The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People

Powerful Lessons in Personal Change

By: Stephen R. Covey

Narrated by: Stephen R. Covey

*New York Times bestseller—over 40 million copies sold*
*The #1 Most Influential Business Book of the Twentieth Century*

One of the most inspiring and impactful books ever written, The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People has captivated readers for nearly three decades. It has transformed the lives of presidents and CEOs, educators and parents—millions of people of all ages and occupations. Now, this 30th anniversary edition of the timeless classic commemorates the wisdom of the 7 Habits with modern additions from Sean Covey.

The 7 Habits have become famous and are integrated into everyday thinking by millions and millions of people. Why? Because they work!

With Sean Covey’s added takeaways on how the habits can be used in our modern age, the wisdom of the 7 Habits will be refreshed for a new generation of leaders.

They include:
Habit 1: Be Proactive
Habit 2: Begin with the End in Mind
Habit 3: Put First Things First
Habit 4: Think Win/Win
Habit 5: Seek First to Understand, Then to Be Understood
Habit 6: Synergize
Habit 7: Sharpen the Saw

This beloved classic presents a principle-centered approach for solving both personal and professional problems. With penetrating insights and practical anecdotes, Stephen R. Covey reveals a step-by-step pathway for living with fairness, integrity, honesty, and human dignity—principles that give us the security to adapt to change and the wisdom and power to take advantage of the opportunities that change creates.© and (P)2004 FranklinCovey

I did not expect to like this book

I really did not expect to like this book. I generally find the self help genre weak and I expected this title to be one more christian based positive thinking book. There is a tiny bit of faith-based stuff in the afterward, but it strives to be any-god-will-do. Mostly it is detailed, ordered, steps to, over time, improve your effectiveness.

The Seven Habits (plus the new eighth one) are:
Be Pro-Active, Set Goals, Prioritize, Think Win-Win, Listen, Synergize, Maintain, & Inspire
This list seems a bit trite, but the author takes care to build each concept upon another. It is more realistic than most self-help books and does not promise a quick fix, or riches, or power, it instead suggests an effective pattern for somewhat steady improvement. This system goes beyond having a "open mindset" to having an "abundance mindset". This does not mean an abundance of stuff, but noticing that many situations are not zero-sum, and that win-win net-positive situations are often, if not almost always, possible.

Of course doing all the things the author suggests is non-trivial, but they are generally good suggestions for making progress once you are committed to change.

The writing and narration is quite clear, folksy, and pleasant, and far from the exuberance of some books in this genre. Some may find the folksiness a bit slow and boring, try speeding it up.

BTW - some reviews mention chapter ordering issues that seem to have been fixed.

Great Content & Horrible Voice for Audiobook

I don't mean to be rude or anything but Mr. Covey doesn't have the voice that you want to hear when you are driving, his voice makes me fall asleep. His voice made an amazing book a terrible audiobook. The book itself has beneficial information and so much to learn from. But It's so hard to pay attention to what he is saying because of how he reads it!!! I wish he would hire someone to read the book instead of him reading. If you find this book read by someone else please download that version. I struggled to finish this book, it's boring.
Please do us a favor and hire Bahmi Turpin or Marguerite Gavin to read this book.

excellent

As good as it gets, a must read is here presented as a great listen... thus allowing us all to more conveniently return to this classic self-help book for a reminder on how to be more effective.

Excellent!

I'm going to apply this to all aspects of my life!

I listened twice.

So many great points, lessons, and principles. You cannot catch them all in one go. I plan to review it often through the year to remind myself of the seven (7) habits. Life lessons, dealing with dictator type bosses, self improvement & more! You will not be disappointed.