need to figure out everything else in life, to stereotype and categorize everything and
everybody in order to accommodate reality
Our personal environment is also changing at an ever-increasing pace. Such rapid change burns
out a large number of people who feel they can hardly handle it, can hardly cope with life. They
become reactive and essentially give up, hoping that the things that happen to them will be good.
But it doesn't have to be that way. In the Nazi death camps where Viktor Frankl learned the
principle of proactivity, he also learned the importance of purpose, of meaning in life. The essence of
"logotherapy," the philosophy he later developed and taught, is that many so-called mental and
emotional illnesses are really symptoms of an underlying sense of meaninglessness or emptiness.
Logotherapy eliminates that emptiness by helping the individual to detect his unique meaning, his
mission in life.
Once you have that sense of mission, you have the essence of your own proactivity. You have the
vision and the values which direct your life. You have the basic direction from which you set your
long- and short-term goals. You have the power of a written constitution based on correct principles,
against which every decision concerning the most effective use of your time, your talents, and your
energies can be effectively measured.
At the Center
In order to write a personal mission statement, we must begin at the very center of our Circle of
Influence, that center comprised of our most basic Our paradigms, the lens through which we see the
world.
It is here that we deal with our vision and our values. It is here that we use our endowment of
self-awareness to examine our maps and, if we value correct principles, to make certain that our maps
accurately describe the territory, that our paradigms are based on principles and reality. It is here that
we use our endowment of conscience as a compass to help us detect our own unique talents and areas
of contribution. It is here that we use our endowment of imagination to mentally create the end we
desire, giving direction and purpose to our beginnings and providing the substance of a written
personal constitution.
It is also here that our focused efforts achieve the greatest results. As we work within the very
center of our Circle of Influence, we expand it. This is highest-leverage PC work, significantly
impacting the effectiveness of every aspect of our lives.
Whatever is at the center of our life will be the source of our security, guidance, wisdom, and power.
Security represents your sense of worth, your identity, your emotional anchorage, your self-esteem,
your basic personal strength or lack of it.
Guidance means your source of direction in life. Encompassed by your map, your internal frame of
reference that interprets for you what is happening out there, are standards or principles or implicit
criteria that govern moment-by-moment decision-making and doing.
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Wisdom is your perspective on life, your sense of balance, your understanding of how the various
parts and principles apply and relate to each other. It embraces judgment, discernment,
comprehension. It is a gestalt or oneness, an integrated wholeness.
Power is the faculty or capacity to act, the strength and potency to accomplish something. It is the
vital energy to make choices and decisions. It also includes the capacity to overcome deeply
embedded habits and to cultivate higher, more effective ones.
These four factors -- security, guidance, wisdom, and power -- are interdependent. Security and
clear guidance bring true wisdom, and wisdom becomes the spark or catalyst to release and direct
power. When these four factors are present together, harmonized and enlivened by each other, they
create the great force of a noble personality, a balanced character, a beautifully integrated individual.
These life-support factors also undergird every other dimension of life. And none of them is an
all-or-nothing matter. The degree to which you have developed each one could be charted somewhere
on a continuum, much like the Maturity Continuum described earlier. At the bottom end, the four
factors are weak. You are basically dependent on circumstances or other people, things over which
you have no direct control. At the top end you are in control. You have independent strength and
the foundation for rich, interdependent relationships.
Your security lies somewhere on the continuum between extreme insecurity on one end, wherein
your life is buffeted by all the fickle forces that play upon it, and a deep sense of high intrinsic worth
and personal security on the other end. Your guidance ranges on the continuum from dependence on
the social mirror or other unstable, fluctuating sources to strong inner direction. Your wisdom falls
somewhere between a totally inaccurate map where everything is distorted and nothing seems to fit,
and a complete and accurate map of life wherein all the parts and principles are properly related to each
other. Your power lies somewhere between immobilization or being a puppet pulled by someone
else's strings to high proactivity, the power to act according to your own values instead of being acted
upon by other people and circumstances.
The location of these factors on the continuum, the resulting degree of their integration, harmony,
and balance, and their positive impact on every aspect of your life is a function of your center, the basic
paradigms at your very core.

燕鸥and小蟹UID: 199804

Alternative Centers
Each of us has a center, though we usually don't recognize it as such. Neither do we recognize the
all-encompassing effects of that center on every aspect of our lives.
Let's briefly examine several centers or core paradigms people typically have for a better
understanding of how they affect these four fundamental dimensions and, ultimately, the sum of life
that flows from them.
Spouse Centeredness. Marriage can be the most intimate, the most satisfying, the most enduring,
growth-producing of human relationships. It might seem natural and proper to be centered on one's
husband or wife.
But experience and observation tell a different story. Over the years, I have been involved in
working with many troubled marriages, and I have observed a certain thread weaving itself through
almost every spouse-centered relationship I have encountered. That thread is strong emotional
dependence.
If our sense of emotional worth comes primarily from our marriage, then we become highly
dependent upon that relationship. We become vulnerable to the moods and feelings, the behavior and
treatment of our spouse, or to any external event that may impinge on the relationship -- a new child,
in-laws, economic setbacks, social successes, and so forth.
When responsibilities increase and stresses come in the marriage, we tend to revert to the scripts we
THE SEVEN HABITS OF HIGHLY EFFECTIVE PEOPLE Brought to you by FlyHeart
were given as we were growing up. But so does our spouse. And those scripts are usually different.
Different ways of handling financial, child-discipline, or in-law issues come to the surface. When these
deep-seated tendencies combine with the emotional dependency in the marriage, the spouse-centered
relationship reveals all its vulnerability.
When we are dependent on the person with whom we are in conflict, both need and conflict are
compounded. Love-hate overreactions, fight-or-flight tendencies, withdrawal, aggressiveness,
bitterness, resentment, and cold competition are some of the usual results. When these occur, we tend
to fall even further back on background tendencies and habits in an effort to justify and defend our own
behavior and we attack our spouse's.
Inevitably, anytime we are too vulnerable we feel the need to protect ourselves from further wounds.
So we resort to sarcasm, cutting humor, criticism -- anything that will keep from exposing the
tenderness within. Each partner tends to wait on the initiative of the other for love, only to be
disappointed but also confirmed as to the rightness of the accusations made.
There is only phantom security in such a relationship when all appears to be going well. Guidance
is based on the emotion of the moment. Wisdom and power are lost in the counterdependent negative
interactions.
Family Centeredness. Another common center is the family. This, too, may seem to be natural
and proper. As an area of focus and deep investment, it provides great opportunities for deep
relationships, for loving, for sharing, for much that makes life worthwhile. But as a center, it ironically
destroys the very elements necessary to family success.
People who are family-centered get their sense of security or personal worth from the family
tradition and culture or the family reputation. Thus, they become vulnerable to any changes in that
tradition or culture and to any influences that would affect that reputation.
Family-centered parents do not have the emotional freedom, the power, to raise their children with
their ultimate welfare truly in mind. If they derive their own security from the family, their need to be
popular with their children may override the importance of a long-term investment in their children's
growth and development. Or they may be focused on the proper and correct behavior of the moment.
Any behavior that they consider improper threatens their security. They become upset, guided by the
emotions of the moment, spontaneously reacting to the immediate concern rather than the long-term
growth and development of the child. They may overreact and punish out of bad temper. They tend
to love their children conditionally, making them emotionally dependent or counterdependent and
rebellious.
Money Centeredness. Another logical and extremely common center to people's lives is making
money. Economic security is basic to one's opportunity to do much in any other dimension. In a
hierarchy or continuum of needs, physical survival and financial security comes first. Other needs are
not even activated until that basic need is satisfied, at least minimally.
Most of us face economic worries. Many forces in the wider culture can and do act upon our
economic situation, causing or threatening such disruption that we often experience concern and worry
that may not always rise to the conscious surface.
Sometimes there are apparently noble reasons given for making money, such as the desire to take
care of one's family. And these things are important. But to focus on money-making as a center will
bring about its own undoing.
Consider again the four life-support factors -- security, guidance, wisdom, and power. Suppose I
derive much of my security from my employment or from my income or net worth. 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. But work and money, per se, provide no
wisdom, no guidance, and only a limited degree of power and security. All it takes to show the
THE SEVEN HABITS OF HIGHLY EFFECTIVE PEOPLE Brought to you by FlyHeart
limitations of a money center is a crisis in my life or in the life of a loved one.
Money-centered people often put aside family or other priorities, assuming everyone will
understand that economic demands come first. I know one father who was leaving with his children
for a promised trip to the circus when a phone call came for him to come to work instead. He declined.
When his wife suggested that perhaps he should have gone to work, he responded, "The work will
come again, but childhood won't." For the rest of their lives his children remembered this little act of
priority setting, not only as an object lesson in their minds but as an expression of love in their hearts.
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."
Because their identity and sense of self-worth are wrapped up in their work, their security is
vulnerable to anything that happens to prevent them from continuing in it. Their guidance is a
function of the demands of the work. Their wisdom and power come in the limited areas of their work,
rendering them ineffective in other areas of life.
Possession Centeredness. A driving force of many people is possessions -- not only tangible,
material possessions such as fashionable clothes, homes, cars, boats, and jewelry, but also the intangible
possessions of fame, glory, or social prominence. Most of us are aware, through our own experience,
how singularly flawed such a center is, simply because it can vanish rapidly and it is influenced by so
many forces.
If my sense of security lies in my reputation or in the things I have, my life will be in a constant state
of threat and jeopardy that these possessions may be lost or stolen or devalued. If I'm in the presence
of someone of greater net worth or fame or status, I feel inferior. If I'm in the presence of someone of
lesser net worth or fame or status, I feel superior. My sense of self-worth constantly fluctuates. I
don't have any sense of constancy or anchorage or persistent selfhood. I am constantly trying to
protect and insure my assets, properties, securities, position, or reputation. We have all heard stories
of people committing suicide after losing their fortunes in a significant stock decline or their fame in a
political reversal.
Pleasure Centeredness. Another common center, closely allied with possessions, is that of fun and
pleasure. We live in a world where instant gratification is available and encouraged. Television and
movies are major influences in increasing people's expectations. They graphically portray what other
people have and can do in living the life of ease and "fun."
But while the glitter of pleasure-centered lifestyles is graphically portrayed, the natural result of
such lifestyles -- the impact on the inner person, on productivity, on relationships -- is seldom
accurately seen.
Innocent pleasures in moderation can provide relaxation for the body and mind and can foster
family and other relationships. But pleasure, per se, offers no deep, lasting satisfaction or sense of
fulfillment. The pleasure-centered person, too soon bored with each succeeding level of "fun,"
constantly cries for more and more. So the next new pleasure has to be bigger and better, more
exciting, with a bigger "high." A person in this state becomes almost entirely narcissistic, interpreting all
of life in terms of the pleasure it provides to the self here and now.
Too many vacations that last too long, too many movies, too much TV, too much video game
playing -- too much undisciplined leisure time in which a person continually takes the course of least
resistance -- gradually wastes a life. It ensures that a person's capacities stay dormant, that talents
remain undeveloped, that the mind and spirit become lethargic and that the heart is unfulfilled.
Where is the security, the guidance, the wisdom, and the power? At the low end of the continuum, in
the pleasure of a fleeting moment.
Malcom Muggeridge writes "A Twentieth-Century Testimony":
When I look back on my life nowadays, which I sometimes do, what strikes me most forcibly about
THE SEVEN HABITS OF HIGHLY EFFECTIVE PEOPLE Brought to you by FlyHeart
it is that what seemed at the time most significant and seductive, seems now most futile and absurd.
For instance, success in all of its various guises; being known and being praised; ostensible pleasures,
like acquiring money or seducing women, or traveling, going to and fro in the world and up and down
in it like Satan, explaining and experiencing whatever Vanity Fair has to offer.
In retrospect, all these exercises in self-gratification seem pure fantasy, what Pascal called, "licking
the earth."
Friend/Enemy Centeredness. Young people are particularly, though certainly not exclusively,
susceptible to becoming friend-centered. Acceptance and belonging to a peer group can become
almost supremely important. The distorted and ever-changing social mirror becomes the source for
the four life-support factors, creating a high degree of dependence on the fluctuating moods, feelings,
attitudes, and behavior of others.
Friend centeredness can also focus exclusively on one person, taking on some of the dimensions of
marriage. The emotional dependence on one individual, the escalating need/conflict spiral, and the
resulting negative interactions can grow out of friend centeredness.
And what about putting an enemy at the center of one's life? Most people would never think of it,
and probably no one would ever do it consciously. Nevertheless, enemy centering is very common,
particularly when there is frequent interaction between people who are in real conflict. When
someone feels he has been unjustly dealt with by an emotionally or socially significant person, it is very
easy for him to become preoccupied with the injustice and make the other person the center of his life.
Rather than proactively leading his own life, the enemy-centered person is counterdependently reacting
to the behavior and attitudes of a perceived enemy.
One friend of mine who taught at a university became very distraught because of the weaknesses of
a particular administrator with whom he had a negative relationship. He allowed himself to think
about the man constantly until eventually it became an obsession. It so preoccupied him that it
affected the quality of his relationships with his family, his church, and his working associates. He
finally came to the conclusion that he had to leave the university and accept a teaching appointment
somewhere else.
"Wouldn't you really prefer to teach at this university, if the man were not here?" I asked him.
"Yes, I would," he responded. "But as long as he is here, then my staying is too disruptive to
everything in life. I have to go.
"Why have you made this administrator the center of your life?" I asked him.
He was shocked by the question. He denied it. But I pointed out to him that he was allowing one
individual and his weaknesses to distort his entire map of life, to undermine his faith and the quality of
his relationships with his loved ones.
He finally admitted that this individual had had such an impact on him, but he denied that he
himself had made all these choices. He attributed the responsibility for the unhappy situation to the
administrator. He, himself, he declared, was not responsible.
As we talked, little by little, he came to realize that he was indeed responsible, but that because he
did not handle this responsibility well, he was being irresponsible.
Many divorced people fall into a similar pattern. They are still consumed with anger and bitterness
and self-justification regarding an ex-spouse. In a negative sense, psychologically they are still
married -- they each need the weaknesses of the former partner to justify their accusations.
Many "older" children go through life either secretly or openly hating their parents. They blame
them for past abuses, neglect, or favoritism and they center their adult life on that hatred, living out the
reactive, justifying script that accompanies it.
The individual who is friend- or enemy-centered has no intrinsic security. Feelings of self-worth
are volatile, a function of the emotional state or behavior of other people. Guidance comes from the
person's perception of how others will respond, and wisdom is limited by the social lens or by an
THE SEVEN HABITS OF HIGHLY EFFECTIVE PEOPLE Brought to you by FlyHeart
enemy-centered paranoia. The individual has no power. Other people are pulling the strings.
Church Centeredness. I believe that almost anyone who is seriously involved in any church will
recognize that churchgoing is not synonymous with personal spirituality. There are some people who
get so busy in church worship and projects that they become insensitive to the pressing human needs
that surround them, contradicting the very precepts they profess to believe deeply. There are others
who attend church less frequently or not at all but whose attitudes and behavior reflect a more genuine
centering in the principles of the basic Judeo-Christian ethic.
Having participated throughout my life in organized church and community service groups, I have
found that attending church does not necessarily mean living the principles taught in those meetings.
You can be active in a church but inactive in its gospel.
In the church-centered life, image or appearance can become a person's dominant consideration,
leading to hypocrisy that undermines personal security and intrinsic worth. Guidance comes from a
social conscience, and the church-centered person tends to label others artificially in terms of "active,"
"inactive," "liberal," "orthodox," or "conservative."
Because the church is a formal organization made up of policies, programs, practices, and people, it
cannot by itself give a person any deep, permanent security or sense of intrinsic worth. Living the
principles taught by the church can do this, but the organization alone cannot.
Nor can the church give a person a constant sense of guidance. Church-centered people often tend
to live in compartments, acting and thinking and feeling in certain ways on the Sabbath and in totally
different ways on weekdays. Such a lack of wholeness or unity or integrity is a further threat to
security, creating the need for increased labeling and self-justifying.
Seeing the church as an end rather than as a means to an end undermines a person's wisdom and
sense of balance. Although the church claims to teach people about the source of power, it does not
claim to be that power itself. It claims to be one vehicle through which divine power can be channeled
into man's nature.
Self-Centeredness. Perhaps the most common center today is the self. The most obvious form is
selfishness, which violates the values of most people. But if we look closely at many of the popular
approaches to growth and self-fulfillment, we often find self-centering at their core.
There is little security, guidance, wisdom, or power in the limited center of self. Like the Dead Sea
in Palestine, it accepts but never gives. It becomes stagnant.
On the other hand, paying attention to the development of self in the greater perspective of
improving one's ability to serve, to produce, to contribute in meaningful ways, gives context for
dramatic increase in the four life-support factors
These are some of the more common centers from which people approach life. It is often much
easier to recognize the center in someone else's life than to see it in your own. You probably know
someone who puts making money ahead of everything else. You probably know someone whose
energy is devoted to justifying his or her position in an ongoing negative relationship. If you look, you
can sometimes see beyond behavior into the center that creates it.

