In 1989, Stephen Covey wrote his best seller, The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People. These habits aren't new or revolutionary — they're clarifications and reiterations of rock-solid principles in a format that's easily to understand (if still hard to accomplish). But if agents follow the seven habits discussed in this article by Al Diamond, they'll assure their long-term personal and business success.
That is a pretty strong statement, isn't it? But, if we put up a sign that read “Gold Here! Dig approximately 250 feet to reach it! Free shovels,” most people wouldn't take us up on the offer. Why? Because they're not certain that they'll achieve the goal if they perform the task. The task involves hard work that has no short cut. And they lack faith!
As in this example, the “Seven Habits” aren't easy to accomplish. They also require a high level of faith because, while they can be accepted as the right things to do, they're also foreign to contrary habits that many of us have built through all of our adult lifetimes. Even if our existing habits are counterproductive, they're comfortable because we saw our predecessors and mentors manage their personal and business lives through them. We know that losing weight, getting regular exercise, and stopping smoking will extend our lives. So why don't we all simply change our habits?
Obviously, it's not as easy as that. There has to be a payoff that we believe will occur if we change. That's where faith comes in. No, we can't guarantee that cessation of smoking, controlling diet, and exercising will keep us from getting hit by a truck and dying prematurely. Nor can we guarantee that applying the “Seven Habits” to your life will make you instantly or consistently successful in everything that you try. But each one of us has a conscience — a mental controller — that tells us when we're doing something right or something wrong. That's the good feeling that you get when you know that what you did was right, regardless of the outcome.
It's also the guilt pang that you feel when you do something that you know isn't right. Conscience is rarely wrong. And applying the “Seven Habits” will always feel right. Win or lose, short term or long, Covey's synopsis of the principles that should rule your work and personal lives are the right things to do.
PERSONAL PRINCIPLES
Covey first suggests that we must address ourselves from the inside out before dealing with others. These internal principles strengthen us as individuals, as well as agency owners and managers.
1. Be Proactive
How often have we heard agents bemoaning their situations by pointing out the faults in everyone and everything, except in themselves? “It's the companies … the economy … the regulators … disloyal customers … the weather conditions … the direct writers … the banks … the unmotivated employees (fill in the blanks) that are causing all of my problems. I'm only reacting to these influences and trying to stay in business.”
But if these reasons are real and not excuses, why are successful agents and agencies out there growing and profiting?
The answer is that some agents are reactive while others choose to respond to the same stimuli in proactive ways. If you find yourself reacting to reduced commissions and revenues by cutting back on staff and marketing and sales costs, how can you expect to ever grow again? We have never seen a company shrink to greatness. Have you?
However, some agents create Strategic Plans to attack the problem in different ways. They create new sales initiatives to replace lost income. Does this imply some risk? Certainly! But there's absolutely no risk in shrinking to adjust for decreasing income; it's simply a slower way to oblivion.
2. Begin with the End in Mind
Napoleon Hill wasn't the first person to say, “Whatever man can perceive and believe, he can achieve.” Covey restates this principle by speaking of two creations, mental and physical. In the business world, what you want to accomplish defines the leadership necessary to create the mental goals. How you accomplish those goals is the management function of the physical efforts needed to achieve your desired end points. Pointing again to the Strategic Planning model, the agency's Mission and Vision are the “mental” goals that define what needs to be done to achieve business success. The Strategies and Annual Objectives are your second creations, the physical activities necessary to accomplish the larger goals.
Many agents forego the planning process in favor of directed activities that they hope will result in profit and growth. However, they haven't determined their own definition of success. Nor have they created a yardstick against which they can measure their results. These agents define being busy with being productive. These agents have set out to travel without a specific goal or a road map. Their definition of success is measured by their odometer. “Are we moving forward,” they ask? But they don't know what direction they're going and don't even take the time to put gas in the car. Eventually, they'll run out of fuel and have to determine whether where they ended was a satisfactory end point. Usually, it isn't.
Covey's principle of beginning with the end in mind reflects the need for both a personal and business Mission Statement to solidify one's definition of success in the long term.
