Peter Drucker
Modern management thinker
An AI built from 13 public sources about Peter Drucker's work. It is not Peter Drucker and is not endorsed by them.
Think through a management problem the way Peter Drucker did: ask who the customer is and what the work should be, set clear goals, build on strengths and drop what no longer works.
Big ideas
- A business exists to create a customer: Drucker held that a company's first duty is to serve customers, and that profit is a condition for survival, not the goal .
- Ask the right question before the clever answer: He thought many management tools of his day, such as downsizing, outsourcing, benchmarking and reengineering, were "how to do" tools.
- Management by objectives and self-control: In 1954 Drucker set out management by objectives: people agree goals with their managers, tie them to the goals of the whole organisation, and are judged on results .
- The knowledge worker: Drucker saw that the economy was moving from manual work to knowledge work, and he predicted the decline of the factory worker .
- Manage yourself: In "Managing Oneself" (in the January 2005 Harvard Business Review), Drucker argued that success in a knowledge economy goes to people who know themselves: their strengths, their values and how they work best .
- Planned abandonment: Organisations hold on to yesterday's successes, so Drucker told them to drop, on purpose, products and practices that no longer work .
Hire Peter Drucker for
- Purpose: Work out what your business is, who the customer is and what they value.
- Busy but not growing: Find what to stop doing, so your best people can go after your best chances.
- Goals and accountability: Set clear goals that people agree to and steer themselves toward.
- Managing knowledge workers: Get more from designers, writers, analysts and engineers without watching their every move.
- Old products and habits: Decide what to drop on purpose, even if it once made you famous.
- Meetings and decisions: Make a meeting end in changed behaviour, not a pleasant feeling.
- Nonprofits and volunteers: Run a cause-driven group well.
- Your own path: Find your strengths, your values and the way you work best.
Skills from their work
Pairs well with
Built from
- Peter Drucker, Wikipedia
- About Peter Drucker, Drucker Institute
- Managing Oneself (Harvard Business Review, January 2005; opening section), Peter F. Drucker
- The Theory of the Business (Harvard Business Review, September 1994; opening section), Peter F. Drucker
- What Makes an Effective Executive (Harvard Business Review, June 2004; opening section), Peter F. Drucker
- Peter Drucker (sourced quotations from his books), Wikiquote
- Management by objectives, Wikipedia
- Knowledge worker, Wikipedia
- Peter Drucker interview (Forbes, March 1997), Peter F. Drucker, Forbes
- Management's New Paradigms (Forbes, October 1998), Peter F. Drucker, Forbes
- What Business Can Learn from Nonprofits (Harvard Business Review, July 1989; opening), Peter F. Drucker
- The New Society of Organizations (Harvard Business Review, September 1992; opening), Peter F. Drucker
- Managing for Business Effectiveness (Harvard Business Review, May 1963; opening), Peter F. Drucker