Peter Ferdinand Drucker was a writer, management consultant and university professor. His writing focused on management-related literature. Peter Drucker made famous the term knowledge worker and is thought to have unknowingly ushered in the knowledge economy, which effectively challenges Karl Marx's world-view of the political economy. George Orwell credits Peter Drucker as one of the only writers to predict the German-Soviet Pact of 1939.
The son of a high level civil servant in the Habsburg empire, Drucker was born in the chocolate capital of Austria, in a small village named Kaasgraben (now a suburb of Vienna, part of the 19th district, D枚bling). Following the defeat of Austria-Hungary in World War I, there were few opportunities for employment in Vienna so after finishing school he went to Germany, first working in banking and then in journalism. While in Germany, he earned a doctorate in International Law. The rise of Nazism forced him to leave Germany in 1933. After spending four years in London, in 1937 he moved permanently to the United States, where he became a university professor as well as a freelance writer and business guru. In 1943 he became a naturalized citizen of the United States. He taught at New York University as a Professor of Management from 1950 to 1971. From 1971 to his death he was the Clarke Professor of Social Science and Management at Claremont Graduate University.
Stop reading boring blogs and books about productivity and go straight to the source of many of these ideas. Then, stop thinking about being productive and go do something.
I used to be a large reader of Jack Welch practices at GE, until I read that he looked to Drucker. I've been reading Drucker and re-reading Drucker ever since. He is the master at learning how to be "effective" and from him, I learned how to filter what are the best effectiveness 21st century leadership practices.
Now, after 14 years of running a company and 8 years of trying to create a leadership engine to run a company, I believe that the 21st century practices for effectiveness in order of sequence:
1. Self love & taking care of oneself daily (for me, taught by Richard Bach, M. Scott Peck, Gay Hendrix, others) 2. Life vision (parents' life history, Richard Bach, Tao Te Ching, Tao of Mentoring) 3. Being resonant. Using a ratio of 7 PEA to 1 NEA(For me, taught by Resonant Leader and developing a self care agenda) 4. Using Appreciative Inquiry style to help others get in touch with when they felt their highest, when I feel my highest 5. Facilitative communication style (Roger Schwarz, other facilitator techniques)
I am still in process on learning on all these dimensions. As AA says, and M.Scott Peck quotes..."I'm not okay, you're not okay and that's okay." Learning to forgive one's self and others and accept the mystery of life is a life long leadership and life journey.
No one in a managerial role should be allowed to manage others without having read at least one book from Peter Drucker. Drucker is widely acclaimed as The Father of Modern Management and published 39 books in a lifetime that spanned 95 years. The Effective Executive was published in 1967 and this book is as good a starting point as any for the uninitiated.
Effectiveness is a habit and habits can be learned through practice, lots of it. According to Drucker there are five habits that, once acquired, determine the effectiveness of an executive. If you want to be effective in your work鈥攁nd in your life鈥攑ractice these five habits:
1. Know where your time goes. 2. Focus on outward contribution. 3. Build on strengths. 4. Concentrate on the few major areas where superior performance will produce outstanding results. 5. Make effective decisions.
The book provides detail and substance to these five habits of executive effectiveness. The examples are a time capsule from the "Mad Men" era drawing on events from the Kennedy and Johnson administrations. Don't let these dated examples lull you into thinking that "times have changed." While they certainly have, the practices that lead to executive effectiveness have stood the test of time.
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I'm pretty sure that if we'd ever met in real life I'd have punched Peter Drucker in the face. This book epitomises everything that I hate about productivity porn. It should be subtitled the definitive guide to squeezing every last drop of blood out of your workers.
Feels totally undated and very much still relevant today. The focus on effectiveness, uninterrupted time and making deliberate choices on what one doesn鈥檛 do is formulated in a powerful manner Executives aren鈥檛 paid for things they like to do, they are paid to get things done
Remarkably readable and clear eyed on leadership being a self discipline set of focussed beliefs and actions, instead of an innate quality. The actions are very concrete and brought in an easy to read manner, although hard to execute well, as is evidenced by the 50 years + popularity of this book. Aphorisms and useful quotes below.
