From the best-selling book ‘The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People’ by popular and influential author Stephen R. Covey comes different principles that lead to effectiveness from high and satisfying work performance. Since the principles have been introduced, the human resources sector has never been the same again. Now, it has working principles and frameworks that serve as guidance for employees who strive to do better and increase productivity within and outside the workplace.
Focus should be given to the second principle for highly effective people, as structured under Covey’s highly publicized book. The principle advises people to ‘begin initiatives with the end result in mind’. You may readily infer that this assertion is intended to convince people to be results-oriented and at the same time be more productive. Looking further into the essence of the statement would definitely point to that direction.
This second habit of highly effective people is mainly based in a premise that initiatives can be divided into two groups: the first being those conceived on mind and the second being initiatives done through action. As such, many experts claim that numerous aggressive endeavors fail because of failure on the mindset. Thus, human resources personnel and corporate managements would always strive to set a mindset among employees and staff that would lead to attainment of targets and overall productivity.
The most convenient and effective measure on how to start initiatives with the end result in mind is to initially formulate a working personal mission statement. Such a statement would have a person set goals and formulate ways on how such targets would be attained. Such is a usual activity of highly organized people.
By setting a goal, you are becoming more proactive. You would eventually observe that you are becoming highly organized because your thoughts and ideals are more targeted to the attainment of goals, which you yourself or your boss may have set. By having a personal mission statement, you would notice that your own actions and mindset are regulated to take the direction that would lead to productivity and success.
When you set your goals and your targets, it is imperative that you identify a center of life where guidance, wisdom, security, power and inspiration could be sourced out. To find this on a personal level, you have to first know yourself and define your priorities in life. In doing so, you would find that yourself is centered on one specific factor, that can be about money, power, work, self, pleasure, possession, family, spouse or company. Knowing yourself well calls for knowing what your main priority and target is. To set a goal for your initiatives, it would significantly help if you would determine the center of your priorities.
Once you set your goal, you would find that you are smooth-sailing to doing endeavors and efforts that would clearly and obviously lead to attainment of such a target. Thus, Covey’s second principle is a necessity on a personal and management level. It is useful on a personal basis if you would use the principle to improve your performance and boost productivity. It is useful on the management level if your company is setting or imposing goals to give direction to your productivity and professional performance.