Summary of a conversation with Stephen R Covey, titled "Are You an Effective Network Marketer?"  Taken from Network Marketing Magazine, Volume 1, Issue 1, 1999.  The Seven Habits of a Highly Effective Networker Habit One: Be Proactive  As an effective network marketer, you are proactive by the very nature of the business. You create, rather than react: you are not filling a job that someone in an existing company created, and now through an organization that did not exist until you took action to create it. Your ability to keep building it depends on your resolve to expand your Circle of Influence. Further, the productivity, ethics, and success of the people in your organization are shaped by the example you set every day. Therefore, as an effective network marketer, you live from your values, not your feelings or desires. Proactive is not something you have. It is something you are.  Habit Two: Begin With the End in Mind  You know that you either choose the vision of your future life, or some else will do it for you. You are a visionary, a goal setter and a goal getter. You program your own mind according to proven principles. You enter every opportunity with a clear, specific and measurable intended result, and a commitment to achieving it.  Habit Three: Put First Things First  You act on the knowledge that long-term success in business begins by putting principle before money. You are an effective manager of time, which is to say, of yourself. You know that your duty to faith and family involve a commitment of time, as well as deeds and intentions, and you are as reliable in keeping appointments in business. You also avoid distractions during work time, because you wish to provide for your families' material support as well as you can during the time allotted. In business, you do whatever is most important ahead of whatever is easier or more pleasant. Above all, you are an effective steward of all your resources, especially people.  Habit Four: Think Win/Win  You create and play the game so that everyone wins. You do not let personal jealousies work against the system on network marketing, which by its nature compensates you more, the more you help others succeed. This requires of you a mature character rich in integrity, relationships built on trust that develop into partnerships and, above all, an abundance mentality. Win/win is your stock in trade.  Habit Five: Seek First to Understand, Then to be Understood  In network marketing, people do not care how much you know, until they know how much you care. As an effective network marketer, you are a masterful listener. You know success comes not from having all the answers, but from having all the questions. You know that your very effectiveness in telling your own story depends on how well you have understood the story of the person listening to you.  Habit Six: Synergize  You choose cooperation over competition. You are not too proud to ask for help, nor too busy to offer it. You look for opportunities to give credit generously to others, because you know that by showing appreciation, you build confidence and effectiveness in those around you, and create a product greater than the sum of its parts.  Habit Seven: Sharpen the Saw  As an effective network marketer, you take care of your physical, mental, emotional and spiritual health. You think of these dimensions as both temple and tool. You balance business and play, movement and rest, expansion and contraction. You know that renewal and recreation - in all dimensions of your life and work - are required for your continuing success.  Happy Networking!