燕鸥and小蟹UID: 199804

Identifying Your Center
But where do you stand? What is at the center of your own life? Sometimes that isn't easy to see
Perhaps the best way to identify your own center is to look closely at your life-support factors. If
you can identify with one or more of the descriptions below, you can trace it back to the center from
which it flows, a center which may be limiting your personal effectiveness.
If you are Spouse Centered...
SECURITY
Your feelings of security are based on the way your spouse treats you.
THE SEVEN HABITS OF HIGHLY EFFECTIVE PEOPLE Brought to you by FlyHeart
You are highly vulnerable to the moods and feelings of your spouse.
There is deep disappointment resulting in withdrawal or conflict when your spouse disagrees with
you or does not meet your expectations.
Anything that may impinge on the relationship is perceived as a threat.
GUIDANCE
Your direction comes from your own needs and wants and from those of your spouse.
Your decision-making criterion is limited to what you think is best for your marriage or your mate,
or to the preferences and opinions of your spouse.
Your decision-making criterion is limited to what you think is best for your marriage or your mate,
or to the preferences and opinions of your spouse.
WISDOM
Your life perspective surrounds things which may positively or negatively influence your spouse or
your relationship.
POWER
Your power to act is limited by weaknesses in your spouse and in yourself.
* * *
If you are Family Centered...
SECURITY
Your security is founded on family acceptance and fulfilling family expectations.
Your sense of personal security is as volatile as the family.
Your feelings of self-worth are based on the family reputation.
GUIDANCE
Family scripting is your source of correct attitudes and behaviors.
Your decision-making criterion is what is good for the family, or what family members want.
WISDOM
You interpret all of life in terms of your family, creating a partial understanding and family
narcissism.
POWER
Your actions are limited by family models traditions.
* * *
If you are Money Centered...
SECURITY
Your personal worth is determined by your net worth.
You are vulnerable to anything that threatens your economic security.
GUIDANCE
Profit is your decision-making criterion.
WISDOM
Money-making is the lens through which life is seen and understood, creating imbalanced
judgment.
POWER
You are restricted to what you can accomplish with your money and your limited vision.
* * *
If you are Work Centered...
SECURITY
You tend to define yourself by your occupational role.
You are only comfortable when you are working.
GUIDANCE
You make your decisions based on the needs and expectations of your work.
THE SEVEN HABITS OF HIGHLY EFFECTIVE PEOPLE Brought to you by FlyHeart
WISDOM
You tend to be limited to your work role.
POWER
Your actions are limited by work role models, organizational constraints, occupational opportunities,
your boss's perceptions, and your possible inability at some point in your life to do that particular work.
* * *
If you are Possession Centered...
SECURITY
Your security is based on your reputation, your social status, or the tangible things you possess.
You tend to compare what you have to what others have.
GUIDANCE
You make your decisions based on what will protect, increase, or better display your possessions.
WISDOM
You see the world in terms of comparative economic and social relationships.
POWER
You function within the limits of what you can buy or the social prominence you can achieve.
* * *
If you are Pleasure Centered...
SECURITY
You feel secure only when you're on a pleasure "high.
Your security is short-lived, anesthetizing, and dependent on your environment.
GUIDANCE
You make your decisions based on what will give you the most pleasure.
WISDOM
You see the world in terms of what's in it for you.
POWER
Your power is almost negligible.
* * *
If you are Friend Centered...
SECURITY
Your security is a function of the social mirror.
You are highly dependent on the opinion of others.
GUIDANCE
Your decision-making criterion is "What will they think?
You are easily embarrassed.
WISDOM
You see the world through a social lens.
Your actions are as fickle as opinion.
POWER
You are limited by your social comfort zone.
* * *
If you are Enemy Centered...
SECURITY
Your security is volatile, based on the movements of your enemy.
You are always wondering what he is up to.
You seek self-justification and validation from the like-minded.
GUIDANCE
You are counter-dependently guided by your enemy's actions.
THE SEVEN HABITS OF HIGHLY EFFECTIVE PEOPLE Brought to you by FlyHeart
You make your decisions based on what will thwart your enemy.
WISDOM
Your judgment is narrow and distorted.
You are defensive, over-reactive, and often paranoid.
POWER
The little power you do have comes from anger, envy, resentment, and vengeance -- negative energy
that shrivels and destroys, leaving energy for littlle else.
* * *
If you are Church Centered...
SECURITY
Your security is based on church activity and on the esteem in which you are held by those in
authority or influence in the church.
You find identity and security in religious labels and comparisons.
GUIDANCE
You are guided by how others will evaluate your actions in the context of church teachings and
expectations.
WISDOM
You see the world in terms of "believers" and "non-believers," "belongers" and "non-belongers.
POWER
Perceived power comes from your church position or role.
* * *
If you are Self-Centered...
SECURITY
Your security is constantly changing and shifting.
GUIDANCE
Your judgment criteria are: "If it feels good..." "What I want." "What I need." "What's in it for me?
WISDOM
You view the world by how decisions, events, or circumstances will affect you.
POWER
Your ability to act is limited to your own resources, without the benefits of interdependency.
More often than not, a person's center is some combination of these and/or other centers. Most
people are very much a function of a variety of influences that play upon their lives. Depending on
external or internal conditions, one particular center may be activated until the underlying needs are
satisfied. Then another center becomes the compelling force.
As a person fluctuates from one center to another, the resulting relativism is like roller coasting
through life. One moment you're high, the next moment you're low, making efforts to compensate for
one weakness by borrowing strength from another weakness. There is no consistent sense of direction,
no persistent wisdom, no steady power supply or sense of personal, intrinsic worth and identity.
The ideal, of course, is to create one clear center from which you consistently derive a high degree of
security, guidance, wisdom, and power, empowering your proactivity and giving congruency and
harmony to every part of your life.