Quotes: If meetings come to dominate your time, than your life is likely being ill spend
Stop what you wouldn鈥檛 start
Never confuse scale of impact with scale of organization
Management is largely by example
Without effectiveness there is no performance
Always ask what needs to be done and what do I need to do uniquely to contribute most to this? Align your agenda and time to the priorities.
Every decision needs to have the RACI clear and have some evaluation and midpoint check-in built in
Start with opportunities (and staff people on these) and not with problems in your reporting
Listen first, speak last
Brilliant insight by itself isn鈥檛 achievement
Organization is a means of multiplying the strengths of an individual
The customer makes the real and final decisions but is outside of the organization
A bigger organization becomes ever more internal oriented, while the surface area, which directly interfaces with clients, does not grow at the same rate, same as in biological beings growing in size.
Time is always the limiting factor, especially focused, uninterrupted time
People decisions are time consuming, for the simple reason the Lord didn鈥檛 create people as resources for organization, they don鈥檛 come in the proper size and shape for the tasks that need to be done in the organization and they can鈥檛 be machined down or recast for these tasks. People are always almost fits at best.
Much more common is the workforce that is too large, with people just interfacing
One cannot manage his time until one knows where it goes. Only constant efforts prevent drifting.
Which activities I do can someone else do as well or better than me?
What is it that I do that wastes your time without adding to your effectiveness
We far too often think our presence is needed for effectiveness
A well managed organization is a dull organization, the dramatic things in such an organization are basic decisions that make the future, rather than heroics in mopping up yesterday.
People have become an impediment to performance instead of a means their to. In a lean organization people have room to move without colliding with one another, and can do their work without having to explain it all the time.
Meetings are by definition a concession to efficient organization, because one either works or he meets.
I鈥檝e yet come across a crisis that could not wait 90 minutes.
Small driplets of time are useless, consolidate time together in blocks
Focus on contribution, what do you do for the organization instead of framing oneself as a manager of a department, or leading xx FTE
Effective executives focus on three themes: Achieve direct results (always come first), affirm values and create clarity, and finally build out talent in the firm and make the organization future proof.
The only meaningful definition of a generalist is a specialist who can relate his own small area to the universe of knowledge
Start every meeting with the purpose of the meeting and the wanted contribution and close it with a recap on what was achieved and decided towards this purpose
Staffing from strength, not to minimize weaknesses
There is no such thing as a good man, the question is good for what
Their question is never 鈥渨hat can he not do鈥�, their question is always 鈥渨hat can he do uncommonly well?鈥�
The second rule of staffing from strength is to make each job demanding and big
Start with what a person can do rather than what a job requires
All one can measure is performance, and all one should measure is performance
By themselves character and integrity don鈥檛 accomplish anything, but their absence fault鈥檚 everything else.
To get strength one has to put up with weaknesses
Making strengths productive is a moral imperative within an organization
People being either readers or listeners in terms of how easy they absorb information.
What can I do?
If leadership performance is high this lifts up the average performance of the group as well
If we not already were doing this, would we start this? - A key question to always keep in mind when reflecting on actions
Programme review, build in assessment of projects, to ensure resources are freed up for the opportunities of the future
Choosing tasks to not pick-up are critical for the success of executives
Solve generic problems with principles and general rules, and think through if one is willing to live with the 鈥渢emporary鈥� for a long time. Also don鈥檛 use old rules for new problems or specific, unique incidents.
