7 Habits Of Highly Effective People Book Review & Summary: Best Book On Leadership
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When it comes to personal development, people tend to search for self-improvement books on the internet to learn and receive advice from the most successful individuals within their professional field.
In particular, The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People by Dr. Stephen Covey is considered the best book on leadership and personal development due to the fact that the author provides several principles and habits that people should learn to lead and motivate others.
Even though it was first published 25 years ago, it’s still relevant and widely read today by many CEOs, entrepreneurs, and others. It’s because the author provides the 7 most fundamental rich habits for personal development so that they can change their life behavior to be more successful.
In this post, we will dive deeper into “The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People: Powerful Lessons In Personal Change” to learn the author’s different principles and effective habits.
Let’s jump to the main important point of this content, which is to get familiar with the 7 habits and how those habits can help transform our lives.
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1. About the Author- Dr. Stephen Covey
Table of Contents
Stephen Covey was an entrepreneur, publish speaker, and especially super famous for his role as an author. One of the best-selling leadership books of all time is ” 7 habits of highly effective people”, the author wrote the book and first published back in 25 years ago.
This best leadership book has sold over 25 million copies worldwide and is still widely read by many leaders and managers in different industries.
In particular, after reading the first few pages, I witnessed there are many testimonials about this personal development and leadership book from famous and popular entrepreneurs and CEOs in fortune 500 companies
In addition, Dr. Stephen Covey was named one of the 2 5 most influential people in the world in 1996 by The Time Magazine ( read more in The New York Times).
2. Why 7 habits are important for personal development
It’s considered one of the best personal development and self-improvement books due to the fact that the author emphasizes the importance of character in ethical leadership, which allows individuals to effectively achieve greater success in life.
In addition, Stephen Covey’s principles of ” the 7 habits” are super important for the understanding of each individual’s identity, values, and visions, so that they can work toward building their leadership role in any organization.
In other words, this book on leadership is good for personal development and self-improvement and an ideal solution for those who want to develop their leadership skills and become influential leaders within their organizations.
Significantly, the seven habits will have a larger impact on the change of our life in terms of learning good and effective habits. Thus, it helps us become happier, more productive, and a better version of ourselves.
3. What are the 7 habits of highly effective people
In this section, we will take a deep analysis of the seven habits in more detail, so that we will have an opportunity to learn and implement those good habits in our daily lives.
In particular, the first three habits will mainly help with personal development called ” Private Victory”, which is the most important to change individual habits.
Thus, before you consider leading the team or becoming an entrepreneur, you must be able to learn and change your individual habits.
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Habit one: “Be Proactive”
The first good habit is being more proactive rather than staying in one spot and doing nothing. One of the great explanations in this book is the high level of ” self-awareness”. It is why we use our self-awareness to understand how we feel, such as angry or happy.
By recognizing our feeling, we will be able to understand our behavior and act accordingly based on our ethical values and professional attitude.
In addition, as a leader, you have to take responsibility for your behavior and attitude based on the ongoing actions, which will directly lead to the outcome you expect it.
Habit two: ” Begin With The End in Mind”
This habit number two, behalf the most important one in the ” Privacy Victory” because you have to set a clear vision and goals for yourself before taking action and working towards achieving those end goals.
For example, the book mentioned Bill Gates, the billionaire entrepreneur, and philanthropist, Bill Gates had clear goals and visions for his life after Microsoft, to build the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and help the world get rid of malaria.
For this reason, the most important step to achieving any goals is to create a “personal mission statement”, which helps you to understand what you want to achieve in the future and your ethical value.
Habit three: ” Put First Things First”
The next habit is to consider doing more important tasks than others, which you will prioritize as the most important thing to accomplish. In particular, you must use your time management skill to highlight the most important task and take action to complete the job, before doing another less important one.
It could be done after you implement habits one and two, which are to evaluate the situation and set your own goals, and this habit is a continue to take action by working day by day towards achieving those goals.
In addition, discipline and commitment are the two essential skills we must adopt to achieve what we want in life.
The ” Public Victory” is more focused on developing your leadership skills, in which you will have an opportunity to learn how to engage and interact with friends, colleagues, and others to develop a trusting relationship and mutual benefits.
Habit four: ” Think Win/ Win”
The first habit of dealing with the outside world is to ” Think Win/Win”, in this case, we have to create a mutual benefit for the involved parties.
Thinking win-win, not only helps to form a trusting relationship with other individuals but also can create opportunities to establish a business deal with them.
In particular, let’s say your business wants to find a solid supplier, which means both parties must agree based on mutual benefits, which will help establish a trusting relationship and keep the business going.
In case, there is a lose/lose, lose/win, or win/lose, then there is no trust between involved parties, and definitely, either party will not participate in the next business deal.
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Habit Five: Seek First to Understand, Then to be Understood”
This habit will emphasize more on the empathetic skill, which is considered one of the vital aspects to become an effective leader in your organization.
In particular, you must develop your communication skills in order to interact and engage with your team members, employees, or family members. It’s important to communicate to understand the overall situation before making an informed decision.
In addition, we seek first to understand by active listening and putting ourselves in others’ perspectives. For this reason, it allows us to see the overall picture of a situation and avoid making any biased decisions.
Habit Six: “Synergize”
The last habit in the ” public Victory” is “synergize”, which requires a leader must have excellent communication, and conflict resolution skills to unify every member of the team, family, or organization.
In addition, building great relationships with other team members and family members will create opportunities for enhancing cooperation and working together to achieve the overall long-term goals.
The author also highlights the importance of this habit for cooperating among team members to build the most driving force to achieve the end goal. This habit could be applicable in your family, classroom, business, and group work context.
For example, in the family, the husband and wife each have their strengths and weaknesses, and they can work together as a team by supporting each other. Thus, they are in a strong position to build a happy family.
Habit Seven: ” Sharpen the Saw”
The final one in the list of seven habits of highly effective people is sharpening the saw. This habit requires you to combine all the previous 6 habits, which allows you to slowly build your behavior and character to transform your life most effectively.
In particular, this habit is a combination of four main aspects of the person:
- Physical aspect
- Mental aspect
- Social/Emotional aspect
- And Spiritual aspect.
Conclusion of 7 habits of highly effective people
Even though this best book on leadership was first published back in 25 years ago, it’s still widely relevant to the modern study associated with personal development and leadership skills.
Whether you are an entrepreneur, student, or stay-at-home parent, I believe this book is a great resource to learn how to interact with others more cooperatively and build trusting relationships with friends, colleagues, and family members.
4. What are other leadership and self-improvement books by Dr. Stephen Covey
The following are other leadership and self-improvement books you could consider reading next:
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By Jiro Nguyen.
The content is only based on the author’s personal opinion and research experience. It is for informational purposes only and does not rely on as a comprehensive or substitute for professional advice.