燕鸥and小蟹UID: 199804

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燕鸥and小蟹UID: 199804

You can make some points with the boss and further your career. You may give yourself a pat on the
back for putting hours well beyond what is required, evidence of what a hard worker you are. Your
wife should be proud of you!
If you're possession-centered, you might be thinking of the things the overtime income could buy.
Or you might consider what an asset to your reputation at the office it would be if you stayed.
Everyone would hear tomorrow how noble, how sacrificing and dedicated you are.
If you're pleasure-centered, you'll probably can the work and go to the concert, even if your wife
would be happy for you to work late. You deserve a night out!
If you're friend-centered, your decision would be influenced by whether or not you had invited
friends to attend the concert with you. Or whether your friends at work were going to stay late, too.
If you're enemy-centered, you may stay late because you know it will give you a big edge over that
person in the office who thinks he's the company's greatest asset. While he's off having fun, you'll be
working and slaving, doing his work and yours, sacrificing your personal pleasure for the good of the
company he can so blithely ignore.
If you're church-centered, you might be influenced by plans other church members have to attend
the concert, by whether or not any church members work at your office, or by the nature of the concert
-- Handel's Messiah might rate higher in priority than a rock concert. Your decision might also be
affected by what you think a "good church member" would do and by whether you view the extra work
as "service" or "seeking after material wealth."
If you're self-centered, you'll be focused on what will do you the most good. Would it be better for
you to go out for the evening? Or would it be better for you to make a few points with the boss? How
the different options affect you will be your main concern.
As we consider various ways of looking at a single event, is it any wonder that we have "young
lady/old lady" perception problems in our interactions with each other? Can you see how
fundamentally our centers affect us? Right down to our motivations, our daily decisions, our actions (or,
in too many cases, our reactions), our interpretations of events? That's why understanding your own
center is so important. And if that center does not empower you as a proactive person, it becomes
fundamental to your effectiveness to make the necessary Paradigm Shifts to create a center that will.
As a principle-centered person, you try to stand apart from the emotion of the situation and from
other factors that would act on you, and evaluate the option. Looking at the balanced whole -- the
work needs, the family needs, other needs that may be involved and the possible implications of the
various alternative decisions -- you'll try to come up with the best solution, taking all factors into
consideration.
Whether you go to the concert or stay and work is really a small part of an effective decision. You
might make the same choice with a number of other centers. But there are several important
differences when you are coming from a principle-centered paradigm. First, you are not being acted
upon by other people or circumstances. You are proactively choosing what you determine to be the
best alternative. You make your decisions consciously and knowledgeably.
Second, you know your decision is most effective because it is based on principles with predictable
long-term results.
Third, what you choose to do contributes to your ultimate values in life. Staying at work to get the
edge on someone at the office is an entirely different evening in your life from staying because you
value your boss's effectiveness and you genuinely want to contribute to the company's welfare. The
experiences you have as you carry out your decisions take on quality and meaning in the context of
your life as a whole.
Fourth, you can communicate to your wife and your boss within strong networks you've created in
your interdependent relationships. Because you are independent, you can be effectively
interdependent. You might decide to delegate what is delegable and come in early the next morning
THE SEVEN HABITS OF HIGHLY EFFECTIVE PEOPLE Brought to you by FlyHeart
to do the rest.
And finally, you'll feel comfortable about your decision. Whatever you choose to do, you can focus
on it and enjoy it.
As a principle-centered person, you see things differently. And because you see things differently,
you think differently, you act differently. Because you have a high degree of security, guidance,
wisdom, and power that flows from a solid, unchanging core, you have the foundation of a highly
proactive and highly effective life.
Writing and Using a A Personal Mission Statement
As we go deeply within ourselves, as we understand and realign our basic paradigms to bring them
in harmony with correct principles, we create both an effective, empowering center and a clear lens
through which we can see the world. We can then focus that lens on how we, as unique individuals,
relate to that world
Frankl says we detect rather than invent our missions in life. I like that choice of words. I think
each of us has an internal monitor or sense, a conscience, that gives us an awareness of our own
uniqueness and the singular contributions that we can make. In Frankl's words, "Everyone has his
own specific vocation or mission in life. Therein he cannot be replaced, nor can his life be repeated.
Thus, everyone's task is as unique as is his specific opportunity to implement it.
In seeking to give verbal expression to that uniqueness, we are again reminded of the fundamental
importance of proactivity and of working within our Circle of Influence. To seek some abstract
meaning to our lives out in our Circle of Concern is to abdicate our proactive responsibility, to place our
own first creation in the hands of circumstance and other people.
Our meaning comes from within. Again, in the words of Frankl, "Ultimately, man should not ask
what the meaning of his life is, but rather must recognize that it is he who is asked. In a word, each
man is questioned by life; and he can only answer to life by answering for his own life; to life he can
only respond by being responsible."
Personal responsibility, or proactivity, is fundamental to the first creation. Returning to the
computer metaphor, Habit 1 says "You are the programmer." Habit 2, then, says, "Write the program."
Until you accept the idea that you are responsible, that you are the programmer, you won't really invest
in writing the program.
As proactive people , we can begin to give expression to what we want to be and to do in our lives.
We can write a personal mission statement, a personal constitution.
A mission statement is not something you write overnight. It takes deep introspection, careful
analysis, thoughtful expression, and often many rewrites to produce it in final form. It may take you
several weeks or even months before you feel really comfortable with it, before you feel it is a complete
and concise expression of your innermost values and directions. Even then, you will want to review it
regularly and make minor changes as the years bring additional insights or changing circumstances.
But fundamentally, your mission statement becomes your constitution, the solid expression of your
vision and values. It becomes the criterion by which you measure everything else in your life.
I recently finished reviewing my own mission statement, which I do fairly regularly. Sitting on the
edge of a beach, alone, at the end of a bicycle ride, I took out my organizer and hammered it out. It
took several hours, but I felt a sense of clarity, a sense of organization and commitment, a sense of
exhilaration and freedom.
I find the process is as important as the product. Writing or reviewing a mission statement changes
you because it forces you to think through your priorities deeply, carefully, and to align your behavior
with your beliefs. As you do, other people begin to sense that you're not being driven by everything
that happens to you. You have a sense of mission about what you're trying to do and you are excited
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about it.
Using Your Whole Brain
Our self-awareness empowers us to examine our own thoughts. This is particularly helpful in
creating a personal mission statement because the two unique human endowments that enable us to
practice Habit 2 -- imagination and conscience -- are primarily functions of the right side of the brain.
Understanding how to tap into that right brain capacity greatly increases our first-creation ability.
A great deal of research has been conducted for decades on what has come to be called brain
dominance theory. The findings basically indicated that each hemisphere of the brain -- left and right
-- tends to specialize in and preside over different functions, process different kinds of information, and
deal with different kinds of problems.
Essentially, the left hemisphere is the more logical/verbal one and the right hemisphere the more
intuitive, creative one. The left deals with words, the right with pictures; the left with parts and
specifics, the right with wholes and the relationship between the parts. The left deals with analysis,
which means to break apart; the right with synthesis, which means to put together. The left deals with
sequential thinking; the right with simultaneous and holistic thinking. The left is time bound; the right
is time free.
Although people use both sides of the brain, one side or the other generally tends to be dominant in
each individual. Of course, the ideal would be to cultivate and develop the ability to have good
crossover between both sides of the brain so that a person could first sense what the situation called for
and then use the appropriate tool to deal with it. But people tend to stay in the "comfort zone" of their
dominant hemisphere and process every situation according to either a right- or left-brain preference.
In the words of Abraham Maslow, "He that is good with a hammer tends to think everything is a
nail." This is another factor that affects the "young lady/old lady" perception difference. Right-brain
and left-brain people tend to look at things in different ways.
We live in a primarily left-brain-dominant world, where words and measurement and logic are
enthroned, and the more creative, intuitive, sensing, artistic aspect of our nature is often subordinated.
Many of us find it more difficult to tap into our right-brain capacity.
Admittedly this description is oversimplified and new studies will undoubtedly throw more light
on brain functioning. But the point here is that we are capable of performing many different kinds of
thought processes and we barely tap our potential. As we become aware of its different capacities, we
can consciously use our minds to meet specific needs in more effective ways.
Two Ways to Tap the Right Brain
If we use the brain dominance theory as a model, it becomes evident that the quality of our first
creation is significantly impacted by our ability to use our creative right brain. The more we are able
to draw upon our right-brain capacity, the more fully we will be able to visualize, to synthesize, to
transcend time and present circumstances, to project a holistic picture of what we want to do and to be
in life.
Expand Perspective
Sometimes we are knocked out of our left-brain environment and thought patterns and into the right
brain by an unplanned experience. The death of a loved one, a severe illness, a financial setback, or
extreme adversity can cause us to stand back, look at our lives, and ask ourselves some hard questions:
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"What's really important? Why am I doing what I'm doing?
But if you're proactive, you don't have to wait for circumstances or other people to create
perspective-expanding experiences. You can consciously create your own.
There are a number of ways to do this. Through the powers of your imagination, you can visualize
your own funeral, as we did at the beginning of this chapter. Write your own eulogy. Actually write
it out. Be specific.
You can visualize your twenty-fifth and then your fiftieth wedding anniversary. Have your spouse
visualize this with you. Try to capture the essence of the family relationship you want to have created
through your day-by-day investment over a period of that many years.
You can visualize your retirement from your present occupation. What contributions, what
achievements will you want to have made in your field? What plans will you have after retirement?
Will you enter a second career?
Expand your mind. Visualize in rich detail. Involve as many emotions and feelings as possible.
Involve as many of the senses as you can.
I have done similar visualization exercises with some of my university classes. "Assume you only
have this one semester to live," I tell my students, "and that during this semester you are to stay in
school as a good student. Visualize how you would spend your semester.
Things are suddenly placed in a different perspective. Values quickly surface that before weren't
even recognized.
I have also asked students to live with that expanded perspective for a week and keep a diary of
their experiences.
The results are very revealing. They start writing to parents to tell them how much they love and
appreciate them. They reconcile with a brother, a sister, a friend where the relationship has
deteriorated.
The dominant, central theme of their activities, the underlying principle, is love. The futility of
bad-mouthing, bad thinking, put-downs, and accusation becomes very evident when they think in
terms of having only a short time to live. Principles and values become more evident to everybody.
There are a number of techniques using your imagination that can put you in touch with your
values. But the net effect of every one I have ever used is the same. When people seriously
undertake to identify what really matters most to them in their lives, what they really want to be and to
do, they become very reverent. They start to think in larger terms than today and tomorrow.

