Habits to be more productive by Stephen R. Covey

Arnaud Weiss

5 minute read

I am generally very skeptical of American self-development literature. Most of the books are pushing open doors or simply recycling existing concepts. Some of them are nevertheless nuggets. Either because they propose an innovative approach (e.g., the "self-development" approach), or because they are based on the "self-development" approach: Never Split the Difference), or because they summarize the state of the art in a field (Ex: The charisma myth).

In a previous article, I summarized the two leading books on habits. They enlighten us on the colossal impact of our routines, which constitute 40% of our actions. The authors also give us the keys to change our bad habits and build new ones.
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But one question remains after these two readings: what habits should we introduce into our daily lives? This is the question that this series of articles answers. To begin with, I went back to a classic: The 7 habits of highly effective people by Stephen R. Covey. With 30 million copies sold and the most listened to audio book in the United States, this book has largely inspired modern management theories.

In this article, discover Covey's habits:

Be proactive, not reactive
Defining your personal constitution
Prioritize with the urgent / important matrix
Be cooperative
Understanding the other

What does proactivity mean? It has become a classic concept in management literature. The French Academy gives us an effective definition:

The term proactivity describes a person who takes control of his or her life and refuses to be directed by external events.

For Stephen R. Covey, the first step towards proactivity is to always take full responsibility for a given situation. This means refusing to blame others, circumstances, or to make excuses. We are solely responsible for our failures from which we must learn, but also for our successes.

Reactive language 😑	Proactive language 🚀
There's nothing I can do about it	Look at all the possible solutions
I am what I am	I can choose a different approach
It makes me sick	I control my emotions
They will not allow it	I can realize a convincing presentation

An illustration through language of this paradigm shift, taken from the book

The second step towards proactivity is emotional maturity. According to Stephen R. Covey, proactivity is also about choosing your reaction to events, good or bad. He quotes Eleanor Roosevelt: "No one can hurt you without your consent".

Faced with a professional setback or a personal failure, the idea is not only to take full responsibility for the situation but also to choose one's emotional reaction. Rather than feeling mechanically bad, or being reactive, it is better to control one's response.

This idea is not new. It is the cornerstone of Stoic philosophy, founded in Athens in the early third century BC. It consists of "accepting the moment as it comes, not allowing oneself to be controlled by the desire for pleasure or the fear of pain, using one's mind to understand the world and to do one's part in nature's plan, working with others and treating them fairly and justly." Stoic authors such as Seneca, Epictetus and Marcus Aurelius have had a profound impact on my intellectual development and I can only invite you to read their works.

‍The third step towards proactivity is to take initiatives to achieve our goals. "I am the sole captain of my ship". You will not become a brilliant musician, a great sportsman, an accomplished executive, by letting yourself be lulled by the course of things.

Success means getting out of your comfort zone. In The Black Swan, statistician and former trader Nicholas Taleb explains that our lives are heavily impacted by the unpredictable. It is therefore necessary to create as many situations as possible in which unexpected opportunities can arise. You have to provoke luck, so to speak!
In summary, proactivity consists of holding oneself solely responsible for one's situation, choosing one's emotional state independently of the circumstances, and refusing passivity by taking initiatives to achieve one's objectives.

For Comey, it is important to formalize two elements:

The principles that should guide our actions (e.g. never lie)
Our personal and professional goals (e.g. to become a university teacher)

They are the two components of a powerful engine to guide our actions and build our character. It is a compass that shows us north at all times. This section of the book inspired Simon Sinek's famous "Start with the why" (link).

The author proposes a tool for formalizing your principles and objectives: writing your mission statement. This summarizes what you want to be (your principles that constitute your character) and do (your objectives, your contributions to the world). I have been doing this for several years now, here is an extract from my personal constitution which I update every year :

If you have trouble defining your personal constitution, Covey suggests the following thought experiment. Close your eyes and imagine your funeral as realistically as possible. Your loved ones speak. What qualities, what accomplishments would you like them to highlight at this time?

‍Regarding goals, there is a broad scientific consensus (link) that they are important for success and happiness. Without them, it is easy to get carried away by the hustle and bustle of daily life. Goals allow :

To motivate oneself
Clearly define the steps and actions to reach the target
To measure its progress

‍For Covey, the principle of self-constitution must also be applied at the level of an organization. This practice marks the difference between leadership and management. Management focuses on the how, on the operational. Leadership, on the other hand, focuses on the macro vision and the why.
‍The second habit is to formalize your principles and life goals and to refer to them constantly as a compass.

