Stephen Covey People Quotations

Both times I was in India, I could not get people to listen to each other. I had to literally tell people to listen to each other and tell them that they can't get creative and find alternate solutions if they don't listen to each other. There's a lot of arguing and justifying.

It's amazing how confused and distracted and misdirected so many people are.

Outsourcing is inevitable, and I don't think it's necessarily treating people like things.

Instead, I have an abundance mentality: When people are genuinely happy at the successes of others, the pie gets larger.

Employers and business leaders need people who can think for themselves - who can take initiative and be the solution to problems.

Reactive people... are often affected by their physical environment. They find external sources to blame for their behavior.

Despite all our gains in technology, product innovation and world markets, most people are not thriving in the organizations they work for.

Most people are basically a victim of the circumstances of their life. They have things like 9/11, they have terrorism threats, they have new war threats, they have economy problems, and they think, 'What can I do? I'm basically a victim.'

We accomplish all that we do through delegation - either to time or to other people.

Effective people stay out of Quadrants III and IV because, urgent or not, they aren't important. They also shrink Quadrant I down to size by spending more time in Quadrant II...Quadrant II is the heart of effective personal management.

We may find it convenient to live with the illusion that circumstances or other people are responsible for the quality of our lives, but the reality is that we are responsible-response-able-for our choices.

Leadership is communicating people's worth and potential so clearly that they come to see it themselves.

...churchgoing is not synonymous with personal spirituality. There are some people who get so busy in church worship and projects that they become insensitive to the pressing human needs that sourround them, contradicting the very precepts they profess to believe deeply.

I know it is possible not only to restore trust but to actually enhance it. The difficult things that we got through with the important people in our lives can become fertile ground for the growth of enduring trust - trust that is actually stronger because it's been tested and proved through challenge.

Proactive people carry their own weather with them.

Interdependence is a choice only independent people can make

I don't read blogs but occasionally people tell me about what they contain, and I do take questions that come from blogs.

I am senting many books for endorsement purposes, which enables me to stay relevant in my own field, and I have people that help me decide which ones I should read and endorse.

I am fortunate to have a very helpful team that enables me to spend time doing things that are important but not necessarily urgent. People who have no such team need to also make these larger decisions so that they can cheerfully say No to that which is urgent but not important.

People are social beings and want interaction and social learning is the primary form of learning, just as word of mouth advertising is the highest form of advertising.

Listen, involve, synergize at work. Then you will bury the old and create an entirely new winning culture which will unleash people's talents and create complementary teams where strengths are made productive and weakness are made irrelevant through the strengths of others.

All things are created twice. There is a mental (first) creation, and a physical (second) creation. The physical creation follows the mental, just as a building follows a blueprint. If you don't make a conscious effort to visualize who you are and what you want in life, then you empower other people and circumstances to shape you and your life by default.

If two people have the same opinion, one is unnecessary. ... I don't want to talk, to communicate, with someone who agrees with me; I want to communicate with you because you see it differently. I value that difference.

Most people do not listen with the intent to understand; they listen with the intent to reply. They're either speaking or preparing to speak. They're filtering everything through their own paradigms, reading their autobiography into other people's lives.

It's not what people do to us that hurts us. In the most fundamental sense, it is our chosen response to what they do to us that hurts us.

Look at the word responsibility-"response-ability"-the ability to choose your response. Highly proactive people recognize that responsibility. They do not blame circumstances, conditions, or conditioning for their behavior. Their behavior is a product of their own conscious choice, based on values, rather than a product of their conditions, based on feeling.

Ineffective people live day after day with unused potential. They experience synergy only in small, peripheral ways in their lives. But creative experiences can be produced regularly, consistently, almost daily in people's lives. It requires enormous personal security and openness and a spirit of adventure.

We hear a lot about identity theft when someone takes your wallet and pretends to be you and uses your credit cards. But the more serious identity theft is to get swallowed up in other people's definition of you.

Most people think of leadership as a position and therefore don't see themselves as leaders.

Don't cheat people of their growth. Empower them to solve problems and generate ideas. Watch them grow!

When the trust is high, you get the trust dividend. Investors invest in brands people trust. Consumers buy more from companies they trust, they spend more with companies they trust, they recommend companies they trust, and they give companies they trust the benefit of the doubt when things go wrong.

People are your most valuable asset. Only people can be made to appreciate in value.

We can never really change someone; people must change themselves.

..people are working harder than ever, but because they lack clarity and vision, they aren’t getting very far. They, in essence, are pushing a rope...with all of their might.

Most people struggle with life balance simply because they haven't paid the price to decide what is really important to them.

The more deeply you understand other people, the more you will appreciate them, the more reverent you will feel about them. To touch the soul of another human being is to walk on holy ground.

Two people can see the same thing, disagree, and yet both be right. It's not logical; it's psychological.

Always surround yourself with people who are even more talented and competent than you.

Some people achieve the top of the ladder and only then realise it was standing against the wrong wall.

Petty things become unimportant when people are impassioned about a purpose higher than self.

It is one thing to make a mistake, and quite another thing not to admit it. People will forgive mistakes, because mistakes are usually of the mind, mistakes of judgment. But people will not easily forgive the mistakes of the heart, the ill intention, the bad motives, the prideful justifying cover-up of the first mistake.

You can't be successful with other people if you haven't paid the price of success with yourself.

Start small, make a promise and keep it. Then, make larger promises and keep them. Eventually, your honor will become greater than your moods or your circumstances, which includes your medical condition and other people's stereotypic observations. Once you overcome this comparison based mentality, your confidence will soar.

Trust is the highest form of human motivation. It brings out the very best in people. But it takes time and patience.

I teach people how to treat me by what I will allow.