燕鸥and小蟹UID: 199804

Visualization and Affirmation
Personal leadership is not a singular experience. It doesn't begin and end with the writing of a
personal mission statement. It is, rather, the ongoing process of keeping your vision and values before
you and aligning your life to be congruent with those most important things. And in that effort, your
powerful right-brain capacity can be a great help to you on a daily basis as you work to integrate your
personal mission statement into your life. It's another application of "Begin with the End in Mind."
Let's go back to an example we mentioned before. Suppose I am a parent who really deeply loves
my children. Suppose I identify that as one of my fundamental values in my personal mission
statement. But suppose, on a daily basis, I have trouble overreacting.
I can use my right-brain power of visualization to write an "affirmation" that will help me become
more congruent with my deeper values in my daily life.
A good affirmation has five basic ingredients: it's personal, it's positive, it's present tense, it's visual,
and it's emotional. So I might write something like this: "It is deeply satisfying (emotional) that I
(personal) respond (present tense) with wisdom, love, firmness, and self-control (positive) when my
children misbehave."
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Then I can visualize it. I can spend a few minutes each day and totally relax my mind and body. I
can think about situations in which my children might misbehave. I can visualize them in rich detail.
I can feel the texture of the chair I might be sitting on, the floor under my feet, the sweater I'm wearing.
I can see the dress my daughter has on, the expression on her face. The more clearly and vividly I can
imagine the detail, the more deeply I will experience it, the less I will see it as a spectator.
Then I can see her do something very specific which normally makes my heart pound and my
temper start to flare. But instead of seeing my normal response, I can see myself handle the situation
with all the love, the power, the self-control I have captured in my affirmation. I can write the
program, write the script, in harmony with my values, with my personal mission statement.
And if I do this, day after day my behavior will change. Instead of living out of the scripts given to
me by my own parents or by society or by genetics or my environment, I will be living out of the script I
have written from my own self-selected value system.
I have helped and encouraged my son, Sean, to use this affirmation process extensively throughout
his football career. We started when he played quarterback in high school, and eventually, I taught
him how to do it on his own.
We would try to get him in a very relaxed state of mind through deep breathing and progressive
muscle relaxation technique so that he became very quiet inside. Then I would help him visualize
himself right in the heat of the toughest situations imaginable.
He would imagine a big blitz coming at him fast. He had to read the blitz and respond. He
would imagine giving audibles at the line after reading defenses. He would imagine quick reads with
his first receiver, his second receiver, his third receiver. He would imagine options that he normally
wouldn't do.
At one point in his football career, he told me he was constantly getting uptight. As we talked, I
realized that he was visualizing uptightness. So we worked on visualizing relaxation in the middle of
the big pressure circumstance. We discovered that the nature of the visualization is very important.
If you visualize the wrong thing, you'll produce the wrong thing.
Dr. Charles Garfield has done extensive research on peak performers, both in athletics and in
business. He became fascinated with peak performance in his work with the NASA program,
watching the astronauts rehearse everything on earth again and again in a simulated environment
before they went to space. Although he had a doctorate in mathematics, he decided to go back and get
another Ph.D. in the field of psychology and study the characteristics of peak performers.
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.
Your creative, visual right brain is one of your most important assets, both in creating your personal
mission statement and in integrating it into your life.
There is an entire body of literature and audio and video tapes that deals with this process of
visualization and affirmation. Some of the more recent developments in this field include such things
as subliminal programming, neurolinguistic programming, and new forms of relaxation and self-talk
processes. These all involve explanation, elaboration, and different packaging of the fundamental
principles of the first creation.
My review of the success literature brought me in contact with hundreds of books on this subject.
Although some made extravagant claims and relied on anecdotal rather than scientific evidence, I think
that most of the material is fundamentally sound. The majority of it appears to have originally come
THE SEVEN HABITS OF HIGHLY EFFECTIVE PEOPLE Brought to you by FlyHeart
out of the study of the Bible by many individuals.
In effective personal leadership, visualization and affirmation techniques emerge naturally out of a
foundation of well thought through purposes and principles that become the center of a person's life.
They are extremely powerful in rescripting and reprogramming, into writing deeply committed-to
purposes and principles into one's heart and mind. I believe that central to all enduring religions in
society are the same principles and practices clothed in different language -- meditation, prayer,
covenants, ordinances, scripture study, empathy, compassion, and many different forms of the use of
both conscience and imagination.
But if these techniques become part of the personality ethic and are severed from a base of character
and principles, they can be misused and abused in serving other centers, primarily the self center.
Affirmation and visualization are forms of programming, and we must be certain that we do not
submit ourselves to any programming that is not in harmony with our basic center or that comes from
sources centered on money-making, self interest, or anything other than correct principles.
The imagination can be used to achieve the fleeting success that comes when a person is focused on
material gain or on "what's in it for me." But I believe the higher use of imagination is in harmony with
the use of conscience to transcend self and create a life of contribution based on unique purpose and on
the principles that govern interdependent reality.
Identifying Roles and Goals
Of course, the logical/verbal left brain becomes important also as you attempt to capture your
right-brain images, feelings, and pictures in the words of a written mission statement. Just as
breathing exercises help integrate body and mind, writing is a kind of psycho-neural muscular activity
which helps bridge and integrate the conscious and subconscious minds. Writing distills, crystallizes,
and clarifies thought and helps break the whole into parts.
We each have a number of different roles in our lives -- different areas or capacities in which we
have responsibility. I may, for example, have a role as an individual, a husband, a father, a teacher, a
church member, and a businessman. And each of these roles is important.
One of the major problems that arises when people work to become more effective in life is that they
don't think broadly enough. They lose the sense of proportion, the balance, the natural ecology
necessary to effective living. They may get consumed by work and neglect personal health. In the
name of professional success, they may neglect the most precious relationships in their lives.
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. Look at your professional role. You might be a salesperson, or a manager, or a product
developer. What are you about in that area? What are the values that should guide you? Think of your
personal roles -- husband, wife, father, mother, neighbor, friend. What are you about in those roles?
What's important to you? Think of community roles -- the political area, public service, volunteer
organizations.
One executive has used the idea of roles and goals to create the following mission statement:
My mission is to live with integrity and to make a difference in the lives of others.
To fulfill this mission:
I have charity: I seek out and love the one -- each one -- regardless of his situation.
I sacrifice: I devote my time, talents, and resources to my mission.
I inspire: I teach by example that we are all children of a loving Heavenly Father and that every
Goliath can be overcome.
I am impactful: What I do makes a difference in the lives of others.
These roles take priority in achieving my mission:
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Husband -- my partner is the most important person in my life. Together we contribute the fruits
of harmony, industry, charity, and thrift.
Father -- I help my children experience progressively greater joy in their lives.
Son/Brother -- I am frequently "there" for support and love.
Christian -- God can count on me to keep my covenants and to serve his other children.
Neighbor -- The love of Christ is visible through my actions toward others.
Change Agent -- I am a catalyst for developing high performance in large organizations.
Scholar -- I learn important new things every day.
Writing your mission in terms of the important roles in your life gives you balance and harmony.
It keeps each role clearly before you. You can review your roles frequently to make sure that you don't
get totally absorbed by one role to the exclusion of others that are equally or even more important in
your life.
After you identify your various roles, then you can think about the Long Term Goals are plans you
make that support the principles described in your Mission Statement. These goals should represent
areas you want to focus on in the near future. Typically, Long Term Goals take longer than a week to
complete, but are most specific than the lifetime goals of your Mission Statement.long-term goals you
want to accomplish in each of those roles. We're into the right brain again, using imagination,
creativity, conscience, and inspiration. If these goals are the extension of a mission statement based on
correct principles, they will be vitally different from the goals people normally set. They will be in
harmony with correct principles, with natural laws, which gives you greater power to achieve them.
They are not someone else's goals you have absorbed. They are your goals. They reflect your deepest
values, your unique talent, your sense of mission. And they grow out of your chosen roles in life.
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.
Roles and goals give structure and organized direction to your personal mission. If you don't yet
have a personal mission statement, it's a good place to begin. Just identifying the various areas of your
life and the two or three important results you feel you should accomplish in each area to move ahead
gives you an overall perspective of your life and a sense of direction.
As we move into Habit 3, we'll go into greater depth in the area of short-term goals. The important
application at this point is to identify roles and long-term goals as they relate to your personal mission
statement. These roles and long-term goals will provide the foundation for effective goal setting and
achieving when we get to the Habit 3 day-to-day management of life and time.

燕鸥and小蟹UID: 199804

Family Mission Statements
Because Habit 2 is based on principle, it has broad application. In addition to individuals, families,
service groups, and organizations of all kinds become significantly more effective as they Begin with the
End in Mind.
Many families are managed on the basis of crises, moods, quick fixes, and instant gratification -- not
on sound principles. Symptoms surface whenever stress and pressure mount: people become cynical,
critical, or silent or they start yelling and overreacting. Children who observe these kinds of behavior
grow up thinking the only way to solve problems is flight or fight.
The core of any family is what is changeless, what is always going to be there -- shared vision and
values. By writing a family mission statement, you give expression to its true foundation.
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This mission statement becomes its constitution, the standard, the criterion for evaluation and
decision making. It gives continuity and unity to the family as well as direction. When individual
values are harmonized with those of the family, members work together for common purposes that are
deeply felt.
Again, the process is as important as the product. The very process of writing and refining a
mission statement becomes a key way to improve the family. Working together to create a mission
statement builds the PC capacity to live it.
By getting input from every family member, drafting a statement, getting feedback, revising it, and
using wording from different family members, you get the family talking, communicating, on things
that really matter deeply. The best mission statements are the result of family members coming
together in a spirit of mutual respect, expressing their different views, and working together to create
something greater than any one individual could do alone. Periodic review to expand perspective,
shift emphasis or direction, amend or give new meaning to time-worn phrases can keep the family
united in common values and purposes.
The mission statement becomes the framework for thinking, for governing the family. When the
problems and crises come, the constitution is there to remind family members of the things that matter
most and to provide direction for problem solving and decision making based on correct principles.
In our home, we put our mission statement up on a wall in the family room so that we can look at it
and monitor ourselves daily. When we read the phrases about the sounds of love in our home, order,
responsible independence, cooperation, helpfulness, meeting needs, developing talents, showing
interest in each other's talents, and giving service to others it gives us some criteria to know how we're
doing in the things that matter most to us as a family.
When we plan our family goals and activities, we say, "In light of these principles, what are the goals
we're going to work on? What are our action plans to accomplish our goals and actualize these values?"
We review the statement frequently and rework goals and jobs twice a year, in September and June
-- the beginning of school and the end of school -- to reflect the situation as it is, to improve it, to
strengthen it. It renews us, it recommits us to what we believe in, what we stand for.
Organizational Mission Statements
Mission statements are also vital to successful organizations. One of the most important thrusts of
my work with organizations is to assist them in developing effective mission statements. And to be
effective, that statement has to come from within the bowels of the organization. Everyone should
participate in a meaningful way -- not just the top strategy planners, but everyone. Once again, the
involvement process is as important as the written product and is the key to its use.
I am always intrigued whenever I go to IBM and watch the training process there. Time and time
again, I see the leadership of the organization come into a group and say that IBM stands for three
things: the dignity of the individual, excellence, and service.
These things represent the belief system of IBM. Everything else will change, but these three things
will not change. Almost like osmosis, this belief system has spread throughout the entire organization,
providing a tremendous base of shared values and personal security for everyone who works there.
Once I was training a group of people for IBM in New York. It was small group, about 20 people,
and one of them became ill. He called his wife in California, who expressed concern because his illness
required a special treatment. The IBM people responsible for the training session arranged to have
him taken to an excellent hospital with medical specialists in the disease. But they could sense that his
wife was uncertain and really wanted him home where their personal physician could handle the
problem.
So they decided to get him home. Concerned about the time involved in driving him to the airport
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and waiting for a commercial plane, they brought in a helicopter, flew him to the airport, and hired a
special plane just to take this man to California.
I don't know what costs that involved; my guess would be many thousands of dollars. But IBM
believes in the dignity of the individual. That's what the company stands for. To those present, that
experience represented its belief system and was no surprise. I was impressed.
At another time, I was scheduled to train 175 shopping center managers at a particular hotel. I was
amazed at the level of service there. It wasn't a cosmetic thing. It was evident at all levels,
spontaneously, without supervision.
I arrived quite late, checked in, and asked if room service were available. The man at the desk said,
"No, Mr. Covey, but if you're interested, I could go back and get a sandwich or a salad or whatever
you'd like that we have in the kitchen." His attitude was one of total concern about my comfort and
welfare. "Would you like to see your convention room?" he continued. "Do you have everything you
need? What can I do for you? I'm here to serve you."
There was no supervisor there checking up. This man was sincere.
The next day I was in the middle of a presentation when I discovered that I didn't have all the
colored markers I needed. So I went out into the hall during the brief break and found a bellboy
running to another convention. "I've got a problem," I said. "I'm here training a group of managers
and I only have a short break. I need some more colored pens.
He whipped around and almost came to attention. He glanced at my name tag and said, "Mr.
Covey, I will solve your problem."
He didn't say, "I don't know where to go" or "well, go and check the front desk." He just took care of
it. And he made me feel like it was his privilege to do so.
Later, I was in the side lobby, looking at some of the art objects. Someone from the hotel came up
to me and said, "Mr. Covey, would you like to see a book that describes the art objects in this hotel?"
How anticipatory! How service-oriented!
I next observed one of the employees high up on a ladder cleaning windows in the lobby. From his
vantage point he saw a woman having a little difficulty in the garden with a walker. She hadn't really
fallen, and she was with other people. But he climbed down that ladder, went outside, helped the
woman into the lobby and saw that she was properly taken care of. Then he went back and finished
cleaning the windows.
I wanted to find out how this organization had created a culture where people bought so deeply into
the value of customer service. I interviewed housekeepers, waitresses, bellboys in that hotel and
found that this attitude had impregnated the minds, hearts, and attitudes of every employee there.
I went through the back door into the kitchen, where I saw the central value: "Uncompromising
personalized service." I finally went to the manager and said, "My business is helping organizations
develop a powerful team character, a team culture. I am amazed at what you have here."
"Do you want to know the real key?" he inquired. He pulled out the mission statement for the hotel
chain.
After reading it, I acknowledged, "That's an impressive statement. But I know many companies
that have impressive mission statements."
"Do you want to see the one for this hotel?" he asked.
"Do you mean you developed one just for this hotel?"
"Yes."
"Different from the one for the hotel chain?"
"Yes. It's in harmony with that statement, but this one pertains to our situation, our environment,
our time." He handed me another paper.
"Who developed this mission statement?" I asked.
"Everybody," he replied.
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"Everybody? Really, everybody?"
"Yes."
"Housekeepers?"
"Yes."
"Waitresses?"
"Yes."
"Desk clerks?"
"Yes. Do you want to see the mission statement written by the people who greeted you last night?"
He pulled out a mission statement that they, themselves, had written that was interwoven with all the
other mission statements. Everyone, at every level, was involved.
The mission statement for that hotel was the hub of a great wheel. It spawned the thoughtful, more
specialized mission statements of particular groups of employees. It was used as the criterion for
every decision that was made. It clarified what those people stood for -- how they related to the
customer, how they related to each other. It affected the style of the managers and the leaders. It
affected the compensation system. It affected the kind of people they recruited and how they trained
and developed them. Every aspect of that organization, essentially, was a function of that hub, that
mission statement.
I later visited another hotel in the same chain, and the first thing I did when I checked in was to ask
to see their mission statement, which they promptly gave me. At this hotel, I came to understand the
motto "Uncompromising personalized service" a little more.
For a three-day period, I watched every conceivable situation where service was called for. I
always found that service was delivered in a very impressive, excellent way. But it was always also
very personalized. For instance, in the swimming area I asked the attendant where the drinking
fountain was. He walked me to it.
But the thing that impressed me the very most was to see an employee, on his own, admit a mistake
to his boss. We ordered room service, and were told when it would be delivered to the room. On the
way to our room, the room service person spilled the hot chocolate, and it took a few extra minutes to
go back and change the linen on the tray and replace the drink. So the room service was about fifteen
minutes late, which was really not that important to us.
Nevertheless, the next morning the room service manager phoned us to apologize and invited us to
have either the buffet breakfast or a room service breakfast, compliments of the hotel, to in some way
compensate for the inconvenience.
What does it say about the culture of an organization when an employee admits his own mistake,
unknown to anyone else, to the manager so that customer or guest is better taken care of!
As I told the manager of the first hotel I visited, I know a lot of companies with impressive mission
statements. But there is a real difference, all the difference in the world, in the effectiveness of a
mission statement created by everyone involved in the organization and one written by a few top
executives behind a mahogany wall.
One of the fundamental problems in organizations, including families, is that people are not
committed to the determinations of other people for their lives. They simply don't buy into them.
Many times as I work with organizations, I find people whose goals are totally different from the
goals of the enterprise. I commonly find reward systems completely out of alignment with stated
value systems.
When I begin work with companies that have already developed some kind of mission statement, I
ask them, "How many of the people here know that you have a mission statement? How many of you
know what it contains? How many were involved in creating it? How many really buy into it and use it
as your frame of reference in making decisions?"
Without involvement, there is no commitment. Mark it down, asterisk it, circle it, underline it.
THE SEVEN HABITS OF HIGHLY EFFECTIVE PEOPLE Brought to you by FlyHeart
No involvement, no commitment.
Now, in the early stages -- when a person is new to an organization or when a child in the family is
young -- you can pretty well give them a goal and they'll buy it, particularly if the relationship,
orientation, and training are good.
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.
That's why creating an organizational mission statement takes time, patience, involvement, skill, and
empathy. Again, it's not a quick fix. It takes time and sincerity, correct principles, and the courage
and integrity to align systems, structure, and management style to the shared vision and values. But
it's based on correct principles and it works.
An organizational mission statement -- one that truly reflects the deep shared vision and values of
everyone within that organization -- creates a great unity and tremendous commitment. It creates in
people's hearts and minds a frame of reference, a set of criteria or guidelines, by which they will govern
themselves. They don't need someone else directing, controlling, criticizing, or taking cheap shots.
They have bought into the changeless core of what the organization is about.

