Although often credited to Stephen Covey or Tony Robbins, the BE-DO-HAVE model is likely to have been around longer than that (I recall hearing about it in my mid-twenties so it must be old!).
Fundamentally, it is a simple framework that provides perhaps a non-intuitive approach for success.
Let me illustrate with an example to start: Suppose you want to be the best golfer in your club.
It might be tempting to think that to be the best golfer, you need to have the best golf clubs or have the best golf instructor. Is this likely to make you the best golfer? Of course not!
Great clubs in the hands of a poor player won’t fix the issue and although instruction is likely to help, the result is very much dependent upon your ability to put the advice into practice. So best not to start with what you need to HAVE.
Okay, then perhaps to be the best golfer in the club, I need to do something about it.
Perhaps watch some videos or do some serious practice. But what happens if when you go to watch the video, you get a better offer to do something else (which you end up doing) or you plan to practice but it looks like it might rain, so you cancel?
No, the DOing needs to be backed up by something else.
And that is the genuine and sincere desire to BE the best golfer in your club. When you take on this mindset, it drives you to action the things you need to do and obtain the things you need to have.
It is the internal personal belief that makes these things happen, not the having or doing alone.
This principle can be applied to a person’s general approach to life and this can be illustrated through each of the following three personality types:
The Victim
The Worker
The Winner
Now the Victim believes that their life is governed by the sequence: HAVE-DO-BE.
For them their personal situation depends on external factors so you will hear them say things like: “When I HAVE enough time and money, then I’ll DO the things I’ve always wanted to and then I’ll BE happy and successful.
For them success depends upon external factors providing and if they don’t, then it is not their problem, hence they are the Victim.
For Victims, everything starts when they HAVE enough.
The Worker is driven by the sequence: DO-HAVE-BE. For them, the more they DO, the more they will HAVE.
The more they HAVE, the happier they will BE. However, the more they do, the more they find there is still to do and so they never actually seem to HAVE enough.
Since for the Worker, doing is the key to success, they become driven, busy and worn out.
In reality we know that happiness is not a function of what we actually have (some of the happiest people in the world own few possessions), so for the Worker happiness never arrives.
By now you will have guessed that the Winner applies the sequence: BE-DO-HAVE.
As in the example above, it is understanding that it is not what you have or even what you do that counts, it is determining what you really want to BE.
Clarity on this, will drive the appropriate actions and since you understand that you are responsible for what you do and that you cannot rely on external factors to achieve your desired results, you are the master of your own destiny.
Ian Ash is the managing director for OrgMent Business Solutions.