People who exercise their embryonic freedom day after day, little by little, expand that freedom. People who do not will find that it withers until they are literally 'being lived.' They are acting out scripts written by parents, associates, and society.

The personal power that comes from principle-centered living is the power of a self-aware, knowledgeable, proactive individual, unrestricted by the attitudes, behaviors, and actions of others or by many of the circumstances and environmental influences that limit other people.

As you care less about what people think of you, you will care more about what others think of themselves.

Don't argue for other people's weaknesses. Don't argue for your own. When you make a mistake, admit it, correct it, and learn from it / immediately.

Ineffective people live day after day with unused potential.

The ability to subordinate an impulse to a value is the essence of the proactive person. Reactive people are driven by feelings, by circumstances, by conditions, by their environment. Proactive people are driven by values - carefully thought about, selected and internalized values.

People behave more on the basis of how they feel than how they think; unless there are good feelings between people, it is almost impossible to reason intelligently.

Involve people in the problem and work out the solution together.

Most people say their main fault is a lack of discipline. On deeper thought, I believe this is not the case. The basic problem is that their priorities have not become deeply planted in their hearts and minds.

We must not let the actions or words of others determine our responses. Magnanimous people make the choice to respond to the indignities of others based upon their own principles and their own value system rather than their moods or anger.

Interdependent people combine their own efforts with the efforts of others to achieve their greatest success.

Empathy takes time, and efficiency is for things, not people.

If you're proactive, you don't have to wait for circumstances or other people to create perspective expanding experiences. You can consciously create your own.

Lose/Win people bury a lot of feelings. And unexpressed feelings come forth later in uglier ways. Psychosomatic illnesses often are the reincarnation of cumulative resentment, deep disappointment and disillusionment repressed by the Lose/Win mentality. Disproportionate rage or anger, overreaction to minor provocation, and cynicism are other embodiments of suppressed emotion. People who are constantly repressing, not transcending feelings toward a higher meaning find that it affects the quality of their relationships with others.

Effective people are not problem-minded; they're opportunity minded. They feed opportunities and starve problems.

Empathic listening takes time, but it doesn't take anywhere near as much time as it takes to back up and correct misunderstandings when you're already miles down the road; to redo; to live with unexpressed and unsolved problems; to deal with the results of not giving people psychological air.

People can't live with change if there's not a changeless core inside them.

Network marketing has come of age. It's undeniable that it has become a way to entrepreneurship and independence for millions of people

The more people train their counsciousness, the more sensitivie they are to it. It's like you had your own voice coming to you.

People don't listen to understand. They listen to reply. The collective monologue is everyone talking and no one listening.

Principle-centered people are constantly educated by their experiences.

What we are communicates far more eloquently than anything we say or do. There are people we trust because we know their character. Whether they're eloquent or not, whether they have human-relations techniques or not, we trust them and work with them.

Our lives are the results of our choices. To blame and accuse other people, the environment, or other extrinsic factors is to choose to empower those things to control us.

It is extremely ironic that the more we care about what people think about us the less we care about people, and the less we care about what people think about us the more we begin to care for others

Contrary to what most people believe, trust is not some soft, illusive quality that you either have or you don't; rather, trust is a pragmatic, tangible, actionable asset that you can create.

Highly proactive people don't blame circumstances, conditions, or conditioning for their behavior. Their behavior is a product of their own conscious choice.

Unless people feel that they are accepted and that they have a right to express their feelings without fear of embarrassment or ridicule, all they will do is react and rebel and struggle for their identity.

Everyone has values; even criminal gangs have values. Values govern people's behavior but principles govern the consequences of those behaviors.

Highly effective people tend to be proactive. They decide to find a better job or to have better health, rather than of responding to whatever curves life throws at them.

Being proactive is more than taking initiative. It is recognizing that we are responsible for our own choices and have the freedom to choose based on principles and values rather than on moods or condition. Proactive people are agents of change and choose not to be victims, to be reactive, or to blame others.

You think effectiveness with people and efficiency with things.

When people seriously undertake to identify what really matters most to them in their lives, what they really want to be and do, they become very reverent. They start to think in larger terms than today and tomorrow.

You are dependent if you allow the weaknesses of other people to ruin your emotional life!

In our personal lives, if we do not develop our own self-awareness and become responsible for first creations, we empower other people and circumstances to shape our lives by default.

To blame and accuse other people, is to choose to empower them, to control us.

When people have a real sense of legacy, a sense of mattering, a sense of contribution, it seems to tap into the deepest part of their heart and soul. It brings out the best and subordinates the rest.

The fire inside people is like a match; the way to ignite that flame is initially through friction, then other matches are lit through warmth.

Whether we are aware of it or not, whether we are in control of it or not, there is a first creation to every part of our lives. We are either the second creation of our own proactive design, or we are the second creation of other people's agendas, of circumstances, or of past habits.

If you were to fault yourself in one of three areas, which would it be: (1) the inability to prioritize; (2) the inability or desire to organize around those priorities; or (3) the lack of discipline to execute around them? ... Most people say their main fault is a lack of discipline. On deeper thought, I believe that is not the case. The basic problem is that their priorities have not become deeply planted in their hearts and minds. They haven't really internalized Habit 2 [Begin with the end in mind].

People who end up with the good jobs are the proactive ones who are solutions to problems, not problems themselves, who seize the initiative to do whatever is necessary to get the job done.

The character ethic, which I believe to be the foundation of success, teaches that there are basic principles of effective living, and that people can only experience true success and enduring happiness as they learn and integrate these principles into their basic character.

As you live your values, your sense of identity, integrity, control, and inner-directedness will infuse you with both exhilaration and peace. You will define yourself from within, rather than by people's opinions or by comparisons to others.