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Application Suggestions
1. Take the time to record the impressions you had in the funeral visualization at the beginning of
this chapter. You may want to use the chart below to organize your thoughts.
2. Take a few moments and write down your roles as you now see them. Are you satisfied with
that mirror image of your life.
3. Set up time to completely separate yourself from daily activities and to begin work on your
personal mission statement.
4. Go through the chart in Appendix A showing different centers and circle all those you can
identify with. Do they form a pattern for the behavior in your life? Are you comfortable with the
implications of your analysis.
5. Start a collection of notes, quotes, and ideas you may want to use as resource material in writing
your .personal mission statement.
6. Identify a project you will be facing in the near future and apply the principles of mental
creation. Write down the results you desire and what steps will lead to those results.
7. Share the principles of Habit 2 with your family or work group and suggest that together you
begin the process of developing a family or group mission statement.
Habit 3: Put First Things First TM -- Principles of Personal Managemen
Things which matter most must never be at the mercy of things which matter least
-- Goeth
* *
Will you take just a moment and write down a short answer to the following two questions? Your
answers will be important to you as you begin work on Habit 3.
Question 1: What one thing could you do (you aren't doing now) that if you did on a regular basis,
would make a tremendous positive difference in your personal life?
Question 2: What one thing in your business or professional life would bring similar results?
We'll come back to these answers later. But first, let's put Habit 3 in perspective
THE SEVEN HABITS OF HIGHLY EFFECTIVE PEOPLE Brought to you by FlyHeart
Habit 3 is the personal fruit, the practical fulfillment of Habits 1 and 2.
Habit 1 says, "You're the creator. You are in charge." It's based on the four unique human
endowments of imagination, conscience, independent will, and particularly, self-awareness. It
empowers you to say, "That's an unhealthy program I've been given from my childhood, from my social
mirror. I don't like that ineffective script. I can change."
Habit 2 is the first or mental creation. It's based on imagination -- the ability to envision, to see the
potential, to create with our minds what we cannot at present see without eyes; and conscience -- the
ability to detect our own uniqueness and the personal, moral, and ethical guidelines within which we
can most happily fulfill it. It's the deep contact with our basic paradigms and values and the vision of
what we can become.
Habit 3, then, is the second creation -- the physical creation. It's the fulfillment, the actualization,
the natural emergence of Habits 1 and 2. It's the exercise of independent will toward becoming
principle-centered. It's the day-in, day-out, moment-by-moment doing it.
Habits 1 and 2 are absolutely essential and prerequisite to Habit 3. You can't become
principle-centered without first being aware of and developing your own proactive nature. You can't
become principle-centered without first being aware of your paradigms and understanding how to shift
them and align them with principles. You can't become principle-centered without a vision of and a
focus on the unique contribution that is yours to make.
But with that foundation, you can become principle-centered, day-in and day-out,
moment-by-moment, by living Habit 3 -- by practicing effective self-management.
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.
But once you have dealt with those issues, once you have resolved them, you then have to manage
yourself effectively to create a life congruent with your answers. The ability to manage well doesn't
make much difference if you're not even in the "right jungle." But if you are in the right jungle, it
makes all the difference. In fact, the ability to manage well determines the quality and even the
existence of the second creation. Management is the breaking down, the analysis, the sequencing, the
specific application, the time-bound left-brain aspect of effective self-government. My own maxim of
personal effectiveness is this: Manage from the left; lead from the right.
The Power of Independent Will
In addition to self-awareness, imagination, and conscience, it is the fourth human endowment --
independent will -- that really makes effective self-management possible. It is the ability to make
decisions and choices and to act in accordance with them. It is the ability to act rather than to be acted
upon, to proactively carry out the program we have developed through the other three endowments.
The human will is an amazing thing. Time after time, it has triumphed against unbelievable odds.
The Helen Kellers of this world give dramatic evidence to the value, the power of the independent will.
But as we examine this endowment in the context of effective self-management, we realize it's
usually not the dramatic, the visible, the once-in-a-lifetime, up-by-the-bootstraps effort that brings
enduring success. Empowerment comes from the learning how to use this great endowment in the
decisions we make every day.
The degree to which we have developed our independent will in our everyday lives is measured by
our personal integrity. Integrity is, fundamentally, the value we place on ourselves. It's our ability to
make and keep commitments to ourselves, to "walk our talk." It's honor with self, a fundamental
part of the character ethic, the essence of proactive growth.
Effective management is putting first things first. While leadership decides what "first things" are,
THE SEVEN HABITS OF HIGHLY EFFECTIVE PEOPLE Brought to you by FlyHeart
it is management that puts them first, day-by-day, moment-by-moment. Management is discipline,
carrying it out.
Discipline derives from disciple -- disciple to a philosophy, disciple to a set of principles, disciple to
a set of values, disciple to an overriding purpose, to a superordinate goal or a person who represents
that goal.
In other words, if you are an effective manager of your self, your discipline comes from within; it is a
function of your independent will. You are a disciple, a follower, of your own deep values and their
source. And you have the will, the integrity, to subordinate your feelings, your impulses, your moods
to those values.
One of my favorite essays is "The Common Denominator of Success," written by E. M. Gray. He
spent his life searching for the one denominator that all successful people share. He found it wasn't
hard work, good luck, or astute human relations, though those were all important. The one factor that
seemed to transcend all the rest embodies the essence of Habit 3: Putting First Things First.
"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."
That subordination requires a purpose, a mission, a Habit 2 clear sense of direction and value, a
burning "Yes!" inside that makes it possible to say "no" to other things. It also requires independent
will, the power to do something when you don't want to do it, to be a function of your values rather
than a function of the impulse or desire of any given moment. It's the power to act with integrity to
your proactive first creation.
Four Generations of Time Management
In Habit 3 we are dealing with many of the questions addressed in the field of life and time
management. As a longtime student of this fascinating field, I am personally persuaded that the
essence of the best thinking in the area of time management can be captured in a single phrase:
Organize and execute around priorities. That phrase represents the evolution of three generations of
time-management theory, and how to best do it is the focus of a wide variety of approaches and
materials.
Personal management has evolved in a pattern similar to many other areas of human endeavor.
Major developmental thrusts, or "waves" as Alvin Toffler calls them, follow each other in succession,
each adding a vital new dimension. For example, in social development, the agricultural revolution
was followed by the industrial revolution, which was followed by the informational revolution. Each
succeeding wave created a surge of social and personal progress.
Likewise, in the area of time management, each generation builds on the one before it -- each one
moves us toward greater control of our lives. The first wave or generation could be characterized by
notes and checklists, an effort to give some semblance of recognition and inclusiveness to the many
demands placed on our time and energy.
The second generation could be characterized by calendars and appointment books. This wave
reflects an attempt to look ahead, to schedule events and activities in the future.
The third generation reflects the current time-management field. It adds to those preceding
generations the important idea of prioritization, of clarifying values, and of comparing the relative
worth of activities based on their relationship to those values. In addition, it focuses on setting goals --
specific long-, intermediate-, and short-term targets toward which time and energy would be directed
in harmony with values. It also includes the concept of daily planning, of making a specific plan to
accomplish those goals and activities determined to be of greatest worth.
THE SEVEN HABITS OF HIGHLY EFFECTIVE PEOPLE Brought to you by FlyHeart
While the third generation has made a significant contribution, people have begun to realize that
"efficient" scheduling and control of time are often counterproductive. The efficiency focus creates
expectations that clash with the opportunities to develop rich relationships, to meet human needs, and
to enjoy spontaneous moments on a daily basis.
As a result, many people have become turned off by time management programs and planners that
make them feel too scheduled, too restricted, and they "throw the baby out with the bath water,"
reverting to first- or second-generation techniques to preserve relationships, to meet human needs, and
to enjoy spontaneous moments on a daily basis.
But there is an emerging fourth generation that is different in kind. It recognizes that "time
management" is really a misnomer -- the challenge is not to manage time, but to manage ourselves.
Satisfaction is a function of expectation as well as realization. And expectation (and satisfaction) lie in
our Circle of Influence.
Rather than focusing on things and time, fourth-generation expectations focus on preserving and
enhancing relationships and accomplishing results -- in short, on maintaining the P/PC Balance.

