Stephen Covey - Time Quotes

26 Sourced Quotes

View all Stephen Covey Quotes
Trust is the highest form of human motivation. It brings out the very best in people. But it takes time and patience.

Stephen Covey
If you don't choose to do it in leadership time up front, you do it in crisis management time down the road.

Stephen Covey
The ability to establish, grow, extend, and restore trust is the key professional and personal competency of our time.

Stephen Covey
As we create synergy among the roles of our lives, there's more of us to put into the time we have.

Stephen Covey
Over time, I have come to this simple definition of leadership: Leadership is getting results in a way that inspires trust.

Stephen Covey
What difference would a clear vision of my principles, values, and ultimate objectives make in the way I spend my time?

Stephen Covey
Empathic listening takes time, but it doesn't take anywhere near as much time as it takes to back up and correct misunderstandings when you're already miles down the road; to redo; to live with unexpressed and unsolved problems; to deal with the results of not giving people psychological air.

Stephen Covey
How many on their deathbeds wished they'd spent more time at the office - or watching TV? The answer is, No one.

Stephen Covey
We accomplish all that we do through delegation - either to time or to other people.

Stephen Covey
As you begin to think more in terms of importance, you begin to see time differently.

Stephen Covey
The challenge is not to manage time, but to manage ourselves.

Stephen Covey
'Efficient' scheduling and control of time are often counterproductive. The efficiency focus creates expectations that clash with the opportunities to develop rich relationships, to meet human needs, and to enjoy spontaneous moments on a daily basis.

Stephen Covey
Most of us spend too much time on what is urgent and not enough time on what is important.

Stephen Covey
We present a dramatically different approach to time management. This is a principle-centered approach. It transcends the traditional prescriptions of faster, harder, smarter, and more. Rather than offering you another clock, this approach provides you with a compass — because more important than how fast you're going, is where you're headed.

Stephen Covey
The essence of the best thinking in the area of time management (practice planning) can be captured in a single phrase: Organize and execute around priorities

Stephen Covey
The human will is an amazing thing. Time after time, it has triumphed against unbelievable odds.

Stephen Covey
Empathy takes time, and efficiency is for things, not people.

Stephen Covey
Most of us think we don't have enough time to exercise. What a distorted paradigm! We don't have time not to. We're talking about three to six hours a week - or a minimum of thirty minutes a day, every other day. That hardly seems an inordinate amount of time considering the tremendous benefits in terms of the impact on the other 162 - 165 hours of the week.

Stephen Covey
Too many vacations that last too long, too many movies, too much TV, too much video game playing - too much undisciplined leisure time in which a person continually takes the course of least resistance gradually wastes a life. It ensures that a person's capacities stay dormant, that talents remain undeveloped, that the mind and spirit become lethargic and that the heart remains unfulfilled.

Stephen Covey
We're constantly making choices about the way we spend our time. The issue is not between the good and the bad, but between the good and the best. So often, the enemy of the best is the good.

Stephen Covey
At some time in your life, you probably had someone believe in you when you didn't believe in yourself.

Stephen Covey
The only thing that endures over time is the 'Law of the Farm.' You must prepare the ground, plant the seed, cultivate, and water if you expect to reap the harvest.

Stephen Covey
Effective people stay out of Quadrants III and IV because, urgent or not, they aren't important. They also shrink Quadrant I down to size by spending more time in Quadrant II...Quadrant II is the heart of effective personal management.

Stephen Covey
The environment you fashion out of your thoughts, your beliefs, your ideals, your philosophy is the only climate you will ever live in. The key is in not spending time, but in investing it.

Stephen Covey
While you can think in terms of efficiency in dealing with time, a principle-centered person thinks in terms of effectiveness in dealing with people.

Stephen Covey