Effective human being in society

How to be effective and inspire others to be effective

Effectiveness is the ability to produce and continue to produce, A scientist named Stephen Covey has studied the lives of hundreds of effective and successful people throughout the ages and in different fields and from different societies, cultures and religions and found that there is a common denominator that unites all of them: their practice of eight habits that he called the eight habits of highly effective people. Anyone who learns these eight habits and practices them in his life will reach effectiveness and success and will inspire those around him effectiveness and success, God willing.

First habit: Be proactive. Initiative means that a person creates opportunities rather than waiting for them to happen. If the proactive husband has a strained relationship with his wife, he does not blame her, but rather takes the initiative to improve this relationship. The proactive manager, if he senses a failure from his employees, does not blame them, but takes the initiative to think about how to motivate them. The initiating professor, if he finds his students not interacting with his lesson, does not blame them, but rather takes the initiative to improve the way he delivers the lesson in order to pull them together. And so on. So the entrepreneur does not blame others, but takes responsibility for change and does something different to get a different result. Some may say, isn’t it tiring for a person to take the initiative and take responsibility? On the contrary, the person who does not initiate and blame others and plays the role of victim continuously is the one who gets tired, fails and falls into crises. While those who initiate and take responsibility for change may tire in the short term, in the long term they will rest and achieve success and become an effective, leading and influential person.

Second habit: Start with the end in your mind. An effective man does not begin any action before he has determined his purpose in that work. Here I will talk on two levels: The first level is the purpose of life in general; an effective person knows what his purpose is in this life. knows what contribution he wants to make to his community and humanity, He knows what impact he wants to leave in this world after he leaves it. In short, an effective person knows what his message is in life.. The second level is to determine the goal before starting any work or activity, no matter how small or large; an effective person knows his purpose from any meeting in which he participates before starting the meeting, and knows his purpose from the speech he wants to give to people if he is asked to speak on a certain occasion, and knows his purpose from the educational process as he raises his children and deals with them. Setting goals clearly helps a person reach his goals and increases his effectiveness and chances of achieving success.

Third habit: Start with the most important before the important. Which is more important human work or health? There is no doubt that his health is the most important, yet many people neglect their health because of work and eventually lose both. Which is more important is a person’s relationship with his family or his work? There is no doubt that his relationship with his family is the most important, yet many people neglect their family relationships because of work and suffer from family problems that ultimately affect their work. These are two clear examples of man’s preoccupation with the important at the expense of the most important. An effective man does not leave the important at the mercy of the less important. So he defines his various roles in life (his role towards himself, His role as a father, as a husband, as an employee, As a social activist, And so on..) He does all these roles with balance.

These first three habits we call the habits of personal victory, That is, the person who manages these habits has achieved victory in his relationship with himself and has become prepared for the following three habits, which are the customs of collective victory that those who practice achieve victory in their relationships with others.

Fourth habit: Think about the benefit of everyone. That is, when a person is in a conflict situation with others, he thinks of a solution that achieves the benefit of the other party in addition to his benefit. When we take into account the feelings and needs of others as well as our own feelings and needs, we can in cooperation with them come up with solutions that take into account our feelings and their feelings and meet our and theirs, In order to know the feelings and needs of others, it is necessary to practice the fifth habit, which is…

Fifth habit: Seek to understand others first and then seek to understand you. That is, to listen to others with the intention of understanding, not the intention of responding. It’s easy to do this when others say things we agree with. But the challenge is to practice the fifth habit when others say things we don’t like and because they don’t agree with it, and here it is better than jumping directly at others and telling them that you are wrong to give them the opportunity to explain to us why they think they are right! Practicing the fifth habit leads to gaining the trust of others and increases our ability to understand them and enable them to understand us.

