Seven Habits of Highly Effective Family Business Executives

During an exercise to develop leadership skills for family-businesses, two consultants for the University of Toledo Center for Family Business, Barbara Gill and Dale Seymour of Seymour and Associates/MassMutual abstracted Stephen Covey's Seven Habits of Highly Effective People. They suggested that by mastering good habits, family business leaders and employees will graduate from independence to interdependence, achieving a private victory in improving oneself and public victory in business success. Their adaptations of the Seven Habits (and a good review) are:

Be Proactive. “The ability to Assume personal responsibility and the habit of personal vision. What is my personal vision of the future of this firm, for myself, for my heirs?”

Begin With The End In Mind. “What is it I want those succeeding me to have in their hands and what is it I want them to say about me?”

Put First Things First. “The habit of self-management.” Prioritize.

Think Win-Win. “Find the third, fourth or fifth alternative where everybody gets our of the deal what it is they want.”

Seek First To Understand Then To Be Understood. “Put yourself on the other person's playing field and earn the right for them to hear your perspective.”

Synergy. “The principle says that one-plus-one has the capacity to be a lot more. Compromise might take you to one and a half, but synergy will give you the multiples.” Family businesses have a distinct capability to provide synergy. The keys are communication, leadership, and fairness.

Sharpen the Saw. “The habit of personal self-renewal.” Never, never, never delude yourself into ceasing your skill building and your learning.

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