The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People

them to read it?
People don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care.
Build a relationship of trust and openness based upon a character example
of trustworthiness and then share how the 7 Habits have helped you. Simply
let them see the 7 Habits in action through your life. Then, at the
appropriate time, you might invite them to participate in a training program
or share your book as a gift or teach some of the basic ideas when the
occasion calls for it.
What is your background and how did you come to write the 7 Habits?
It was implicitly understood that I would follow in my father’s footsteps
and go into the family business. However, I found that I enjoyed teaching
and training leaders even more than business. I became deeply interested
and involved in the human side of organizations when I was at Harvard
Business School. Later I taught business subjects at Brigham Young
University and did consulting, advising, and training on the side for several
years. During that time, I became interested in creating integrated lead- 
ership and management development programs around a sequential and
balanced set of principles. These eventually evolved into the 7 Habits and
then while applying it to organiza tions it evolved into the concept of
principle-centered leadership. I decided to leave the university and go full-
time into training executives from all different kinds of organizations. After
a year of following a very carefully developed curriculum came the
development of a business that has enabled us to take the mate rial to people
throughout the world.
What is your response to the people who claim to have the true formula for success?

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I would say two things. First, if what they are saying is based on principles
or natural laws, I want to learn from them and I com mend them. Second, I
would say we are probably using different words to describe the same basic
principles or natural laws.