Sixth habit: Join hands with others. When we practice the fourth and fifth habits, we will be able to practice the sixth habit, which is the fruit of them. Solidarity means that a person cooperates with others in controversial situations to reach the third alternative, which is not a settlement in which each party waives some of its demands, but rather an innovative and creative solution that all parties reach in cooperation with each other, which is better than the solution proposed by each of them alone. To reach a third alternative, it is necessary to follow the two steps of constructive disagreement and can be clarified by the following simple scheme:

Two steps to reach the third alternative
Do you want to look for a better solution than the one offered by each of us?Do you agree with this simple basic rule: no one can explain their point of view until they repeat the other’s point of view in a way that they (the other) are satisfied with.

Following these two steps in any disagreement will eliminate the possibility of any misunderstanding between the different parties and will build trust between these parties, which will ultimately lead to the third alternative.

Habit Seven: Sharpen the saw. A saw that is left unsharpened loses its ability to cut, as well as a person who does not renew his physical, heart, spiritual and mental energies loses his ability to give and produce. By physical renewal, we mean that a person takes care of his health, does not abuse what offends it, sleeps well, eats well, and exercises regularly, As for heart renewal, it means communicating with others and loving them, Mental renewal means enriching the mind by reading and learning, Spiritual renewal means communication with God Almighty. The practice of the seventh habit enables a person to renew his activity and energies so that he can practice the previous six habits in the best possible way.

Habit Eight: Find your voice and inspire others to find their voices. This habit brings a person to maximum effectiveness and turns him into an inspiring person who inspires others to be effective.

Any person who comes to this life is given three gifts by Allah:

• Principles: They are the immutable divine laws that regulate the movement of this world. Just as there are laws in the natural world that regulate the movement of things, such as the laws of physics and chemistry, so there are laws in the human psyche that regulate the movement of individuals and groups. When we say, for example, “honesty leads to trust” or “treating people with respect makes them give their best,” these are clear examples of some of the divine laws that are fixed in the world of human psychology and people’s relationships. Just as man has been able to discover and harness natural laws to achieve the best achievements, so by discovering and harnessing human laws, he can reach the maximum degree of effectiveness by himself and those with him.
• Freedom of choice: It is a gift given to a person as soon as he is born, Man is free to choose what he wants to do. Rather than blaming the circumstances around them, effective people use this gift well, choosing responses that change these circumstances.
• The Four Intelligences : Every human being has four types of intelligence:
• Mental Intelligence: It is the human ability to think logically, analyze, reason, deduce, remember and imagine.
• Emotional intelligence: It is the ability of a person to perceive and control his emotions and to perceive and motivate the feelings of others.
• Physical intelligence: It is the ability of man to maintain and care for his body.
• Spiritual intelligence: It is the ability of man to live a life with meaning beyond his limited physical existence, And to listen to the voice of his conscience, that quiet voice that exists within each of us and that tells us right and wrong, beautiful and ugly.

Fortunately for man, these four intelligences grow and strengthen using them.

Some people come to this world and go without opening these gifts and benefiting from them, while others open them and benefit from them and benefit others as well. How does a person unlock these precious gifts? by practicing the eighth habit, to find his voice and inspire others to find their voices, So what is sound and how does a person find it?

Man finds his voice when he discovers a talent that God has given him, so he puts it in the service of a human need in a way that ignites his enthusiasm, that is, he feels excited and impulsive while activating this talent.

It satisfies his conscience, that is, to do this talent according to the moral standards dictated by his conscience .

So sound consists of a meeting of four things: 1. Talent, 2. Need, 3. Conscience, 4- Enthusiasm. For example, when someone has the talent for teaching, he puts it at the service of a human need, which is the need for people to learn, and he feels enthusiasm and excitement while practicing the teaching profession while teaching in an ethical manner that satisfies his conscience, then we say that this person has found his voice through the teaching profession. Sound is the distinctive flavor that man adds to this existence and it is his own imprint that he will leave in this life.

