First Things First

26 Mar 2022

Book	First Things First
Author	Stephen R. Covey
Published	July 14, 2015

Importance of production capacity (PC):

A significant part of effectiveness in any role is in the balance between developing and doing, between production (P) and increasing our production capability (PC). We see it in the executive who goes to a seminar to learn things that will help her be more effective in her business role. We see it in the teacher who spends part of his summer taking a class to improve his teaching skills. We see it in the mother or father who reads or takes classes to improve parenting skills. Looking at our lives as a whole, the P/PC balance involves renewal in all four dimensions on a regular basis. It’s taking time to exercise, to read, to connect with our deep inner life so that we increase the character and competence, the energy and wisdom we bring to every role in our lives.

Prioritizing requires a deep understanding of context or the bigger picture:

Priority is a function of context, or the “bigger picture” in which something occurs.

Schedule time to regularly organize your work:

Designate a specific time each week to do your Quadrant II organizing. Find a place that’s conducive to introspection and contemplation.

Principle-centered living means having character and a conscience:

The essence of principle-centered living is making the commitment to listen to and live by conscience. Why? Because of all the factors that influence us in the moment of choice, this is the factor that will always point to true north. This is the one that unerringly leads to quality-of-life results.

This is the essence of principle-centered living. It’s creating an open channel with that deep inner knowing and acting with integrity to it. It’s having the character and competence to listen to and live by your’ conscience.

Our relationships reflect our relationship with ourselves:

“People seem not to see,” said Emerson, “that their opinion of the world is also a confession of character.” One of the best ways to educate our heart is to look at our interaction with other people, because our relationships with others are fundamentally a reflection of our relationship with ourselves.

If it’s not a “hell yes”, then it’s probably a “no”:

Connect to mission empowers you to access the deep burning “yes!” created by the awareness of first things in your life, the “yes!” that generates passion and energy and makes it possible for you to say “no”—with confidence and peace—to the less important.

4 step process to putting “first things first”:

• “Review your roles” enables you to reconnect with the avenues through which you can do first things in a balanced, synergistic way
• “Identify your goals” empowers you to focus effectively on the most important thing you can do in each role each week to accomplish your mission. It enables you to put the “big rocks”—your important Quadrant II goals—in first, and to schedule other things around them. •
• “Exercise integrity in the moment” empowers you to pause in the space between stimulus and response and act with integrity to first things in any moment of choice in your life.
• “Evaluate” empowers you to turn your weeks into an upward spiral of learning and living. The shift is from doing more things in less time to doing first things in an effective, balanced, and synergistic way. It’s a holistic, integrated, and aligned approach to living, loving, learning, and leaving a legacy.

Transformational > transactional relationships:

Fourth-generation interdependence is not transactional; it’s transformational. It literally changes those who are party to it. It takes into consideration the full reality of the uniqueness and capacity of each individual and the rich, serendipitous potential of creating synergistic third alternatives that are far better than individuals could ever come up with on their own. Fourth-generation interdependence is the richness of relationships, the adventure of discovery, the spontaneity and deep fulfillment of putting people ahead of schedules, and the joy of creating together what did not exist before. It’s the ultimate “moving of the fulcrum”—the exponential increase of creativity, capacity, and production that comes from combining the energy and talents of many in synergistic ways.

Being successful is a product of interdependence, not independence:

Despite the obvious interdependent reality of quality of life, we tend to see “success” in terms of independent achievement. And the time management literature essentially reflects this independent achievement paradigm. In one way or another, most of the literature says “time is life,” but the skills and techniques have to do with management of “things.” People are seen primarily as resources through which we increase our leverage through delegation, or as interruptions to be handled efficiently so that we can stay on schedule. There’s a place for independence. In the space between stimulus and response, independence is having the strength of character to transcend scripting, the social mirror, and other influences that would keep us from a principle-centered response to life. But, as well as a place, there’s a purpose for this independence. It’s not an end in itself. True independence precedes and prepares us for effective interdependence. It’s the personal trustworthiness that makes trust possible. There’s also a role for independence when we’re dealing with “things,” and here is where we find great value in the time management literature. It’s filled with excellent, high-leverage ideas and techniques for the management of “things.” But people aren’t things. When we’re dealing with people, we’re dealing with living, breathing human beings who have their own space between stimulus and response. They also have human endowments and an incredible capacity to act within that space. And a good percentage of our time is spent interacting in this interdependent reality.

