Chapter 9 – Exercise 3
Read Douglas Ross’s article: “Applying Covey’s seven habits to a project management career” or another article that describes the seven habits. Summarize three of Covey’s habits in your own words and give examples of how these habits would apply to a project management (Schwalbe, p. 380).
The three habits that are going to be explained below are: Habit One – Be Proactive, Habit 3 – Put first things first and Habit 5 – Seek first to understand, then to be understood (Ross, 1996).
Habit One: Be Proactive
People need to be proactive to be successful in what they do, being proactive is the process of doing something before the event occurs converting a problem into positive opportunities that might be good to get some experience in the future.
It is about one step further that a person has to take; it is the action of taking the charge position and thinking: “what could go wrong if this or that happened?” The difference between proactive and reactive people is that proactive people focus their energy on productive actions that add values to what they do whilst reactive people are those who focus their attention on weakness of the others, problems of the environment and circumstances over which they have no control.
A good example of applying habit one in a real world is that a project manager among many things has to be a decisive person, good problem solver, team builder and above of all he must be proactive to add values to the project successfully.
Habit 3 – Put first things first
Habit 3 is about the development of a time management plan that helps people prioritize their time, in other words, it is the vision of beginning a project with the end in mind. It involves analysis, breakdown and sequencing of tasks and actions to be performed; it shows the importance of prioritizing tasks and it also explains that team members should spend more time doing things that are important but not urgent, such as, reading, planning and exercising, while project managers should spend more time working on building relationships, developing team member skills and project plans since these tasks contribute to the success and completion of the project.
This habit addresses mainly the importance of time management and since it is considered one of the most limited resources, once it is expended it can never be recovered. The project manager should have a clear understanding of the difference between important and urgent issues and it can be demonstrated into four quadrants:
- Quadrant 1: Important, Urgent
- Quadrant 2: Important, Not Urgent
- Quadrant 3: Not Important, Urgent
- Quadrant 4: Not Important, Not Urgent
Habit 3 also describes that a project manager should spend time on Quadrants 1 and 2 only because the time dedicated to Quadrant 2 decreases the number of high pressure, high-stress events that require project manager attention in Quadrant 1.
Habit 5 – Seek first to understand, then to be understood.
This habit describes the importance of active listening and emphatic listening, in other words, it is when a person listens to someone with the intention to interact effectively and understand what the speaker has to say; the relevant habits include listening carefully to organize and process the information to fully understand what the speaker says, but to understand other people, the listener has to learn how to focus on other people’s ideas first. It is very important that the speaker feels the response that he is being understood and that his ideas are being valued and considered. Active listening helps identify and determine the real requirements, needs and expectations of a client or team members.
When the step understanding is achieved, a person needs to seek to be understood by presenting and exposing his ideas clearly in a way that he increases the credibility of his ideas. This step is as important as seeking to understand.
For example, in a project, the project manager has to understand exactly what the client needs are (no matter who the client is, it could be an internal customer such as someone from some department or an outside customer, such as a supplier), make sure that he understood the requirements and analyse the project not to result in lost of revenue due to the failure of active listening.
References
Schwalbe, K., (2006) – Information Technology Project Management – Fourth Edition – Cambridge, MA: Course Technology/Thompson Learning
Ross, D., (1996) – Applying Covey's Seven Habits to a Project Management Career – Retrieved October 25, 2007 from http://www.welchco.com/02/14/01/60/96/04/0105.HTM