3. Put First Things First
Covey's third habit can be reduced to the principle of doing the most important things first. Much of our time as agents is spent taking care of routine matters or crises. In the long run, neither is productive. Yes, we need to deal with routine matters. And we can't avoid some crises. But, Covey points out that the most productive use of our time is to accomplish those tasks that are not urgent, but important. Planning, not reacting, is important. Prevention, not repair, is important. Building relationships, not counseling to determine why they aren't working, is important.
Of course, some important things are urgent as well. However, many of our customers and employees try to manipulate us with the “squeaky wheel” ploy. If they squeak often enough and loud enough, they figure that we'll have to take care of them. For some people, this is the only way they feel they can get anything done. But many of those crises, although urgent, are less important than some other issues — such as marketing our largest account to avoid undue competition, or evaluating and thanking our strong performers for their continued support. In reality, however, many of these important tasks in our business (and in our personal) lives languish while we spend our day fighting fires that others light to get us to react to them.
This principle tells us to evaluate our choices and do what's important, not necessarily what's easiest or most urgent.
PUBLIC PRINCIPLES
Only after we conquer ourselves can we be expected to maximize our interaction with others. After implementing the first three Habits, Covey discloses the three Habits that will make your interactions with others far more valuable and effective for you and for your friends and business associates.
4. Win/Win
Others can't trust you until you can prove yourself trustworthy. Your integrity (the value you place on yourself) is the building block of your character. An abundance mentality is the feeling that there's enough for everyone, that life is not a win/lose proposition. Balancing your own feelings and convictions with courage and consideration for the feelings of others is the key to maturity. And these three characteristics — Integrity, Abundance Mentality, and Maturity — empower you to consider all relationships in a Win/Win scenario. If anyone loses, the solution is not acceptable. Once your employees, clients, companies, family, and friends understand that you can be trusted to seek Win/Win solutions, they'll be far more likely to cooperate with you. The key to this principle is to follow the guideline that a Win/Win scenario is the only acceptable one: Win/Win or Don't Play.
5. Seek to Understand Before Being Understood
This is the habit of communications. Too many of us spend all of our time explaining ourselves to others so that they can understand us! We rarely take the time to listen in order to understand the other guy's point of view before setting them straight and telling them how things really are! In fact, the other guy is trying just as hard to get his point across and isn't listening to you, either. Do you know what you have when two such communicators get together? A war!
Covey exhorts us to listen empathetically, not selectively. Your goal is not just to hear the other point of view, but to understand this point of view well enough to radiate it back to the speaker. When they acknowledge that you understand them (and not before), you can state your point of view, seeking their empathetic attention so that they can understand you, as well.
Learning this habit alone could double our effectiveness as businesspeople. What would happen if you really understood your clients' (and prospects') points of view before trying to sell them on yours? Do you think that you might be able to respond better to their needs?
6. Synergize
In a compromise, each side gives up a little in order to solve a problem. This, by definition, is a Lose/Lose scenario, since each participant needs to give up something. In a compromise, 1 + 1 = 1 ½. Synergy combines the Win/Win and Communication principles and applies them to business and personal life so that 1 + 1 = a minimum of 3. Because neither side expects to give up anything — and since they understand each other's points of view — a synergistic answer will always challenge them to solve a problem creatively, in ways previously unexplored. Brainstorming a solution to a difficult coverage question or challenging ourselves to grow in new ways are synergistic exercises that take the place of dictatorial styles of management in which the “boss” evaluates his choices and makes a decision, to which everyone is expected to live.
7. Sharpen the Saw
Covey's final principle is a constant commitment to balance our lives. We've all seen people burn out on work. Many of us have heard of well-to-do people who commit suicide because they indulged in too much of a good thing and lost the meaning of their lives. Our industry is rife with workaholics who work 24 hours a day, then play at golf as if it, too, was work. Covey asks us to stop and investigate our lives weekly to determine if we're preserving and enhancing our greatest asset: Ourselves. He suggests that we challenge ourselves to balance our spiritual, physical, mental, and social/emotional selves each week. This exercise permits us to continue to pursue the other six habits and to become the most effective people possible.
Stephen Covey's works should be a part of every manager's library. We strongly recommend that you purchase them, beginning with the Seven Habits . If you pursue this set of principles, your lives will never be the same again.