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Quadrant II
The essential focus of the fourth generation of management can be captured in the Time
Management Matrix diagrammed on the next page. Basically, we spend time in one of four ways.
As you see, the two factors that define an activity are urgent and important. Urgent means it
requires immediate attention. It's "Now!" Urgent things act on us. A ringing phone is urgent. Most
people can't stand the thought of just allowing the phone to ring. You could spend hours preparing
materials, you could get all dressed up and travel to a person's office to discuss a particular issue, but if
the phone were to ring while you were there, it would generally take precedence over your personal
visit.
If you were to phone someone, there aren't many people who would say, "I'll get to you in 15
minutes; just hold." But those same people would probably let you wait in an office for at least that
long while they completed a telephone conversation with someone else.
Urgent matters are usually visible. They press on us; they insist on action. They're often popular
with others. They're usually right in front of us. And often they are pleasant, easy, fun to do. But so
often they are unimportant!
Importance, on the other hand, has to do with results. If something is important, it contributes to
your mission, your values, your high priority goals.
We react to urgent matters. Important matters that are not urgent require more initiative, more
proactivity. We must act to seize opportunity, to make things happen. If we don't practice Habit 2, if
we don't have a clear idea of what is important, of the results we desire in our lives, we are easily
diverted into responding to the urgent.
Look for a moment at the four quadrants in the Time Management Matrix. Quadrant I is both
urgent and important. It deals with significant results that require immediate attention. We usually
call the activities in Quadrant I "crises" or "problems." We all have some Quadrant I activities in our
lives. But Quadrant I consumes many people. They are crisis managers, problem-minded people, the
deadline-driven producers.
As long as you focus on Quadrant I, it keeps getting bigger and bigger until it dominates you. It's
like the pounding surf. A huge problem comes and knocks you down and you're wiped out. You
struggle back up only to face another one that knocks you down and slams you to the ground.
Some people are literally beaten up by the problems all day every day. The only relief they have is
in escaping to the not important, not urgent activities of Quadrant IV. So when you look at their total
matrix, 90 percent of their time is in Quadrant I and most of the remaining 10 percent is in Quadrant IV
THE SEVEN HABITS OF HIGHLY EFFECTIVE PEOPLE Brought to you by FlyHeart
with only negligible attention paid to Quadrants II and III. That's how people who manage their lives
by crisis live.
There are other people who spend a great deal of time in "urgent, but not important" Quadrant III,
thinking they're in Quadrant I. They spend most of their time reacting to things that are urgent,
assuming they are also important. But the reality is that the urgency of these matters is often based on
the priorities and expectations of others.
People who spend time almost exclusively in Quadrants III and IV basically lead irresponsible lives.
Effective people stay out of Quadrants III and IV because, urgent or not, they aren't important.
They also shrink Quadrant I down to size by spending more time in Quadrant II.
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.
To paraphrase Peter Drucker, effective people are not problem-minded; they're opportunity-minded.
They feed opportunities and starve problems. They think preventively. They have genuine
Quadrant I crises and emergencies that require their immediate attention, but the number is
comparatively small. They keep P and PC in balance by focusing on the important, but not the urgent,
high-leverage capacity-building activities of Quadrant II.
With the Time Management Matrix in mind, take a moment now and consider how you answered
the questions at the beginning of this chapter. What quadrant do they fit in? Are they important?
Are they urgent?
My guess is that they probably fit into Quadrant II. They are obviously important, deeply
important, but not urgent. And because they aren't urgent, you don't do them.
Now look again at the nature of those questions: What one thing could you do in your personal and
professional life that, if you did on a regular basis, would make a tremendous positive difference in
your life? Quadrant II activities have that kind of impact. Our effectiveness takes the quantum leaps
when we do them.
I asked a similar question to a group of shopping center managers. "If you were to do one thing in
your professional work that you know would have enormously positive effects on the results, what
would it be?" Their unanimous response was to build helpful personal relationships with the tenants,
the owners of the stores inside the shopping center, which is a Quadrant II activity.
We did an analysis of the time they were spending on that activity. It was less than 5 percent.
They had good reasons -- problems, one right after another. They had reports to make out, meetings
to go to, correspondence to answer, phone calls to make, constant interruptions. Quadrant I had
consumed them.
They were spending very little time with the store managers, and the time they did spend was filled
with negative energy. The only reason they visited the store managers at all was to enforce the
contract -- to collect the money or discuss advertising or other practices that were out of harmony with
center guidelines, or some similar thing.
The store owners were struggling for survival, let alone prosperity. They had employment
problems, cost problems, inventory problems, and a host of other problems. Most of them had no
training in management at all. Some were fairly good merchandisers, but they needed help. The
tenants didn't even want to see the shopping center owners; they were just one more problem to
contend with.
So the owners decided to be proactive. They determined their purpose, their values, their priorities.
In harmony with those priorities, they decided to spend about one-third of their time in helping
relationships with the tenants.
THE SEVEN HABITS OF HIGHLY EFFECTIVE PEOPLE Brought to you by FlyHeart
In working with that organization for about a year and a half, I saw them climb to around 20 percent,
which represented more than a fourfold increase. In addition, they changed their role. They became
listeners, trainers, consultants to the tenants. Their interchanges were filled with positive energy.
The effect was dramatic, profound. By focusing on relationships and results rather than time and
methods, the numbers went up, the tenants were thrilled with the results created by new ideas and
skills, and the shopping center managers were more effective and satisfied and increased their list of
potential tenants and lease revenue based on increased sales by the tenant stores. They were no longer
policemen or hovering supervisors. They were problem solvers, helpers.
Whether you are a student at the university, a worker in an assembly line, a homemaker, fashion
designer, or president of a company, I believe that if you were to ask what lies in Quadrant II and
cultivate the proactivity to go after it, you would find the same results. Your effectiveness would
increase dramatically. Your crises and problems would shrink to manageable proportions because
you would be thinking ahead, working on the roots, doing the preventive things that keep situations
from developing into crises in the first place. In the time management jargon, this is called the Pareto
Principle -- 80 percent of the results flow out of 20 percent of the activities.
What it Takes to Say "No"
The only place to get time for Quadrant II in the beginning is from Quadrants III and IV. You can't
ignore the urgent and important activities of Quadrant I, although it will shrink in size as you spend
more time with prevention and preparation in Quadrant II. But the initial time for Quadrant II has
come out of III and IV.
You have to be proactive to work on Quadrant II because Quadrant I and III work on you. To say
"yes" to important Quadrant II priorities, you have to learn to say "no" to other activities, sometimes
apparently urgent things.
Some time ago, my wife was invited to serve as chairman of a committee in a community endeavor.
She had a number of truly important things she was trying to work on, and she really didn't want to do
it. But she felt pressured into it and finally agreed.
Then she called one of her dear friends to ask if she would serve on her committee. Her friend
listened for a long time and then said, "Sandra, that sounds like a wonderful project, a really worthy
undertaking. I appreciate so much your inviting me to be a part of it. I feel honored by it. For a
number of reasons, I won't be participating myself, but I want you to know how much I appreciate your
invitation."
Sandra was ready for anything but a pleasant "no." She turned to me and sighed, "I wish I'd said
that."
I don't mean to imply that you shouldn't be involved in significant service projects. Those things
are important. But you have to decide what your highest priorities are and have the courage --
pleasantly, smiling, nonapologetically -- to say "no" to other things. And the way you do that is by
having a bigger "yes" burning inside. The enemy of the "best" is often the "good."
Keep in mind that you are always saying "no" to something. If it isn't to the apparent, urgent
things in your life, it is probably to the more fundamental, highly important things. Even when the
urgent is good, the good can keep you from your best, keep you from your unique contributions, if you
let it.
When I was Director of University Relations at a large university, I hired a very talented, proactive,
creative writer. One day, after he had been on the job for a few months, I went into his office and
asked him to work on some urgent matters that were pressing on me.
He said, "Stephen, I'll do whatever you want me to do. Just let me share with you my situation."
Then he took me over to his wall board, where he had listed over two dozen projects he was
THE SEVEN HABITS OF HIGHLY EFFECTIVE PEOPLE Brought to you by FlyHeart
working on, together with performance criteria and deadline dates that had been clearly negotiated
before. He was highly disciplined, which is why I went to see him in the first place. "If you want to
get something done, give it to a busy man."
Then he said, "Stephen, to do the jobs that you want done right would take several days. Which of
these projects would you like me to delay or cancel to satisfy your request?"
Well, I didn't want to take the responsibility for that. I didn't want to put a cog in the wheel of one
of the most productive people on the staff just because I happened to be managing by crisis at the time.
The jobs I wanted done were urgent, but not important. So I went and found another crisis manager
and gave the job to him.
We say "yes" or "no" to things daily, usually many times a day. A center of correct principles and a
focus on our personal mission empowers us with wisdom to make those judgments effectively.
As I work with different groups, I tell them that the essence of effective time and life management is
to organize and execute around balanced priorities. Then I ask this question: if you were to fault
yourself in one of three areas, which would it be: (1) the inability to prioritize; (2) the inability or desire
to organize around those priorities; or (3) the lack of discipline to execute around them, to stay with
your priorities and organization?
Most people say their main fault is a lack of discipline. On deeper thought, I believe that is not the
case. The basic problem is that their priorities have not become deeply planted in their hearts and
minds. They haven't really internalized Habit 2.
There are many people who recognize the value of Quadrant II activities in their lives, whether they
identify them as such or not. And they attempt to give priority to those activities and integrate them
into their lives through self-discipline alone. But without a principle center and a personal mission
statement, they don't have the necessary foundation to sustain their efforts. They're working on the
leaves, on the attitudes and the behaviors of discipline, without even thinking to examine the roots, the
basic paradigms from which their natural attitudes and behaviors flow.
A Quadrant II focus is a paradigm that grows out of a principle center. If you are centered on your
spouse, your money, your friends, your pleasure, or any extrinsic factor, you will keep getting thrown
back into Quadrants I and III, reacting to the outside forces your life is centered on. Even if you're
centered on yourself, you'll end up in I and II reacting to the impulse of the moment. Your
independent will alone cannot effectively discipline you against your center.
In the words of the architectural maxim, form follows function. Likewise, management follows
leadership. The way you spend your time is a result of the way you see your time and the way you
really see your priorities. If your priorities grow out of a principle center and a personal mission, if
they are deeply planted in your heart and in your mind, you will see Quadrant II as a natural, exciting
place to invest your time.
It's almost impossible to say, "no" to the popularity of Quadrant III or to the pleasure of escape to
Quadrant IV if you don't have a bigger "yes" burning inside. Only when you have the self-awareness
to examine your program -- and the imagination and conscience to create a new, unique,
principle-centered program to which you can say "yes" -- only then will you have sufficient
independent will power to say "no," with a genuine smile, to the unimportant.

