Customer Reviews

The 8th Habit: From Effectiveness to Greatness

5 star:		(18)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(7)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(5)

 

 

This is one of the most articulate compendiums on human/business relationships on the market today. Not the sugary feel-good hype but luminescent truths peppered with examples on how to achieve success in today's world by applying age-old human relationship laws with new laws born of the paradigm shift. Incomparable stuff - something for everyone. LOTS of info here - and with 13 CDs, it's not to be absorbed overnight.

BONUS! This set also comes with a DVD full of GREAT relevant "mini-movies"! Each movie set is wonderfully produced and qualifies as a top-notch corporate level teaching tool! In addition the family can enjoy it! This bonus DVD alone is worth the price of the 13 CD + 1 DVD set!

Highly recommended!

Asaad A. Abduljawad
The 8th habit book Summary

To achieve interdependence from a path of dependence to independence; one must find their voice first, and express that voice. Then they must inspire others to find theirs by focus and execution.

In order to understand ones personal pain and overcome it and to reach a level of satisfaction, one must understand the causation of the problem. With that said, they will be able to reach a solution to forget about the pain, and become more effective, productive, and contribute to his or her organization. The development of technology has not only changed the world, but it has also changed the way people think and operate where managers are programmed to function under the mindset of the industrial age. These managers control the employees of their organizations in a centralized fashion with lack of trust and anathematize the generality and especially the lower in chain of command personnel, their right of empowerment. These workers begin to loose their voice and identity, and feel they are not adding to the organization.

People rarely find their voice and do not realize the ability to contribute, and instead they spend their careers giving at a lower level. The first solution as the author states is "Discover your voice". Simply stated, each individual is born with traits of greatness gifted by God almighty. It is that individual's call to either use those unopened gifts or to loose them. A person could discover these traits and improve them by indulging deeply and hard dedicated work. These magnificent privileges include "The power and freedom of choice", which is explained in detail fourteen centuries ago. God almighty in the holy Qur'an revealed in the ninetieth (sura) the chapter of the city, the countryside verses 9-12 says: "We have given man kind and humans the means of knowledge and the faculties of thinking and understanding and opened up before him both the highways of virtue and vice: one way leads down to moral depravity, and it is an easy way pleasing for the self; the other way leads up to moral heights, which is steep like an uphill road, for scaling which man has to exercise self- restraint. It is man's weakness that he prefers slipping down into the abyss to scaling the cliff." Bottom line, no one can blame another for his or her own choices.

"Natural laws or principles", is the second gift. I would consider personally faith of a book (Islam, Christianity and Judaism.) one of the biggest gifts to humanity, which outlines laws, universal principles, and guidelines. These religions have fruitful teachings of fairness, respect, honesty, kindness, charity, contribution, and integrity. These Norms and values should be reposited in our conscience, and used in proper decision and choice making in one's daily life.

The third gift is "The four intelligences/ capacities of our nature". As Mr. Covey mentioned, mankind is made up of four parts of nature "Body, mind, heart, and spirit". Corresponding to these natures are four overlapping capacities that are touched daily listed respectively as following: "The Mental, physical, emotional, and spiritual intelligence." The highest manifestations of these capacities respectively are "discipline, vision, passion, and conscience". In order to express your voice more decisively and distinctively and to become an influential leader; at least the former three manifestations should be placed into actions. Vision the most important of the four manifestations brings upon the imagination, the future, and self-sense. Discipline, which is effectively willpower, which is an important trait to all successful people. It is accepting, implementing that imaginary visionary idea. Passion comes from the heart and it is the thing that excites human beings to reach for their desires. Conscience is the moral sense of what is right or wrong, the set of values that dictates the sense of fairness. Conscience encourages us to sacrifice to get to something valuable. Building our capacities in each of the above-mentioned four dimensions with the application of them makes us find and express our voices displaying personal leadership.