Reality never stands still for too long - about the need to reassess decisions frequently
Focus on what is right, measured against some clear boundary conditions which define success and performance, and use this to guide compromises instead of focus on what is acceptable
Events by themselves are not facts
Unless one considered alternatives one鈥檚 mind is closed
Do not become a prisoner of preconceived opinions by enabling active discussion and constructive conflict and not defaulting to the plausible
Disagreement is needed to stimulate the imagination
Is a decision really necessary, think like a surgeon and don鈥檛 intervene unneeded in systems, and operate and do the job fully (one doesn鈥檛 do a half surgery)
Effectiveness needs to be learned
Effectiveness is after all not a subject but self discipline
Adding this book to my list of must-reads for anyone working in corporate America. In brief:
1. Know where your time goes; relentlessly prune unproductive activities. 2. Know the contribution you're expected to make - to others' contributions and to the organization. 3. Make your strengths productive and hone them; focus on the absence of weakness leads to mediocrity. 4. There are always more opportunities available than time to pursue them 鈥� prioritize and focus on the truly impactful. 5. Continually shed unproductive programs and processes by asking, "If we didn't already do this, would we go into it now?" 6. Most events are generic and should be handled by rules, policies, and procedures; solutions to truly unique events should be formed on the highest conceptual level possible.
Good reminder of the basic fundamentals of time management.
鈥淭he people who get nothing done often work a great deal harder. In the first place, they underestimate the time for any one task. They always expect that everything will go right. Yet, as every executive knows, nothing ever goes right. The unexpected always happens鈥攖he unexpected is indeed the only thing one can confidently expect.鈥�
鈥淚f there is any one 'secret' of effectiveness, it is concentration. Effective executives do first things first and they do one thing at a time.鈥�
鈥淭he oft-repeated quip, 'I鈥檓 sorry to write you a long letter, as I did not have time to write a short one,' could be applied to meetings: 'I鈥檓 sorry to imprison you in this long meeting, as I did not have time to prepare a short one.'鈥�
"Effectiveness is not a 'subject,' but a self-discipline."
"Don't tell me that you had a wonderful time reading this book, tell me what you are going to do differently on Monday". The higher up the organization, the less time he has under his own control (senior executives rarely have more than quarter of their time under their control), so you have to take control of your time. Understand what are the things that waste your time without contributing to effectiveness. Ask your subordinates how you are preventing them from doing their work effectively.
The first version of the book was written in 1965, but majority of the assumptions are still valid on 21th century (like the perception that computers will take over decision making VS actually expecting serious mental effort from people because one cannot compete with computer on standard computation).
1. Know where your time goes; relentlessly prune unproductive activities. 2. Know the contribution you're expected to make - to others' contributions and to the organization. 3. Make your strengths productive and hone them; focus on the absence of weakness leads to mediocrity. 4. There are always more opportunities available than time to pursue them 鈥� prioritize and focus on the truly impactful. 5. Continually shed unproductive programs and processes by asking, "If we didn't already do this, would we go into it now?" 6. Most events are generic and should be handled by rules, policies, and procedures; solutions to truly unique events should be formed on the highest conceptual level possible. Decisions without disagreement are not effective. Doing nothing might be a good option (Warren Buffet).
