Seven Habits of Highly Effective People

Goethe taught, “Treat a man as he is and he will remain as he is. Treat a man
as he can and should be and he will become as he can and should be.”
Balance in Renewal
The self-renewal process must include balanced renewal in all four
dimensions of our nature: the physical, the spiritual, the mental, and the
social/emotional.
Although renewal in each dimension is important, it only becomes optimally
effective as we deal with all four dimensions in a wise and balanced way. To
neglect any one area negatively impacts the rest.
I have found this to be true in organizations as well as in individual lives. In
an organization, the physical dimension is expressed in economic terms. The
mental or psychological dimension deals with the recognition, development, and
use of talent. The social/emotional dimension has to do with human relations,
with finding meaning through purpose or contribution and through
organizational integrity.
When an organization neglects any one or more of these areas, it negatively
impacts the entire organization. The creative energies that could result in
tremendous, positive synergy are instead used to fight against the organization
and become restraining forces to growth and productivity.
I have found organizations whose only thrust is economic -- to make money.
They usually don't publicize that purpose. They sometimes even publicize
something else. But in their hearts, their only desire is to make money.
Whenever I find this, I also find a great deal of negative synergy in the
culture, generating such things as interdepartmental rivalries, defensive and
protective communication, politicking, and masterminding. We can't effectively
thrive without making money, but that's not sufficient reason for organizational
existence. We can't live without eating, but we don't live to eat.
At the other end of the spectrum, I've seen organizations that focused almost
exclusively on the social/emotional dimension. They are, in a sense, some kind
of social experiment and they have no economic criteria to their value system.
They have no measure or gauge of their effectiveness, and as a result, they lose
all kinds of efficiencies and eventually their viability in the marketplace.
I have found many organizations that develop as many as three of the
dimensions -- they may have good service criteria, good economic criteria, and
good human-relations criteria, but they are not really committed to identifying,
developing, utilizing, and recognizing the talent of people. And if these
psychological forces are missing, the style will be a benevolent autocracy and
the resulting culture will reflect different forms of collective resistance,
adversarialism, excessive turnover, and other deep, chronic, cultural problems.