Our work and personal lives are inextricably linked:

Life Is One Indivisible Whole

As we mentioned earlier, Gandhi once observed that “a person cannot do right in one department of life whilst attempting to do wrong in another department. Life is one indivisible whole.” An associate shared this story: At one time I worked for a large aerospace company. I was part of a key marketing team whose assignment was to prepare “executive summary” presentation materials to help sell multibillion-dollar defense programs and products. One day a new member of the team was hired and introduced. We could tell by the way management rolled out the red carpet that he was considered a prized recruit. He was very bright and came with ten years of related experience in the industry. He was appointed team leader on the company’s most important new business proposal. I was assigned to work with him and to occupy the open office space next to his. As work progressed on the project, I soon came to know this person very well. Because of our close proximity, I could overhear all of his telephone calls and conversations. These calls began to reveal a very sordid and disorganized private life. Aware that I was picking up signals, he would explain away the calls and then say, “But this won’t affect my work. ” He repeated that line day after day. As the intense proposal effort peaked, the hours and pressure at work doubled. Now, in the pressure cooker, the private life of this team leader had its ugly effects. Working on little sleep and peace, he became impossible to work with—short-tempered, unreasonable, argumentative, imbalanced. It affected everyone. In spite of his considerable knowledge, he became an obstacle to the project and was fired, only six months after he was brought on with such high expectations. We may think we’re fooling others. We may even be fooling ourselves. But if we’re duplicitous or dishonest in any role, it affects every role in our lives.

Be trustworthy to build trust:

Trust is the glue of life. It’s the most essential ingredient in effective communication. It’s the foundational principle that holds all relationships—marriages, families, and organizations of every kind—together. And trust grows out of trustworthiness.

Leadership > management. Effectiveness > efficiency. Vision > method.

As you look through the lens of the interdependent reality, consider these questions: Is it more important to get the job done efficiently … or to take the time to empower an employee or a child to do it, both now and in the future? Which choice will have greater impact on the quality of your time, the time of others, the time of the organization? Is it more important to spend time supervising and controlling others, or to release the tremendous creative potential in others so that they govern themselves? Is it more important to schedule your time to efficiently solve the problems created by conflicting expectations … or to take the time to work with others and clarify expectations up front? Is it more important to spend time trying to solve problems created by lack of communication, or to build the relationships that make effective communication possible? The fourth generation is a “people” paradigm. More than the efficient, mechanical management of “things,” it’s focused on effective, synergistic interaction with people. The difference between the focus on people and things represents one of the deepest underlying differences between the third and fourth generations. In the third generation, the focus is on managing and controlling. It relegates people to the status of things. People finally become efficient even with themselves in organizing, planning, prioritizing, disciplining, and controlling. But the fourth-generation paradigm is people first, things second. It’s leadership first, management second. It’s effectiveness first, efficiency second. It’s purpose first, structure second. It’s vision first, method second.

Lack of vision results in an “high urgency” rather than “high importance” culture:

Several years ago, I was asked to come into the big R&D facility of a large international firm to help them create a Quadrant II culture. The assumption was that I would do some analysis, and then work with the director of the division to create a series of custom training workshops that would accomplish this objective. In the process, I visited in the offices of several of the management and staff. As I was escorted from one office to another, I became increasingly intrigued to see the identical scene over and-over again. In each office, a somewhat frazzled man or woman—one hand on the phone, another on the computer, desk literally piled with papers—would look up and say, “Just a minute! I’ll be right with you!” After hurriedly completing some task or phone conversation, the person would sigh, take a quick look at the clock, and push papers aside long enough to tell me how incredibly busy they were and how there was literally more to do than could possibly be done. Between offices, people rushed down the halls. There was a sense of gushing energy and panic everywhere. Finally, I went back to the director of the division and said, “These people don’t want a Quadrant II environment. I suggest we not do it. ” She said, “What do you mean?” I said, “These people love urgency. They’re out there trying to convince each other and themselves that they have more to do than anybody else. This is where they’re getting their security. Urgency dominates the culture. I suspect that the real problem is that nobody really knows what the priorities are. ” She sighed. “That’s right. There’s a big power struggle between the vice-presidents in terms of what R&D is supposed to do. Each one has a following. Frankly, we’re at odds with each other. There’s not a clear set of signals. We don’t know how long it’s going to last, but one of these days things are going to come unglued. ” These people were trying to keep some sense of security and identity in the organization by being frantically busy. The underlying paradigm was: “When the showdown comes and heads start to roll, I’m the last person they’ll get rid of because I’m the busiest, most hardworking person around here and everybody knows it. ” Soon after that experience, there was a big shake-up in the organization and quite a few people lost their jobs. Before their reorganization, we could have taught traditional time management till we were blue in the face and it wouldn’t have created the Quadrant II culture they desired. The core problem was a lack of shared vision.

