The seven habits of highly effective people (who lead AI transformation)

Stephen Covey’s "The 7 habits of highly effective people" has sold over 40 million copies worldwide and been translated into more than 50 languages, making it one of the best-selling books (actual books, not just management theory books) of all time.

I don’t want to make anyone feel old but if you remember 1989, when the book was released, you’ll know that it was a mad, mad year. Everything changed. The Berlin Wall came down amid a wave of revolutions that overturned Communism in Eastern Europe (but not China), Tim Berners-Lee invented the internet, and I got a Game Boy for my birthday then played approximately three hundred million games of Tetris.*

The case for good habits

The book still sells. The principle-centred leadership and personal integrity he wrote about are critical to building that kind of legacy, so his advice has proven itself to be more than just an abstract concept. The habits are all about how you – as a leader who wants to have an impact – consistently live those principles.

There’s a strong argument that as we navigate an increasingly complex global landscape and try to keep up with pace of advances in tech, the need for authentic and effective leadership is paramount now more than ever. At Leading AI, we think generative AI, with the capacity to improve decision-making, collaboration, and personal development, offers a powerful tool for leaders who still seek to embody Covey's principles. By integrating AI into your thinking and habits, you can not only grow your own capability but also transform your organisations for the future.

Habit 1: Be proactive

Generative AI can provide more, and more nuanced, predictive insights, helping you foresee obstacles and trends. Being proactive also means avoiding the trap of waiting until you have the perfect strategy (digital or otherwise) or relying on identifying a single "magic" solution. Take action. Companies like Target have successfully integrated AI into their operations by starting small and scaling up, using AI to improve customer experiences with personalised offers and things like curb-side pickup. Getting stuck in is how you allow your organisation to adapt and evolve as you learn and grow. Keep moving forwards.

Do: Take initiative, anticipate challenges, and act before problems arise. Start with some ‘quick win’ AI adoption, fail fast – safely - and build on successes.

Don't: Wait for issues to escalate before addressing them or keep thinking of just one more thing to explore before you take a decision. Life is short, and competition is fierce.

Habit 2: Begin with the end in mind

Generative AI can help you define a vision by analysing data and suggesting strategic directions, but the key thing is that AI works best when you apply it to a workflow that directly relates to your objectives and therefore adds real value. General Electric (GE) uses AI-powered predictive maintenance to monitor industrial machinery, reducing downtime by 30% and saving millions in repair costs annually. This approach means their AI investments align with business objectives and deliver tangible results.

Do: Set clear, strategic goals and desired outcomes. Use AI to improve workflows that directly contribute to these goals.

Don't: Start with the solution then look for something to bolt it on to, or invest in AI solutions that don't ultimately offer value.

Habit 3: Put first things first

This is the Covey habit that switched me on to the book (many years after it was published) and stopped me working reactively. For years, the dreaded inbox was dictating my day when I really needed to decide what I needed to achieve, as a priority, and start with that.

AI can help us prioritise by automating routine tasks and highlighting critical actions. Processing things like invoices and dealing with low-level or repetitive queries can all be AI-assisted, freeing you up for the complex work that need your attention. This is one of the impacts we see when we deploy our AI ‘staff agents’ in organisations: private GPTs with stellar communication skills are trained on a defined set of policies and procedures, answering teams’ questions patiently, kindly and repeatedly while HR professionals crack on with the tricky stuff.

Do: Focus on high-impact activities; use AI to assist you so you can make best use of yours and your teams’ brains, experience and time.

Don't: Get bogged down by less important tasks that don't contribute to overall objectives and could be done by a good GPT. Don’t spend time perfecting your drafting; make the information you’re crafting more accessible.

Habit 4: Think win-win

AI can help with communication, analysing team interactions and suggesting ways to improve collaboration. It also gives you limitless scope to adapt to each person’s way of working so you get an inclusion premium on top. Trying new AI tools doesn’t just help with a single task, it can develop people's tech skills in the round, improving productivity and engagement and inspiring people to identify more use cases. Urban Company are a good example: they used GitHub Copilot to make writing code faster and easier for developers, expanding their generative AI solutions across the organization. Everyone worked together and improved their skills.

Do: Actively look for collaborative environments and solutions with multiple benefits. Encourage experimentation with AI to grow skills, increase productivity and unlock the headspace and time for creativity and innovation.

Don't: Approach AI adoption with a win-lose mentality or overlook the potential for skill development in your current workforce.

Habit 5: Seek first to understand, then to be understood

Analysing feedback and identifying common issues helps you understand the state of morale and people’s concerns, and you can address problems more easily if you can gather and use unstructured data effortlessly. Power the process with AI and it means people don’t have to give everything a subjective score out of ten; they can tell you what they think in language that works for them. And you don’t need to wait to crunch the data. AI will chunk through all that information and still find the key messages – and suggest some ways to respond. You can focus on listening, reflecting, planning and discussing.

The same habit applies to exploring the tech market: try tools for yourself and show your colleagues what you’re done and what you’ve learned. Be honest about mistakes and where you had help with your successes. Give people permission to be as curious as you are.

Do: Try things out - and learn about what your peers are doing. Use data to moderate your perception. Listen empathetically and strive to understand others before expressing your own views.

Don't: Make assumptions or push to make your point without considering new perspectives.

Habit 6: Synergise

I’m going to forgive Covey for using this awful word because it was only later in the 90s that it became deeply overused and supremely annoying, with people synergising synergistically all over the place. The word is valid despite my linguistic prejudice, and AI really can enable cross-functional collaboration by connecting team members with complementary skills. Learning from other teams or sectors and applying it in new places drives innovation.

Do: Make the most of diverse talents and perspectives to create innovative solutions. Encourage learning from other sectors and teams.

Don't: Work in silos or ignore the potential of collaborative efforts. Don’t wait for the IT team to fix it for you: you know your pain points better.

Habit 7: Sharpen the saw

I don’t know that this language is aging all that well either, but the habit is right: continuously train yourself. AI can easily and cheaply provide more personalised development plans and training resources, as well as improving each person’s capability with AI as an assistant. This focus on continuous learning and self-improvement is how leaders and their teams remain adaptable and competitive.

Do: Commit to continuous learning and self-improvement. Use AI to augment personal capabilities. Try new things.

Don't: Neglect personal and professional development and wait for the machines to take over. AI won’t take your job; someone using AI might.

The complicated problem with simple solutions

Nothing is ever really as easy as a seven-step plan because it’s not what you do, it’s the way that you do it, day in day out. But that’s the point: make these ideas a habit.

Sadly, Covey hasn’t been around for the generative AI revolution so there’s an argument that the world has moved on since he wrote his bestselling book. His contemporary detractors highlighted, to varying degrees, issues around privilege and Western bias. But I think the Seven Habits philosophy has held up better than a lot of other, more problematic, management theory output**. We’re circling back to double denim, so why not this?
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*I was a child: I wasn’t operating any heavy machinery and had no responsibilities to speak of.

**Some of the classics now read more like the megalomaniac’s guide to coercive control. I’m not going to give them too much airtime here but you can look up ‘Theory X’, ‘Agency theory’ and ‘Transaction cost economics’ at your leisure: they all tend to assume employees are dummies to control and shareholders are paramount. That choice is also available to you. But if you fall into that rabbit hole, read a bit of Ray Dalio after. For your soul.

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