PRINCIPAL’S COFFEE
HABIT ONE
FROM THE SEVEN HABITS
December 5, 2011
Excerpts taken from
The Leader In Me
by Steven Covey
The Seven Habits
• Private Victory
• Habit one – Be Proactive
• Habit two – Begin with the end in mind
• Habit three – Put first thing first
• Public Victory
• Habit four – Think win-win (bucket)
• Habit five – Seek first to understand, then to be understood
• Habit six – Synergize (work together)
• Habit seven – Sharpen the saw (Take care of self)
(Basic needs: physical, social-emotional, mental, spiritual)
• Habit eight – Finding your voice/talent
Quotes for The Leader in Me
• “Leadership is about unleashing the whole person toward
inspiring and worthwhile goals….It is about engaging their
hearts, minds, bodies, and spirits. It is also about
optimizing students’ gifts and unleashing their talents.”
• Henry David Thoreau “The woods would be silent if no
bird sang but the best.”
• “Every child is important. Every child has gifts. Every
child has potential. Every child can be a leader.”
We want our children to be:
• Pro-Active: to take responsibility
for their actions, to acknowledge
mistakes rather than blaming
others or making excuses, to show
initiative, and to remain in charge
of their emotions.
Habit One - Be Proactive for Parents
Underlying Paradigms/Principles
Key Actions
• You choose your actions
• Stop and think. Ask: What is
and the “weather” of your
mind.
• You choose your response
to how others treat you. In
other words, your child does
not “make” you angry; only
you can choose to be angry
• Patience is a proactive
choice.
the right thing to do?
• Gain control of your
emotions. Walk away for a
time if need be.
• Focus on matters within
your influence, not on
matters outside your control.
• Take responsibility for
actions rather than blaming
others or making lame
excuses.
Quotes to Discuss
• Parents – Discuss the following
quotes at your table with other
parents.
• How can you use the ideas from
the quotes to help develop your
child into a leader?
Quotes to discuss
• Goethe – “Treat a man as he is and you make him
worse than he is. Treat a man as he has the
potential to become and you make him better than he
is.”
• “Leadership is communicating people’s worth and
potential so clearly that they are inspired to see it in
themselves.”
• “Every child has leadership, the challenge is how to
bring it out, how to nurture it.”
• “If you treat all students as if they are gifted in at least
some aspect, they will rise to that level of
expectation.”
The Power of Principles for Parents
We cannot protect our children 24/7 so the best
way for us to help our children is to instill within
them the internal desire to make right choices,
even when no one else is watching. One way is to
teach them the correct principles - the earlier the
better.
The principles will always stay the same even as a
child’s world changes drastically throughout the
years. These principles protect children against
negative social influences, but they also will enable
young people to succeed in the new reality.
Parents could work on these four steps:
Step 1 – Inspire Trust.
• Remember the key to inspiring trust is
modeling.
• The best way for children to learn is see
their parents model the principles
themselves.
• Relating, letting them know you care about
them, spending time with them, and letting
them feel your love is important.
Step 2 – Clarifying purpose.
• Why are these principles of leadership important
for your child?
• What goals do you have for your child?
• What goals does your child want to pursue?
When was the last time you asked about their
goals?
• What family and/or individual milestones can be
set in place to help your child achieve their
goals? What is the strategy for achieving the
milestones?
• This might be a great time to make a family mission
statement.
Step 3 – Align systems.
• How will you get your children to “buy in” to
learning these leadership principles?
• How will the principles be taught? Will they be
taught directly, or in a ubiquitous manner, such as
identifying them in movies, in books, during family
vacations, or during sporting activities?
• In pursuing your family goals, what leadership
roles will your children take on?
• How will adherence to the principles be rewarded?
• How will accountability for going against principles
be handled?
Step 4 – Unleash talent.
• What specific talents or “gifts” do you want to
nurture or expand in your children?
• How will you nurture those gifts and set them
free in your child?
• Will you do all the planning and goal setting in
your family, or will your children be involved in
planning family activities or in setting their own
goals?
• How will you let them know you trust them?
Next Principal’s Coffee
• January 30, 2012
• Concern or comments
• Future Agenda Items:
• Habit 2
• Habit 3