In an earlier post, I referred to Eli Goldratt’s proposed six-step process to stand on the shoulders of giants, which includes “Get on the giant’s shoulders. Gain the historical perspective – understand the giant’s solution better than he did.”
So, what did Dr Covey say about principles? A lot. And he shared his thoughts in his many books:
The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People: 30th Anniversary Edition
The 8th Habit: From Effectiveness to Greatness
The Leader in Me: How Schools Around the World Are Inspiring Greatness, One Child at a Time
Predictable Results in Unpredictable Times
The 3rd Alternative: Solving Life’s Most Difficult Problems
Great Work Great Career: Interactive Edition
Those close to Dr Stephen R Covey also remain close to principles:
The SPEED of Trust: The One Thing That Changes Everything
The 4 Disciplines of Execution: Achieving Your Wildly Important Goals
Smart Trust: Creating Prosperity, Energy, and Joy in a Low-Trust World
Management Mess to Leadership Success: 30 Challenges to Become the Leader You Would Follow
Everyone Deserves a Great Manager: The 6 Critical Practices for Leading a Team
Other authors have also written about principles:
Principles: Life and Work
The Leader’s Checklist Expanded Edition: 15 Mission-Critical Principles – who I think fell into the trap of naming good guidelines principles. Either way, these are good guidelines but not fundamental principles of human effectiveness.
The following is a list of principles mentioned in the referenced books. The list is crude because it conveys the list with minimal filtering and thought:
- Renewal is the principle—and the process—that empowers us to move on an upward spiral of growth and change, of continuous improvement
- The principle that all things are created twice There’s a mental or first creation, and a physical or second creation, to all things
- Private Victory precedes Public Victory Self-mastery and self-discipline are the foundation of good relationships with others
- The idea that we are embryonic and can grow and develop and release more and more potential, develop more and more talents
- P/PC Balance – The PC principle is to always treat your employees exactly as you want them to treat your best customers
- Principle of making what is important to the other person as important to you as the other person is to you
- Understand nature’s practical lessons – No pain no gain – Push one’s limits to gain strength
- Agree on the desired results, guidelines, resources, accountability and consequences
- Frankel – Proactivity: Between stimulus and response, man has the freedom to choose
- Pareto Principle—80 percent of the results flow out of 20 percent of the activities
- The dominant, central theme of their activities, the underlying principle, is love
- When the priorities receive the first energy, there is energy to do the priorities
- Synergy – the principle of the whole being greater than the sum of its parts
- Evolving is life’s greatest accomplishment and its greatest reward
- You can’t talk yourself out if a problem you behave yourself into
- Delegation – Hold people accountable for results not methods
- Cooperation and long-term personal and interpersonal growth
- The process of releasing potential and developing talents
- You always reap what you sow – see the law of the harvest
- An agreement must be win-win or it will end up lose-lose
- One cannot wholly focus on more than one thing at a time
- The principle that people are more important than things
- Look to nature to learn how reality works – Grow or die
- Vision tells you what is important – where to focus
- You are accountable for the results of your actions
- Radically open-minded and radically transparent
- Seek first to understand, then to be understood
- You can’t have trust without being trustworthy
- Temperance – moderation and self-restraint
- Look at the machine from the higher level
- Weigh second and third order consequences
- A Rock-Solid Interpersonal Relationship
- It takes discipline to act consistently
- You are responsible for you own actions
- Actions are more important than words
- Separate the people from the problem
- Insist on using objective criteria
- Focus on interests, not positions
- Commitment is required to finish
- Invent options for mutual gain
- The Principle of Contribution
- Agreement on Success Factors
- Pain + reflection = Progress
- The Principle of Reputation
- You can take the initiative
- You must use your resources
- The Principle of Alignment
- It takes energy to focus
- Principle of the harvest
- Clarity of Expectations
- You choose your actions
- Continuous improvement
- Integrity – self-unity
- A Culture of Feedback
- A Foundation of Trust
- Extending Smart Trust
- Making a contribution
- Proportional response
- Quality or excellence
- Mutual understanding
- Principle of process
- Purpose gives energy
- You are accountable
- Be a hyperrealist
- Live and let live
- Own your outcomes
- Win-Win principle
- Resourcefulness
- Self-discipline
- Accountability
- Mutual benefit
- Prioritization
- Responsibility
- Encouragement
- Human dignity
- Consistency
- Flexibility
- Commitment
- Creativity
- Discipline
- Engagement
- Generosity
- Initiative
- Nurturance
- Abundance
- Diversity
- Integrity
- Potential
- Fairness
- Humility
- Kindness
- Leverage
- Patience
- Balance
- Charity
- Courage
- Dignity
- Empathy
- Honesty
- Justice
- Purpose
- Quality
- Respect
- Service
- Choice
- Equity
- Growth
- Vision
- Focus
- Trust
- Truth
Congratulations! You scrolled all the way down here.
Again – the list of principles above is true and good. I maintain that it is useful to look for fundamental principles:
Fundamental principles express what people are or have and serve as the foundation for a chain of reasoning to support human effectiveness.
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