High-performance companies spend significantly more time doing things that are important, but not urgent—and significantly less time doing things that are urgent but not important. The principal reason behind these differences, in most cases, is in the degree of clarity about what is important.

Levels of initiative:

Adapted from William Oncken’s work are the following six levels of initiative:

• Wait until told -Ask
• Recommend
• Act and report immediately
• Act and report periodically
• Act on own

An agreement might contain different levels of initiative for different functions. A secretary could be at level three in handling correspondence or responding to staff problems and level five in dealing with visitors and incoming calls. Levels of initiative can change as capability and trust increase. A three-year-old child who waits until he’s told to clean his room will hopefully progress to level five by the time he’s ten or twelve. The important thing is to match the level of initiative with the capacity of the individual.

High trust culture leads to horizontal relationships/ flat structures and internally motivated people:

What if we all lived and worked in cultures with shared vision and stewardship agreements, where win-win was a way of interacting? What difference would it make? Consider supervision. In a low-trust culture, supervision is associated with words like control, monitor, hover over, and check up. In a high-trust culture, people supervise themselves according to the agreement. The criteria are clear, the consequences are set. There’s common understanding of what’s expected. A manager, leader, or parent becomes a source of help—a facilitator, helper, cheerleader, advisor, counselor, and coach—someone to remove the oil spills and then get out of the way.

In a low-trust culture, you’re into “the great jackass theory of motivation”—the carrot out in front, the stick behind. In a high-trust culture, people are internally motivated. They’re fueled by the fire within. They’re driven by a sense of passion about fulfilling a shared vision that’s also a co-mission, a synergy between their own mission and the mission of the family or organization.

Work on the system, not in it (see “E-Myth Revisited”):

This reiterates another important difference between management and leadership. While management works in the system, leadership works on the system.

Leader > manager > producer:

A CEO of one organization asked people to give feedback based on two questions. These questions were designed around the idea that we spend our time in three different roles: producer (doing things necessary to produce desired results), manager (setting up and working with people in systems) or leader (providing vision and direction and building a complementary team based on mutual respect). He asked people to indicate by the size of the letters P, M, and L where they felt he spent most of his time. He then asked them to represent how they felt he should be spending his time.

Leadership and empowerment:

“Accomplishing tasks through people” is a different paradigm than “building people through the accomplishment of tasks.” With one, you get things done. With the other, you get them done with far greater creativity, synergy, and effectiveness . . . and in the process, you build the capacity to do more in the future as well.

Things come up all the time where independent decisions need to be made. As a manager, I want these people to be fully functioning, empowered human beings, using their best judgment to create their job as they go along. I know that’s the way to get their hearts and not just their hands. The agreement we have is that if they make a mistake, it’s my fault. But if they make it again, it’s their fault. They’re covered to make an empowered decision.

See “the system”, not the isolated event:

Where others see isolated events, you see systems.

It’s all about courage. Be courageous, be self-reliant, be the best.

Discouragement is literally discouragement—a lack of courage. Discouragement is the antithesis of everything we’ve talked about. It comes as a result of building our lives on illusion instead of principle, of facing the consequences of climbing ladders against wrong walls.

Courage, on the other hand, comes as a result of knowing there are principles, of fulfilling our needs and capacities in a balanced way, of having clear vision, balance between roles, the ability to set and achieve meaningful goals, the perspective to transcend the urgency of the moment, the character and competence to act with integrity in the moment of choice, the abundance mentality to function effectively and synergistically in the interdependent reality. Courage comes from the heart, and being in touch with the heart creates hope.

Don’t be seduced by the good; go for the best. Go for that which represents your unique contribution.

As Emerson said: Nothing can bring you peace but yourself. Nothing can bring you peace but the triumph of principles.