The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People

The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People, published in 1990, is a self-help book written by Stephen Covey. It lists seven behaviors that, if established as habits, are supposed to help a person achieve "effectiveness" by aligning him- or herself to what Covey calls "true north"; principles of a character ethic that, unlike values, he believes to be universal.

The book was enormously popular, and catapulted Covey into lucrative public-speaking appearances and workshops. He has also written a number of sequels and spinoffs, such as Power of the Seven Habits; Seven Habits of Highly Effective Families; and Beyond the Seven Habits.

Covey has been criticized, for example by adherents of orthodox Christian creeds, for covertly promoting doctrines of Mormonism as well as New Age psychology that is poorly founded in scientific fact.

A chapter is dedicated to each of the habits, which are represented by the following imperatives:

1. Be Proactive. Here, Covey recommends an attitude of initiative-taking and compares this to the less effective, but more common "reactive" stance.
2. Begin with the End in Mind. This chapter is about setting long-term goals based on "true-north principles". Covey recommends to formulate a "personal mission statement" to document one's perception of one's own purpose in life. He sees visualization as an important tool to develop this. He also deals with organizational mission statements, which he claims to be more effective if developed and supported by all members of an organization, rather than being prescribed.
3. Put First Things First. Here, Covey describes a framework for prioritizing work that is aimed at long-term goals, at the expense of tasks that appear to be urgent, but are in fact less important. Delegation is presented as an important part of time management. Successful delegation, according to Covey, focuses on results and benchmarks that are to be agreed in advance, rather than on prescribing detailed work plans.
4. Think Win-Win describes an attitude whereby solutions are sought that benefit oneself as well as others, or, in the case of a conflict, people on both sides of that conflict.
5. Seek First to Understand, Then to be Understood. Covey warns that giving out advice before having understood a person and their situation will likely result in the advice being rejected. Thoroughly listening to another person's concerns is purported to increase the chance of establishing a working communication.
6. Synergize describes a way of working in teams. It is purported that, when this is pursued as a habit, the result of the team work will exceed the sum of what each of the members could have achieved on their own.
7. Sharpen the saw focuses on regaining what Covey calls productive capacity by engaging in carefully selected recreational activities.

The first three "habits" intend to take a person from dependence to independence, or one's ability to do things for oneself. Adopting the second three is supposed to lead to interdependence, the ability to align one's needs and desires with those of other people and create effective relationships. The last habit encompasses all of the others.

A sequel to the Seven Habits is The 8th Habit: From Effectiveness to Greatness publlished in 2004 ISBN 0684846659

Links

Seven Habits Study Guide (http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Seven_Habits_Study_Guide) on WikiBooks (http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Main_Page)