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‍Once we have an unwavering course, how do we achieve our ambitions? For Comey, self-discipline is at the heart of our success. This discipline involves learning to prioritize your tasks, and doing the critical ones first, even if you don't like them.

‍In The common denominator of success, Albert E. M. Gray studies the common denominators of successful people in their field. His conclusion can be summarized in one sentence:

Successful people have a habit of doing the unpleasant tasks that those who fail refuse to do. Their displeasure is subordinated by their discipline to their desire to achieve their goal.

‍For Comey, there are three stages of organization that lead to different levels of effectiveness :

Level 0, the to-do list
The to-do list, which incorporates a temporal notion. Each task is assigned a time limit.
An urgent/important matrix. This is the only way to prioritize correctly

Eisenhower matrix
Urgent and Important : Deal with it	Not Urgent but Important : Plan
- Tasks that need immediate attention	- Long-term goals and strategic planning
- Deadlines and crises	- Relationship building
- Pressing problems	- Personal growth and development
Urgent but Not Important : Delegate	Not Urgent and Not Important : Delete/Cancel
- Interruptions and distractions	- Time-wasting activities
- Some emails and phone calls	- Trivia and busywork
- Some meetings	- Social media and entertainment

The author invites us to allocate no more than a quarter of our time to urgent and important tasks, and the remaining three quarters to those that are only important. The underlying idea is to manage our stress level and to dedicate most of our time to strategic tasks. ‍

Other good practices suggested by Comey for effective prioritization:

Proactively prepare and plan your week to ensure that you dedicate sufficient energy to the projects that are critical to your success.
At the end of the week, measure retrospectively the time spent on the different work sites. What were the results?
Delegate. This is difficult at the beginning, but essential in order to grow a team and focus on the tasks where we have the most impact.

For Stephen Covey, in Western society, the competitive paradigm prevails over the cooperative paradigm. This mentality has its roots in the educational system. In school, we are always compared to others, rather than assessed on our progress or potential. At university, the overall grade (A, B+...) is calculated according to our position in the class of students.

This mentality also dominates our professional and personal lives. We often experience the victories of others as a threat, as they may overshadow us. Or worse, as a failure, with the fruits of that success now unavailable to us.

The author then proposes to adopt a cooperative posture and to always seek to achieve win-win situations. He is convinced that in the long term, a cooperative approach brings more benefits than a competitive approach, both personally and professionally. But how can this be done in practice?

First of all, it is necessary to get rid of what the author calls the scarcity mindset. This is the belief that there is a fixed volume of opportunities. Every successful person in a project reduces the remaining opportunities for me. This mentality makes it hard for us to be genuinely happy for others when they succeed. But it also makes us reluctant to share the fruits of collective labor, to want to stand alone in the spotlight.

Personally, I find this mentality very present in the entrepreneurial world. Many founders are bitter about seeing others succeed. But having successful peers means more opportunities: they can give you advice, access to their network, etc. Many studies have shown that having successful people around us increases our own chances of success.

Stephen Covey invites us to counter this mentality and to adopt a spirit of abundance. There is enough opportunity for everyone, and the successes of others do not threaten us, on the contrary.
The second step consists, in our interpersonal relationships, in seeking an optimum where everyone wins (win-win), rather than wanting to crush the other(win-lose). Or even worse, since we can't win, we can lead to a negative spiral in which everyone loses (lose-lose). In this cooperative logic, both parties are satisfied with the outcome of the negotiation.
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Finally, when a mutually satisfactory agreement is not possible, it is best to withdraw and accept the no deal. This is also recommended by Chris Voss, the FBI's chief negotiator (see our article on his negotiation techniques).

Think about your personal relationships, your interactions with your team. Do you have a spirit of abundance? Are you in a win-win mentality, with the right conditions for this to be the case?

When a colleague or friend comes to us for advice or support, we often already have an answer in mind before we have even listened. Selfishly, we don't wait for them to finish speaking before sharing our reading of the situation and our recommendations.

Covey's fifth habit invites us to make the effort to really listen to our interlocutors before speaking. We must seek to understand deeply their feelings, their point of view, through empathetic listening. To do this we must learn to listen.
First of all, by showing the other person that our attention is devoted to them, through body language. Don't let your mind wander or look at your phone.

Secondly, by leaving aside our prejudices, our own reading of the situation. We often project our needs and feelings onto others, without considering that they are very different from our own. This is what Covey calls "listening autobiographically". Often, when a person comes for advice, they really just need to be listened to without judgment in order to solve their own problem.

This sincere effort to understand the other party creates the conditions for a win-win resolution. A counterparty that feels understood will be more likely to collaborate on a solution that is favorable to both parties.