The "How To" Imperative

Steve is a Covey guy and is always talking about some Covey principle. I'm not a Covey guy. It's not that Covey doesn't have great ideas. He does. I've enjoyed reading his books and have read most of them. It's just that I perceived Covey to be mostly an idea guy. Little or no "how to". An example. His discussion about Mission Statements.

Covey talks about how important it is to have a good mission statement. He tells stories about how companies with effective mission statements have great success. He also tells stories about how effective it is when the employees know the mission statement. All good stuff. He just doesn't have a good "how to" for building mission statements.

So Steve and I spent some significant time discussing a Covey Principle one day last week. Or maybe it's two principles. Steve calls them the "Circle of Experience" and the "Circle of Concern". The idea is to stay out of the circle of concern. Television News spends most of its time in the "Circle of Concern." I know that is a great big generalization and I accept responsibility for it. Okay, so sometimes some of the television news casts spend time in what I would characterize as the "circle of silly and irrelevant."

A few years ago I found myself watching television news and spending a significant amount of time worrying about what I saw. I was talking to my friend John one day. The subject went to TV news and my worries. John said, "you know how to solve the problem, don't you?" "No, how?" was my quick reply. To which John answered, "just stop watching TV news." That's pretty simple. But he was right. Ever since then I've stopped watching the news. It's made a big difference.

Over the past few days I've thought often about this "circle of concern" discussion. Some times it takes me a while to figure things out. This is one of those times. But it was worth the time & effort. While I was out on a walk today, thinking, I realized that my Mom has given me some good "how to" in this area. I'm fortunate to have a wonderful Mom.

As a small boy I worried about a lot of things. I can't remember any of them now, but at the time it was troublesome. My Mom watched me struggle with these worries for some time. It must have bothered her. One day she sat me down on her lap, hugged me close, and said something like this:

I know you worry about things. So I'm going to help you deal with these worries. Whenever something comes up I want you to decide if you can do anything about it or not. Put it in one place or the other. If you decide you can't do anything, then forget about it. If you decide you can do something, then do it. Either way there is never a need for worry. And, oh, remember that probably about 90% of all worries fall into the area of things you can't do anything about.

Thanks, Mom. It's been good advice.

And it's just that sort of "how to" that Covey could benefit from. And it's how my Mom taught me to avoid the circle of concern.

Just so you don't think I'm picking on Covey you should know that I feel the same way about most self-help or management books. Until I found the The Fifth Discipline Fieldbook I felt the same way about The Fifth Discipline. The Fieldbook is filled with real experiences in how the ideas in the book have been used in "actual" businesses.

That's all for now........
8:35:08 PM    comment []