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Moving Into Quadrant II
If Quadrant II activities are clearly the heart of effective personal management -- the "first things" we
need to put first -- then how do we organize and execute around those things
The first generation of time management does not even recognize the concept of priority. It gives
us notes and "to do" lists that we can cross off, and we feel a temporary sense of accomplishment every
time we check something off, but no priority is attached to items on the list. In addition, there is no
THE SEVEN HABITS OF HIGHLY EFFECTIVE PEOPLE Brought to you by FlyHeart
correlation between what's on the list and our ultimate values and purposes in life. We simply
respond to whatever penetrates our awareness and apparently needs to be done.
Many people manage from this first-generation paradigm. It's the course of least resistance.
There's no pain or strain; it's fun to "go with the flow." Externally imposed disciplines and schedules
give people the feeling that they aren't responsible for results.
But first-generation managers, by definition, are not effective people. They produce very little, and
their life-style does nothing to build their Production Capability. Buffeted by outside forces, they are
often seen as undependable and irresponsible, and they have very little sense of control and self-esteem.
Second-generation managers assume a little more control. They plan and schedule in advance and
generally are seen as more responsible because they "show up" when they're supposed to.
But again, the activities they schedule have no priority or recognized correlation to deeper values
and goals. They have few significant achievements and tend to be schedule-oriented.
Third-generation managers take a significant step forward. They clarify their values and set goals.
They plan each day and prioritize their activities.
As I have said, this is where most of the time-management field is today. But this third generation
has some critical limitations. First, it limits vision -- daily planning often misses important things that
can only be seen from a larger perspective. The very language "daily planning" focuses on the urgent
-- the "now." While third generation prioritization provides order to activity, it doesn't question the
essential importance of the activity in the first place -- it doesn't place the activity in the context of
principles, personal mission, roles, and goals. The third-generation value-driven daily planning
approach basically prioritizes the Quadrant I and III problems and crises of the day.
In addition, the third generation makes no provision for managing roles in a balanced way. It lacks
realism, creating the tendency to over-schedule the day, resulting in frustration and the desire to
occasionally throw away the plan and escape to Quadrant IV. And its efficiency, time-management
focus tends to strain relationships rather than build them.
While each of the three generations has recognized the value of some kind of management tool,
none has produced a tool that empowers a person to live a principle-centered, Quadrant II life-style.
The first-generation note pads and "to do" lists give us no more than a place to capture those things that
penetrate our awareness so we won't forget them. The second-generation appointment books and
calendars merely provide a place to record our future commitments so that we can be where we have
agreed to be at the appropriate time.
Even the third generation, with its vast array of planners and materials, focuses primarily on helping
people prioritize and plan their Quadrant I and III activities. Though many trainers and consultants
recognize the value of Quadrant II activities, the actual planning tools of the third generation do not
facilitate organizing and executing around them.
As each generation builds on those that have preceded it, the strengths and some of the tools of each
of the first three generations provide elemental material for the fourth. But there is an added need for
a new dimension, for the paradigm and the implementation that will empower us to move into
Quadrant II, to become principle-centered and to manage ourselves to do what is truly most important.
The Quadrant II Tool
The objective of Quadrant II management is to manage our lives effectively -- from a center of sound
principles, for 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
This is, admittedly, an ambitious objective for people caught in the thick of thin things in Quadrants
THE SEVEN HABITS OF HIGHLY EFFECTIVE PEOPLE Brought to you by FlyHeart
III and IV. But striving to achieve it will have a phenomenal impact on personal effectiveness.
A Quadrant II organizer will need to meet six important criteria.
Coherence: Coherence suggests that there is harmony, unity, and integrity between your vision
and mission, your roles and goals, your priorities and plans, and your desires and discipline. In your
planner, there should be a place for your personal mission statement so that you can constantly refer to
it. There also needs to be a place for your roles and for both short- and long-term goals.
Balance: Your tool should help you to keep balance in your life, to identify your various roles and
keep them right in front of you, so that you don't neglect important areas such as your health, your
family, professional preparation, or personal development.
Many people seem to think that success in one area can compensate for failure in other areas of life.
But can it really? Perhaps it can for a limited time in some areas. But can success in your profession
compensate for a broken marriage, ruined health, or weakness in personal character? True
effectiveness requires balance, and your tool needs to help you create and maintain it.
Quadrant II Focus:. You need a tool that encourages you, motivates you, actually helps you spend
the time you need in Quadrant II, so that you're dealing with prevention rather than prioritizing crises.
In my opinion, the best way to do this is to organize your life on a weekly basis. You can still adapt
and prioritize on a daily basis, but the fundamental thrust is organizing the week.
Organizing on a weekly basis provides much greater balance and context than daily planning.
There seems to be implicit cultural recognition of the week as a single, complete unit of time. Business,
education, and many other facets of society operate within the framework of the week, designating
certain days for focused investment and others for relaxation or inspiration. The basic Judeo-Christian
ethic honors the Sabbath, the one day out of every seven set aside for uplifting purposes.
Most people think in terms of weeks. But most third-generation planning tools focus on daily
planning. While they may help you prioritize your activities, they basically only help you organize
crises and busywork. The key is not to prioritize what's on your schedule, but to schedule your
priorities. And this can best be done in the context of the week.
A "People" Dimension: You also need a tool that deals with people, not just schedules. While you
can think in terms of efficiency in dealing with time, a principle-centered person thinks in terms of
effectiveness in dealing with people. There are times when principle-centered Quadrant II living
requires the subordination of schedules to people. Your tool needs to reflect that value, to facilitate
implementation rather than create guilt when a schedule is not followed.
Flexibility: Your planning tool should be your servant, never your master. Since it has to work
for you, it should be tailored to your style, your needs, your particular ways.
Portability: Your tool should also be portable, so that you can carry it with you most of the time.
You may want to review your personal mission statement while riding the bus. You may want to
measure the value of a new opportunity against something you already have planned. If your
organizer is portable, you will keep it with you so that important data is always within reach.
Since Quadrant II is the heart of effective self-management, you need a tool that moves you into
Quadrant II. My work with the fourth-generation concept has led to the creation of a tool specifically
designed according to the criteria listed above. But many good third-generation tools can easily be
adapted. Because the principles are sound, the practices or specific applications can vary from one
individual to the next.
Becoming a Quadrant II Self-Manager
Although my effort here is to teach principles, not practices, of effectiveness, I believe you can better
understand the principles and the empowering nature of the fourth generation if you actually
experience organizing a week from a principle-centered, Quadrant II base.
THE SEVEN HABITS OF HIGHLY EFFECTIVE PEOPLE Brought to you by FlyHeart
Quadrant II organizing involves four key activities.
Identifying Roles: The first task is to write down your key roles. If you haven't really given
serious thought to the roles in your life, you can write down what immediately comes to mind. You
have a role as an individual. You may want to list one or more roles as a family member -- a husband
or wife, mother or father, son or daughter, a member of the extended family of grandparents, aunts,
uncles, and cousins. You may want to list a few roles in your work, indicating different areas in which
you wish to invest time and energy on a regular basis. You may have roles in church or community
affairs.
You don't need to worry about defining the roles in a way that you will live with for the rest of your
life -- just consider the week and write down the areas you see yourself spending time in during the
next seven days.
Here are two examples of the way people might see their various roles.
1. Individual
2. Husband/Father
3. Manager New Products
4. Manager Research
5. Manager Staff Dev.
6. Manager Administration
7. Chairman United Way
1. Personal Development
2. Wife
3. Mother
4. Real Estate Salesperson
5. Sunday School Teacher
6. Symphony Board Member
Selecting Goals: The next step is to think of two or three important results you feel you should
accomplish in each role during the next seven days. These would be recorded as goals.
At least some of these goals should reflect Quadrant II activities. Ideally, these short-term goals
would be tied to the longer-term goals you have identified in conjunction with your personal mission
statement. But even if you haven't written your mission statement, you can get a feeling, a sense, of
what is important as you consider each of your roles and two or three goals for each role.
Scheduling: Now you look at the week ahead with your goals in mind and schedule time to
achieve them. For example, if your goal is to produce the first draft of your personal mission
statement, you may want to set aside a two-hour block of time on Sunday to work on it. Sunday (or
some other day of the week that is special to you, your faith, or your circumstances) is often the ideal
time to plan your more personally uplifting activities, including weekly organizing. It's a good time to
draw back, to see inspiration, to look at your life in the context of principles and values.
If you set a goal to become physically fit through exercise, you may want to set aside an hour three
or four days during the week, or possibly every day during the week, to accomplish that goal. There
are some goals that you may only be able to accomplish during business hours, or some that you can
only do on Saturday when your children are home. Can you begin to see some of the advantages of
organizing the week instead of the day?
Having identified roles and set goals, you can translate each goal to a specific day of the week, either
as a priority item or, even better, as a specific appointment. You can also check your annual or
monthly calendar for any appointments you may have previously made and evaluate their importance
in the context of your goals, transferring those you decide to keep to your schedule and making plans to
THE SEVEN HABITS OF HIGHLY EFFECTIVE PEOPLE Brought to you by FlyHeart
reschedule or cancel others.
As you study the following weekly worksheet, observe how each of the 19 most important, often
Quadrant II, goals has been scheduled or translated into a specific action plan. In addition, notice the
box labeled "Sharpen the Saw TM" that provides a place to plan vital renewing Quadrant II activities in
each of the four human dimensions that will be explained in Habit 7.
Even with time set aside to accomplish 19 important goals during the week, look at the amount of
remaining unscheduled space on the worksheet! As well as empowering you to Put First Things First,
Quadrant II weekly organizing gives you the freedom and the flexibility to handle unanticipated events,
to shift appointments if you need to, to savor relationships and interactions with others, to deeply enjoy
spontaneous experiences, knowing that you have proactively organized your week to accomplish key
goals in every area of your life.
Daily Adapting: With Quadrant II weekly organizing, daily planning becomes more a function of
daily adapting, or prioritizing activities and responding to unanticipated events, relationships, and
experiences in a meaningful way.
Taking a few minutes each morning to review your schedule can put you in touch with the
value-based decisions you made as you organized the week as well as unanticipated factors that may
have come up. As you overview the day, you can see that your roles and goals provide a natural
prioritization that grows out of your innate sense of balance. It is a softer, more right-brain
prioritization that ultimately comes out of your sense of personal mission.
You may still find that the third-generation A, B, C or 1, 2, 3 prioritization gives needed order to
daily activities. It would be a false dichotomy to say that activities are either important or they aren't.
They are obviously on a continuum, and some important activities are more important than others. In
the context of weekly organizing, third-generation prioritization gives order to daily focus.
But trying to prioritize activities before you even know how they relate to your sense of personal
mission and how they fit into the balance of your life is not effective. You may be prioritizing and
accomplishing things you don't want or need to be doing at all.
Can you begin to see the difference between organizing your week as a principle-centered,
Quadrant II manager and planning your days as an individual centered on something else? Can you
begin to sense the tremendous difference the Quadrant II focus would make in your current level of
effectiveness?
Having experienced the power of principle-centered Quadrant II organizing in my own life and
having seen it transform the lives of hundreds of other people, I am persuaded it makes a difference -- a
quantum positive difference. And the more completely weekly goals are tied into a wider framework
of correct principles and into a personal mission statement, the greater the increase in effectiveness will
be.

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Living It
Returning once more to the computer metaphor, if Habit 1 says "You're the programmer" and Habit
2 says "Write the program," then Habit 3 says "Run the program," "Live the program." And living it is
primarily a function of our independent will, our self-discipline, our integrity, and commitment -- not to
short-term goals and schedules or to the impulse of the moment, but to the correct principles and our
own deepest values, which give meaning and context to our goals, our schedules, and our lives.
As you go through your week, there will undoubtedly be times when your integrity will be placed
on the line. The popularity of reacting to the urgent but unimportant priorities of other people in
Quadrant III or the pleasure of escaping to Quadrant IV will threaten to overpower the important
Quadrant II activities you have planned. Your principle center, your self-awareness, and your
conscience can provide a high degree of intrinsic security, guidance, and wisdom to empower you to
THE SEVEN HABITS OF HIGHLY EFFECTIVE PEOPLE Brought to you by FlyHeart
use your independent will and maintain integrity to the truly important.
But because you aren't omniscient, you can't always know in advance what is truly important. As
carefully as you organize the week, these will be times when, as a principle-centered person, you will
need to subordinate your schedule to a higher value. Because you are principle-centered, you can do
that with an inner sense of peace.
At one point, one of my sons was deeply into scheduling and efficiency. One day he had a very
tight schedule, which included down-to-the-minute time allocations for every activity, including
picking up some books, washing his car, and "dropping" Carol, his girlfriend, among other things.
Everything went according to schedule until it came to Carol. They had been dating for a long
period of time, and he had finally come to the conclusion that a continued relationship would not work
out. So, congruent with his efficiency mode, he had scheduled a 10- to 15-minute telephone call to tell
her.
But the news was very traumatic to her. One-and-a-half hours later, he was still deeply involved in
a very intense conversation with her. Even then, the one visit was not enough. The situation was a
very frustrating experience for them both.
Again, you simply can't think efficiency with people. You think effectiveness with people and
efficiency with things. I've tried to be "efficient" with a disagreeing or disagreeable person and it
simply doesn't work. I've tried to give 10 minutes of "quality time" to a child or an employee to solve a
problem, only to discover such "efficiency" creates new problems and seldom resolves the deepest
concern.
I see many parents, particularly mothers with small children, often frustrated in their desire to
accomplish a lot because all they seem to do is meet the needs of little children all day. Remember,
frustration is a function of our expectations, and our expectations are often a reflection of the social
mirror rather than our own values and priorities.
But if you have Habit 2 deep inside your heart and mind, you have those higher values driving you.
You can subordinate your schedule to those values with integrity. You can adapt; you can be flexible.
You don't feel guilty when you don't meet your schedule or when you have to change it.
Advances of the Fourth Generation
One of the reasons why people resist using third-generation time management tools is because they
lose spontaneity; they become rigid and inflexible. They subordinate people to schedules because the
efficiency paradigm of the third generation of management is out of harmony with the principle that
people are more important than things.
The fourth-generation tool recognizes that principle. It also recognizes that the first person you
need to consider in terms of effectiveness rather than efficiency is yourself. It encourages you to spend
time in Quadrant II, to understand and center your life on principles, to give clear expression to the
purposes and values you want to direct your daily decisions. It helps you create balance in your life.
It helps you rise above the limitations of daily planning and organize and schedule in the context of the
week. And when a higher value conflicts with what you have planned, it empowers you to use your
self-awareness and your conscience to maintain integrity to the principles and purposes you have
determined are most important. Instead of using a road map, you're using a compass.
The fourth generation of self-management is more advanced than the third in five important ways.
First, it's principle-centered. More than giving lip service to Quadrant II, it creates the central
paradigm that empowers you to see your time in the context of what is really important and effective
Second, it's conscience-directed. It gives you the opportunity to organize your life to the best of
your ability in harmony with your deepest values. But it also gives you the freedom to peacefully
subordinate your schedule to higher values.
THE SEVEN HABITS OF HIGHLY EFFECTIVE PEOPLE Brought to you by FlyHeart
Third, it defines your unique mission, including values and long-term goals. This gives direction
and purpose to the way you spend each day.
Fourth, it helps you balance your life by identifying roles, and by setting goals and scheduling
activities in each key role every week.
And fifth, it gives greater context through weekly organizing (with daily adaptation as needed),
rising above the limiting perspective of a single day and putting you in touch with your deepest values
through review of your key roles.
The practical thread running through all five of these advances is a primary focus on relationships
and results and a secondary focus on time.
Delegation: Increasing P and PC
We accomplish all that we do through delegation -- either to time or to other people. If we
delegate to time, we think efficiency. If we delegate to other people, we think effectiveness.
Many people refuse to delegate to other people because they feel it takes too much time and effort
and they could do the job better themselves. But effectively delegating to others is perhaps the single
most powerful high-leverage activity there is.
Transferring responsibility to other skilled and trained people enables you to give your energies to
other high-leverage activities. Delegation means growth, both for individuals and for organizations.
The late J. C. Penney was quoted as saying that the wisest decision he ever made was to "let go" after
realizing that he couldn't do it all by himself any longer. That decision, made long ago, enabled the
development and growth of hundreds of stores and thousands of people.
Because delegation involves other people, it is a Public Victory and could well be included in Habit
4. But because we are focusing here on principles of personal management, and the ability to delegate
to others is the main difference between the role of manager and independent producer, I am
approaching delegation from the standpoint of your personal managerial skills.
A producer does whatever is necessary to accomplish desired results, to get the golden eggs. A
parent who washes the dishes, an architect who draws up blueprints, or a secretary who types
correspondence is a producer.
But when a person sets up and works with and through people and systems to produce golden eggs,
that person becomes a manager in the interdependent sense. A parent who delegates washing the
dishes to a child is a manager. An architect who heads a team of other architects is a manager. A
secretary who supervises other secretaries and office personnel is an office manager.
A producer can invest one hour of effort and produce one unit of results, assuming no loss of
efficiency.
A manager, on the other hand, can invest one hour of effort and produce 10 or 50 or 100 units
through effective delegation.
Management is essentially moving the fulcrum over, and the key to effective management is
delegation.
Gofer Delegation
There are basically two kinds of delegation: "gofer delegation" and "stewardship delegation." Gofer
delegation means "Go for this, go for that, do this, do that, and tell me when it's done." Most people
who are producers have a gofer delegation paradigm. Remember the machete wielders in the jungle?
They are the producers. They roll up their sleeves and get the job done. If they are given a position
of supervision or management, they still think like producers. They don't know how to set up a full
delegation so that another person is committed to achieve results. Because they are focused on
THE SEVEN HABITS OF HIGHLY EFFECTIVE PEOPLE Brought to you by FlyHeart
methods, they become responsible for the results.
I was involved in a gofer delegation once when our family went water skiing. My son, who is an
excellent skier, was in the water being pulled and I was driving the boat. I handed the camera to
Sandra and asked her to take some pictures.
At first, I told her to be selective in her picture taking because we didn't have much film left. Then I
realized she was unfamiliar with the camera, so I became a little more specific. I told her to be sure to
wait until the sun was ahead of the boat and until our son was jumping the wake or making a turn and
touching his elbow.
But the more I thought about our limited footage and her inexperience with the camera, the more
concerned I became. I finally said, "Look, Sandra, just push the button when I tell you. Okay? And
I spent the next few minutes yelling, "Take it! -- Take it! -- Don't take it! -- Don't take it!" I was afraid
that if I didn't direct her every move every second, it wouldn't be done right.
That was true gofer delegation, one-on-one supervision of methods. Many people consistently
delegate that way. But how much does it really accomplish? And how many people is it possible to
supervise or manage when you have to be involved in every move they make?
There's a much better way, a more effective way to delegate to other people. And it's based on a
paradigm of appreciation of the self-awareness, the imagination, the conscience, and the free will of
other people.