It is the Leaderships responsibility to inspire others, and for an organization to find its voice; leaders must fulfill four sequential and simultaneous roles: "Modeling, path finding, aligning and empowering". These four influential roles are characters of leaders everywhere. Modeling: It inspires trust without expecting it. The leader must be a good example. Leaders must buy into the culture of the corporate aligned within the organizations vision. Path finding: It creates order without asking for it. It is finding a strategy to move to, and a vision of where to be in the future. Aligning: It forms a spontaneous authority. It is the creation of a structure and the system to keep everybody on track. Empowering: Leaders give help and direction only when demanded in empowered organizations. It is all about execution.

The 8th habit is a combination of Knowledge, skill, and attitude. Leadership includes people's guidance becoming better. Path finding is the toughest of all since we have to deal with several personalities, issues, agendas, and levels of trust. Focusing tools that enhance path finding are creating a mission statement and a strategic plan.

Better execution incorporates aligning goals and systems and empowering others, which helps organizations to find their voices and to achieve greatness. Utilizing structures and systems is needed in organizations for reinforcement purposes. Empowerment on the other hand, is a model of trustworthy behavior. Empowered people do not need supervision, which inspires trust. When people are empowered they find their voice by doing the things they want. Their individual voices blend with the voices of the organization. This type of directed autonomy shifts the manager from a controller to an enabler. Empowered mission statements are produced when enough people are fully informed, and interact freely and trustfully.

The ability to work with a team must be achieved in order for a precedence to be set. Models are needed to show how they work and lead in different ways. Striving and encouraging others for personal excellence, while taking initiatives and doing the right thing without waiting for permission to do so. Avoiding criticism, negativity, and blaming others enhances working with others. The ability to be stable and constantly keeping to the same principles all of the time are factors that enhance trust. To be influential without authority, the leader must be trustworthy, which enables that leader to inspire others to find their voice. Building strong relations, understanding others point of views, and openness. I truly believe that loyalty and forgiveness all are tactics that enhances trust thus power to build focus.

This trust allows the leader to find alternatives, which is the best way to find a solution between two conflicts. This solution requires a new mindset, which creates synergy that addresses differences between ideologies. This solution should be better than proposals of other parties, and must be a simple satisfactory rule that is agreed upon. This "third alternative" is based on the Win-Win principle. Miscommunication is a stressful event. Communication on the other hand is the most important skill in dealing with others and to be an excellent leader one must be a good listener.

The other major source of trust is the trust within the organization. Organizational character and organizational competence are both required in building trust in an organization. Character is an important factor of trustworthiness. Character has three aspects "Integrity, maturity, and abundance mentality" Integrity is incorporating principles and natural law when dealing with others. Maturity is dealing with difficult issues with the ability to be compassionate at the same time. Abundance Mentality: is seeing life full of opportunities and not envying others for their success. Another important factor of personal trustworthiness is competence. Competence has three aspects and they are known as "Technical competence, conceptual knowledge, and interdependency." Technical competence is the knowledge and skill needed to finish a given task. Conceptual knowledge is the ability to imagine the macro picture. Interdependency is the thought of interconnectedness of everything in life. These principles are important basis to the design structures, systems, processes and personal values aligned with organizational values.

Aligning structures, systems, and processes and culture gives us the ability to realize our vision. Constant adjustments, and change to systems is a requirement to keep up with times keeping in mind to not change the universal principles. The 360-º or balance feedback system is one of the best alignment tools that can be used. This feedback is an informative tool to know if the organizational strategies are in line with its mission.


Asaad Abduljawad

Sometimes follow up efforts by authors are better than their first book and sometimes they're worse; author Stephan Covey's book titled - "The 8th Habit" - falls somewhere in between those two extremes. His seminal work "The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People" was a truly revolutionary work that significantly advanced the school of thought around personal development. Unfortunately, it's difficult to duplicate that success and 8th Habit falls short. The book centers on the premise that today's "Knowledge Worker" (not sure why the author gravitates toward such Orwellian descriptors) needs to find their own voice while helping others find theirs as well. Soundview likes that concept but wishes there was a stronger quantitative link to its claim that this 8th Habit is the catalyst for anyone or any organization seeking to jump from being effective to great. Additionally, there is a lot of discussion of the previous 7 habits to set the appropriate context of the 8th habit - which makes it a decent read if this is the first time you've been exposed to Covey's concepts, but a bit slow for those of us who read it the first time.