The man whose voice has been found is distinguished by four things:

• Vision: It is looking at the future with the eye of the mind. He knows exactly what he wants in this life.
• Discipline: It is the sacrifice required to turn a vision into reality.
• Enthusiasm: It is the feeling of excitement and impulsiveness that a person feels as he seeks to achieve his vision. Since feelings are contagious, a person of this type, if he is at the head of a team or organization, will find enthusiasm and enthusiasm spread among all those who work with him.
• Conscience: The man whose voice has been found lives according to the dictates of his conscience, One of the characteristics of a person who lives according to the dictates of conscience is that he treats others as human beings and cares about their feelings and needs. He accepts criticism and thanks those who brought it because it derives his sense of security from within; from listening to the voice of conscience and from his integrity on principles and not from people’s praise for him. He has (the mentality of abundance), that is, he looks at life as a flowing spring, and if others take more than this spring, he does not feel that he has taken from his share because the flowing spring is enough for everyone, so he gives others powers and rejoices for their success and considers it his success.

When a person finds his voice, he becomes an inspiring person, Inspires others to find their voices by exercising the four leadership roles:

• Setting the path: that is, uniting people who see the world in different ways and possess various strengths in one vision and one voice is the vision of the organization led by that person whose voice was found.
• Reconciliation: Creating a state of harmony and harmony between the departments of the institution so that they all work to achieve the vision of the institution as if they were members of one body.
• Empowerment: That is, making people responsible for reaching results and leaving them free to choose the methods that reach those results so that they activate their own potential and talents, of course within general rules and guidelines.
• Good example: We trust people who set a good example in the things they call us to commit to. Such as honesty, sincerity, humility, service and respect for others. When a leader sets an example for others in these matters, followers trust him. Trust thus transforms into a general atmosphere that includes the organization led by such a person; the manager trusts employees and they trust him and trust each other.

The organization whose leader plays these four roles (1) Setting the course, 2. Conciliation, 3. Empowerment, 4- Good example) is an effective organization that unleashes the energies of its employees and inspires them to find their voices.

versus people who find their votes, There are people who waste their votes, Thus, they do not open the three gifts that we mentioned earlier, that is, they do not live according to the principles, do not exercise freedom of choice, do not develop their four intelligences, and these are characterized by the following four qualities:

• Play the victim: they always blame the circumstances and the people around them and do nothing to change the bad conditions facing them.
• Indulgence: that is, they live as slaves to their whims, moods and vicissitudes, Because they don’t have a vision to achieve.
• Social mirror: that is, these people do not act according to their vision emanating from within them, but according to what others want from them, so they do not feel enthusiastic about what they do, Since feelings are contagious, if one of these is found at the head of an organization, you will find boredom and boredom spread throughout the organization.
• Ego: The person who lost his voice lives according to the dictates of the voice of (I), which is that voice contrary to the voice of conscience, It is that loud, tyrannical voice that exists within us and that proves itself by excluding, banishing and marginalizing others, A person who lives according to the dictates of the voice of the ego treats others as objects and does not care about their feelings and needs. He does not accept criticism because he derives his sense of security from the outside; from people’s praise, praise and praise. If this praise is turned into criticism, he has lost the only source of his sense of security and feels a great emptiness and panic, so this type of person rejects criticism and may even punish those who criticize and object to it. He has a (scarcity mentality), that is, he views life as a limited mold of candy, if others take more than this mold, he has taken from his share, so he does not give others powers and does not rejoice in their success and considers it a threat to him.

An organization led by someone who has lost their vote has the following four qualities:

• There is no single path: every department in this institution, but each person, has their own agenda and there is no common vision, mission and values.
• Lack of reconciliation: that is, pathological competition between departments, dependency and evasion of responsibility.
• Disempowerment: that is, deprivation of powers, as everyone does not think about the best way to do the work, but rather thinks how to satisfy his boss, even at the expense of work and the interest of the institution.
• Lack of trust: since there is no single path, no compromise, no empowerment in the organization led by someone who has lost their vote, There is no trust in this organization, so the manager does not trust the employees and they do not trust him and they do not trust each other.

An organization characterized by the above four things is an inert organization that restricts those who work in it, disrupts their energies, and prevents them from finding their voices.

Yasser Al-Aiti