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Stewardship Delegation
Stewardship delegation is focused on results instead of methods. It gives people a choice of
method and makes them responsible for results. It takes more time in the beginning, but it's time well
invested. You can move the fulcrum over, you can increase your leverage, through stewardship
delegation.
Stewardship delegation involves clear, up-front mutual understanding and commitment regarding
expectations in five areas.
Desired Results: Create a clear, mutual understanding of what needs to be accomplished, focusing
on what, not how; results, not methods. Spend time. Be patient. Visualize the desired result.
Have the person see it, describe it, make out a quality statement of what the results will look like, and
by when they will be accomplished.
Guidelines: Identify the parameters within which the individual should operate. These should be
as few as possible to avoid methods delegation, but should include any formidable restrictions. You
won't want a person to think he had considerable latitude as long as he accomplished the objectives,
only to violate some long-standing traditional practice or value. That kills initiative and sends people
back to the gofer's creed: "Just tell me what you want me to do, and I'll do it."
If you know the failure paths of the job, identify them. Be honest and open -- tell a person where
the quicksand is and where the wild animals are. You don't want to have to reinvent the wheel every
day. Let people learn from your mistakes or the mistakes of others. Point out the potential failure
paths, what not to do, but don't tell them what to do. Keep the responsibility for results with them --
to do whatever is necessary within the guidelines.
Resources: Identify the human, financial, technical, or organizational resources the person can
draw on to accomplish the desired results.
Accountability: Set up the standards of performance that will be used in evaluating the results and
the specific times when reporting and evaluation will take place.
Consequences: Specify what will happen, both good and bad, as a result of the evaluation. This
could include such things as financial rewards, psychic rewards, different job assignments, and natural
consequences tied into the overall mission of an organization.
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Some years ago, I had an interesting experience in delegation with one of my sons. We were
having a family meeting, and we had our mission statement up on the wall to make sure our plans
were in harmony with our values. Everybody was there.
I set up a big blackboard and we wrote down our goals -- the key things we wanted to do -- and the
jobs that flowed out of those goals. Then I asked for volunteers to do the job.
"Who wants to pay the mortgage?" I asked. I noticed I was the only one with my hand up.
"Who wants to pay for the insurance? The food? The cars?" I seemed to have a real monopoly on
the opportunities.
"Who wants to feed the new baby?" There was more interest here, but my wife was the only one
with the right qualifications for the job.
As we went down the list, job by job, it was soon evident that Mom and Dad had more than
sixty-hour work weeks. With that paradigm in mind, some of the other jobs took on a more proper
perspective.
My seven-year-old son, Stephen, volunteered to take care of the yard. Before I actually gave him a
job, I began a thorough training process. I wanted him to have a clear picture in his mind of what a
well-cared-for yard was like, so I took him next door to our neighbor's.
"Look, son," I said. "See how our neighbor's yard is green and clean? That's what we're after: green
and clean. Now come look at our yard. See the mixed colors? That's not it; that's not green. Green
and clean is what we want. Now how you get it green is up to you. You're free to do it any way you
want, except paint it. But I'll tell you how I'd do it if it were up to me."
"How would you do it, Dad?"
"I'd turn on the sprinklers. But you may want to use buckets or a hose. It makes no difference to
me. All we care about is that the color is green. Okay?"
"Okay."
"Now let's talk about 'clean,' Son. Clean means no messes around -- no paper, strings, bones, sticks,
or anything that messes up the place. I'll tell you what let's do. Let's just clean up half of the yard
right now and look at the difference."
So we got out two paper sacks and picked up one side of the yard. "Now look at this side. Look
at the other side. See the difference? That's called clean."
"Wait!" he called. "I see some paper behind that bush!"
"Oh, good! I didn't notice that newspaper back there. You have good eyes, Son."
"Now before you decide whether or not you're going to take the job, let me tell you a few more
things. Because when you take the job, I don't do it anymore. It's your job. It's called a stewardship.
Stewardship means 'a job with a trust.' I trust you to do the job, to get it done. Now who's going to be
your boss?"
"You, Dad?"
"No, not me. You're the boss. You boss yourself. How do you like Mom and Dad nagging you
all the time?"
"I don't."
"We don't like doing it either. It sometimes causes a bad feeling doesn't it? So you boss yourself.
Now, guess who your helper is."
"Who?"
"I am," I said. "You boss me."
"I do?"
"That's right. But my time to help is limited. Sometimes I'm away. But when I'm here, you tell
me how I can help. I'll do anything you want me to do."
"Okay!"
"Now guess who judges you."
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"Who?"
"You judge yourself."
"I do?"
"That's right. Twice a week the two of us will walk around the yard and you can show me how it's
coming. How are you going to judge?"
"Green and clean."
"Right!"
I trained him with those two words for two weeks before I felt he was ready to take the job. Finally,
the big day came.
"Is it a deal, Son?"
"It's a deal."
"What's the job?"
"Green and clean."
"What's green?"
He looked at our yard, which was beginning to look better. Then he pointed next door. "That's
the color of his yard."
"What's clean?"
"No messes."
"Who's the boss?"
"I am."
"Who's your helper?"
"You are, when you have time."
"Who's the judge?"
"I am. We'll walk around two times a week and I can show you how it's coming."
"And what will we look for?"
"Green and clean."
At that time I didn't mention an allowance. But I wouldn't hesitate to attach an allowance to such a
stewardship.
Two weeks and two words. I thought he was ready.
It was Saturday. And he did nothing. Sunday...nothing. Monday...nothing. As I pulled out of
the driveway on my way to work on Tuesday, I looked at the yellow, cluttered yard and the hot July
sun on its way up. "Surely he'll do it today," I thought. I could rationalize Saturday because that was
the day we made the agreement. I could rationalize Sunday; Sunday was for other things. But I
couldn't rationalize Monday. And now it was Tuesday. Certainly he'd do it today. It was
summertime. What else did he have to do?
All day I could hardly wait to return home to see what happened. As I rounded the corner, I was
met with the same picture I left that morning. And there was my son at the park across the street
playing.
This was not acceptable. I was upset and disillusioned by his performance after two weeks of
training and all those commitments. We had a lot of effort, pride, and money invested in the yard and
I could see it going down the drain. Besides, my neighbor's yard was manicured and beautiful, and
the situation was beginning to get embarrassing.
I was ready to go back to gofer delegation. Son, you get over here and pick up this garbage right
now or else! I knew I could get the golden egg that way. But what about the goose? What would
happen to his internal commitment?
So I faked a smile and yelled across the street, "Hi, Son. How's it going?"
"Fine!" he returned.
"How's the yard coming?" I knew the minute I said it I had broken our agreement. That's not the
THE SEVEN HABITS OF HIGHLY EFFECTIVE PEOPLE Brought to you by FlyHeart
way we had set up an accounting. That's not what we had agreed.
"How's the yard coming?" I knew the minute I said it I had broken our agreement. That's not the
way we had set up an accounting. That's not what we had agreed.
So he felt justified in breaking it, too. "Fine, Dad."
I bit my tongue and waited until after dinner. Then I said, "Son, let's do as we agreed. Let's walk
around the yard together and you can show me how it's going in your stewardship."
As we started out the door, his chin began to quiver. Tears welled up in his eyes and, by the time
we got out to the middle of the yard, he was whimpering.
"It's so hard, Dad!"
What's so hard? I thought to myself. You haven't done a single thing! But I knew what was
hard -- self management, self-supervision. So I said, "Is there anything I can do to help?"
"Would you, Dad?" he sniffed
"What was our agreement?"
"You said you'd help me if you had time."
"I have time."
So he ran into the house and came back with two sacks. He handed me one. "Will you pick that
stuff up?" He pointed to the garbage from Saturday night's barbecue. "It makes me sick!"
So I did. I did exactly what he asked me to do. And that was when he signed the agreement in
his heart. It became his yard, his stewardship.
He only asked for help two or three more times that entire summer. He took care of that yard. He
kept it greener and cleaner than it had ever been under my stewardship. He even reprimanded his
brothers and sisters if they left so much as a gum wrapper on the lawn.
Trust is the highest form of human motivation. It brings out the very best in people. But it takes
time and patience, and it doesn't preclude the necessity to train and develop people so that their
competency can rise to the level of that trust.
I am convinced that if stewardship delegation is done correctly, both parties will benefit and
ultimately much more work will get done in much less time. I believe that a family that is well
organized, whose time has been spent effectively delegating on a one-to-one basis, can organize the
work so that everyone can do everything in about an hour a day. But that takes the internal capacity
to want to manage, not just produce. The focus is on effectiveness, not efficiency.
Certainly you can pick up that room better than a child, but the key is that you want to empower the
child to do it. It takes time. You have to get involved in the training and development. It takes time,
but how valuable that time is downstream! It saves you so much in the long run.
This approach involves an entirely new paradigm of delegation. In effect, it changes the nature of
the relationship: The steward becomes his own boss, governed by a conscience that contains the
commitment to agreed upon desired results. But it also releases his creative energies toward doing
whatever is necessary in harmony with correct principles to achieve those desired results.
The principles involved in stewardship delegation are correct and applicable to any kind of person
or situation. With immature people, you specify fewer desired results and more guidelines, identify
more resources, conduct more frequent accountability interviews, and apply more immediate
consequences. With more mature people, you have more challenging desired results, fewer guidelines,
less frequent accountability, and less measurable but more discernible criteria.
Effective delegation is perhaps the best indicator of effective management simply because it is so
basic to both personal and organizational growth.
The Quadrant II Paradigm
The key to effective management of self, or of others through delegation, is not in any technique or
THE SEVEN HABITS OF HIGHLY EFFECTIVE PEOPLE Brought to you by FlyHeart
tool or extrinsic factor. It is intrinsic -- in the Quadrant II paradigm that empowers you to see through
the lens of importance rather than urgency.
I have included in the Appendix an exercise called "A Quadrant II Day at the Office" which will
enable you to see in a business setting how powerfully this paradigm can impact your effectiveness.
As you work to develop a Quadrant II paradigm, you will increase your ability to organize and
execute every week of your life around your deepest priorities, to walk your talk. You will not be
dependent on any other person or thing for the effective management of your life.
Interestingly, every one of the Seven Habits is in Quadrant II. Every one deals with fundamentally
important things that, if done on a regular basis, would make a tremendous positive difference in our
lives.