In a time when many people are feeling at a loss about the future - this author says the future lies in upbuilding the people around you.... good book. There were some parts that are better understood by students of Organizational Behavior and Business principles but otherwise it is well worth the time and money.

Except for the fact that I was laughing so hard when I opened the package and found out I ordered the miniature there is nothing wrong with this product. It is very small and easy to lose at this size (fits in your palm).

Just be aware. This is a very small mini book. It is not a large regular book. It is like a miniature pocket size.

Covey is not telling anything new in this little book. Everything written here is an abstract from his " 7 Habit..." book. Covey has shown the chart on page 68-69 on Whole person, Needs, Intelligence Capacities, Attributes and Voice is fully written in "7 Habits.." book also which was written twenty some years ago. I personally think I wasted my money in purchasing this book.

Covey says he worked a year to produce the Best-Selling 7 Habits of Effective People" and 5 years to produce the 8th Habit. I believe him. This book can change your life- it changed mine. One fine examplw: "Speak first to understand, then to be understood!" Many people handle this the opposite way - they clamor to be understood. Me too. Understanding the other guy is a much lower priority. And you? Covey will teach you what value there is in making this change.
The richness of this book is astounding - there are videos on a CD, ideas and processes which will take you to new and surprising understandings. My wife complains about the size of my bookcase. This is the best book in it.
Craig Jennings

A Zen master once said:"You go to University and spend time studying hundreds of books, we prefer to spend all our time studying one book to get all the essence out of it". If I had to choose one book that I would like to study again and again it would be this one.

If you have read and applied Stephen Covey's previous books, then don't expect the 8th Habit to be similar as it is very dense, so not as easy to apply. However I think it is the best success book I have ever read. Whilst First Things First and 7 habits are applicable to your daily life, this book is applicable to the world surrounding you: your community, your organization and your planet. It gives strategies for turning things around to success in a much more holistic way and it works!!
This book could be the subject of a PHD on changing the world and making organizations and communities successful.

Here is one area and example I chose where this book applies (and there are many others): Managing and Leading Corporations.
Today we are suffering either through lay offs or the dwindling of our savings from corporations run by CEOs bad at their jobs. Millions of people are suffering, including the CEOs and board members. Corporations over a hundred years old are disappearing. People are demotivated in the workplace, only 5% of their capacities is used and no amount of top down initiatives can motivate them. Nobody really wants this. So why is it happening? It could be that capitalism is made of creation and destruction. But what is key to survival then? Steven Covey's book in my opinion answers these questions. He gives the key to turning around corporations to success in a more effective way than 6 Sigma processes, big 5 consulting reorganizations and all the hypes that come and go. As I said the book is very dense, but here are some highlights:

- S. Covey explains the context: we have moved from an industrial era to a knowledge era. This changes the rules of how success is achieved.
- What is key now is people and leading them to get the best of them. We can no longer be lead by specialists in Finance and PR jobs who play lip service to employees. "Employees are on the forefront of our minds";
- S. Covey explains how to motivate people;
- S. Covey explains the importance of devising synergistic solutions. So many companies are run through silos. The objective of one department is defeating the objective of another.
- S. Covey outlines the importance of focus by limiting goals to 3 wildly important goals;
- S. Covey explains how you cannot change the laws of nature. Ethics is a cornerstone of his principles and again this is an area where too many companies just play lip service to. Ultimately whether Ethics is not applied or is just a PR job the company pays the price.

And so on...extremely powerful concepts. No amount of financial restructuring and marketing can make up for all these basic concepts.

This book is to be put in the hands of all CEOs (and those who hire them :)), Presidents and Leaders (and we are all leaders). More organizations should employ S. Covey's consulting services. S. Covey should create a research community that brings the edge to these corporations and devises of simple ways of rolling them out. The proof is in the pudding old tricks no longer work and in my opinion S. Covey has the secret.

I have to work at it in a bit by bit method to digest each of the concepts and practice what I preach is a lot harder and it only works if we do it that way.This is a life time of work list out for me to do.The High quality DVD also help me to understand by example, I have share that with everyone around me and I will show it again and again until we are all align with the basic principle and values.