Principles of Personal Management

 Things which matter most must never be at the mercy of things which matter least --Goeth * * Will you take just a moment and write down a short answer to the following two questions? Your answers will be important to you as you begin work on Habit 3. Question 1: What one thing could you do (you aren't doing now) that if you did on a regular basis, would make a tremendous positive difference in your personal life? Question 2: What one thing in your business or professional life would bring similar results? We'll come back to these answers later. But first, let's put Habit 3 in perspective Habit 3 is the personal fruit, the practical fulfillment of Habits 1 and 2. Habit 1 says, "You're the creator. You are in charge." It's based on the four unique human endowments of imagination, conscience, independent will, and particularly, selfawareness. It empowers you to say, "That's an unhealthy program I've been given from my childhood, from my social mirror. I don't like that ineffective script. I can change." Habit 2 is the first or mental creation. It's based on imagination -- the ability to envision, to see the potential, to create with our minds what we cannot at present see without eyes; and conscience -- the ability to detect our own uniqueness and the personal, moral, and ethical guidelines within which we can most happily fulfill it. It's the deep contact with our basic paradigms and values and the vision of what we can become. Habit 3, then, is the second creation -- the physical creation. It's the fulfillment, the actualization, the natural emergence of Habits 1 and 2. It's the exercise of independent will toward becoming principle-centered. It's the day-in, day-out, moment-by-moment doing it. Habits 1 and 2 are absolutely essential and prerequisite to Habit 3. You can't become principle-centered without first being aware of and developing your own proactive nature. You can't become principle-centered without first being aware of your paradigms and understanding how to shift them and align them with principles. You can't become principle-centered without a vision of and a focus on the unique contribution that is yours to make. But with that foundation, you can become principle-centered, day-in and day-out, moment-by-moment, by living Habit 3 -- by practicing effective self-management. 91 Management, remember, is clearly different from leadership. Leadership is primarily a high-powered, right-brain activity. It's more of an art; it's based on a philosophy. You have to ask the ultimate questions of life when you're dealing with personal leadership issues. But once you have dealt with those issues, once you have resolved them, you then have to manage yourself effectively to create a life congruent with your answers. The ability to manage well doesn't make much difference if you're not even in the "right jungle." But if you are in the right jungle, it makes all the difference. In fact, the ability to manage well determines the quality and even the existence of the second creation. Management is the breaking down, the analysis, the sequencing, the specific application, the time-bound leftbrain aspect of effective self-government. My own maxim of personal effectiveness is this: Manage from the left; lead from the right. The Power of Independent Will In addition to self-awareness, imagination, and conscience, it is the fourth human endowment -- independent will -- that really makes effective self-management possible. It is the ability to make decisions and choices and to act in accordance with them. It is the ability to act rather than to be acted upon, to proactively carry out the program we have developed through the other three endowments. The human will is an amazing thing. Time after time, it has triumphed against unbelievable odds. The Helen Kellers of this world give dramatic evidence to the value, the power of the independent will. But as we examine this endowment in the context of effective self-management, we realize it's usually not the dramatic, the visible, the once-in-a-lifetime, up-by-thebootstraps effort that brings enduring success. Empowerment comes from the learning how to use this great endowment in the decisions we make every day. The degree to which we have developed our independent will in our everyday lives is measured by our personal integrity. Integrity is, fundamentally, the value we place on ourselves. It's our ability to make and keep commitments to ourselves, to "walk our talk." It's honor with self, a fundamental part of the character ethic, the essence of proactive growth. Effective management is putting first things first. While leadership decides what "first things" are, it is management that puts them first, day-by-day, moment-by-moment. Management is discipline, carrying it out. Discipline derives from disciple -- disciple to a philosophy, disciple to a set of principles, disciple to a set of values, disciple to an overriding purpose, to a superordinate goal or a person who represents that goal. In other words, if you are an effective manager of your self, your discipline comes from within; it is a function of your independent will. You are a disciple, a follower, of your own deep values and their source. And you have the will, the integrity, to subordinate your feelings, your impulses, your moods to those values. One of my favorite essays is "The Common Denominator of Success," written by E. M. Gray. He spent his life searching for the one denominator that all successful people share. He found it wasn't hard work, good luck, or astute human relations, though those were 92 all important. The one factor that seemed to transcend all the rest embodies the essence of Habit 3: Putting First Things First. "The successful person has the habit of doing the things failures don't like to do," he observed. "They don't like doing them either necessarily. But their disliking is subordinated to the strength of their purpose." That subordination requires a purpose, a mission, a Habit 2 clear sense of direction and value, a burning "Yes!" inside that makes it possible to say "no" to other things. It also requires independent will, the power to do something when you don't want to do it, to be a function of your values rather than a function of the impulse or desire of any given moment. It's the power to act with integrity to your proactive first creation.