鈥淐onverting a decision into action requires answering several distinct questions: Who has to know of this decision? What action has to be taken? Who is to take it? And what does the action have to be so that the people who have to do it can do it? The first and the last of these are too often overlooked鈥攚ith dire results.鈥�
鈥淲orking on the right things is what makes knowledge work effective.鈥�
鈥淚f the executive lets the flow of events determine what he does, what he works on, and what he takes seriously, he will fritter himself away 鈥渙perating.鈥� He may be an excellent man. But he is certain to waste his knowledge and ability and to throw away what little effectiveness he might have achieved. What the executive needs are criteria which enable him to work on the truly important, that is, on contributions and results, even though the criteria are not found in the flow of events.鈥�
鈥淎 well-managed factory is boring. Nothing exciting happens in it because the crises have been anticipated and have been converted into routine.鈥�
鈥淭he first rule in decision-making is that one does not make a decision unless there is disagreement.鈥�
鈥淭he danger is that executives will become contemptuous of information and stimulus that cannot be reduced to computer logic and computer language. Executives may become blind to everything that is perception (i.e., event) rather than fact (i.e., after the event). The tremendous amount of computer information may thus shut out access to reality.鈥�
鈥淭he executive鈥檚 time tends to belong to everybody else. If one attempted to define an 鈥渆xecutive鈥� operationally (that is, through his activities) one would have to define him as a captive of the organization. Everybody can move in on his time, and everybody does. There seems to be very little any one executive can do about it. He cannot, as a rule, like the physician, stick his head out the door and say to the nurse, 鈥淚 won鈥檛 see anybody for the next half hour.鈥� Just at this moment, the executive鈥檚 telephone rings, and he has to speak to the company鈥檚 best customer or to a high official in the city administration or to his boss鈥攁nd the next half hour is already gone.*鈥�
鈥淭he job is, however, not to set priorities. That is easy. Everybody can do it. The reason why so few executives concentrate is the difficulty of setting 鈥減osteriorities鈥濃€攖hat is, deciding what tasks not to tackle鈥攁nd of sticking to the decision.鈥�
鈥淓xecutives are not paid for doing things they like to do. They are paid for getting the right things done鈥攎ost of all in their specific task, the making of effective decisions.鈥�
Know Thy Time - take a time inventory & eliminate "need not be done", "could be done by others", and "wasting other's time". - prune time wasters - lack of systems --> crisis - overstaffing --> unnecessary coordination - malorganization --> excessive mtgs - malfunction in information - consolidate discretionary time into meaningful chunks to facilitate effectiveness (eg 1.5 hr)
What can I contribute? - in terms of EXTERNAL results - aim high
Making strengths productive - focus on indvidual STRENGTHS and the strengths of others, not trying to improve on weaknesses
First things first - focus on single BHAGs at a time - slough off yesterday (sunk cost, don't just do things to finish them if ineffective) - to-do AND to-don't lists
Decision making - establish generic problem - set boundary conditions - determine what is RIGHT, not what is acceptable - build in action to carry out decision - DIRECT feedback (go see) to test validity/effectiveness of decision once enacted
Effective decisions - not effective without disagreement - must define a measure of effectiveness before enacting - "do-nothing" is an option
Just like most of them, this book has too many words for 5 or so ideas. The conclusion at the very end sums everything up, so you don't have to read the whole book, just read the last few pages.
The Effective Executive 鈥� Peter E. Drucker Book Review for 欧宝娱乐. Originally published 1967. Edition read was Harper Business, 1993. I鈥檓 too young to have been part of the Drucker Generation. I had always heard him talked of and quoted among the staid and dusty corners of mainstream business, but I never thought to reach back and read him. Drucker鈥檚 words and ideas were the Esperanto of an emerging class in the business world of post WWII. He was part and parcel of important board room conversations in the 1950鈥檚 and 1960鈥檚. By the 1980鈥檚 when I entered the business world things had changed, or people were tired of basic business sense. We got Peters and Porter and a cadre of super smart guys from Harvard and Stanford who tried to take it to the next level. They all owed their chops to the work of Drucker though. Drucker was their text book. Drucker was the original management consultant the likes of which many owe their profession to today. I鈥檓 not even sure how I came into possession of this book. Perhaps the book sale at the local library where you can buy them for $5 a shopping bag? I鈥檓 not sure how this book pushed its way to the front of the queue ahead of the other 30 books that are waving their little book-arms to get my attention. But, I鈥檓 glad it did because it was a minor revelation to me. This book must be read not as a small collection of business advice, like a Poor Richards for the executive class, but as a manifesto for the times. A manifesto for an emerging class of business professionals. A manifesto for a society caught in the sea change from basic, patriarchal, industrial capitalism to effective organizations that would be needed to compete and thrive on the world鈥檚 stage. It is Drucker鈥檚 plea for American business to get their act together. The Effective Executive can be seen as anachronistic but also as a history lesson. It is birthed from a point in time in America where the knowledge worker was emerging and a new style of leadership was needed to utilize them. Drucker recognized that this new class of workers needed to be harnessed as the driving force for a new generation of organizations. He is also interestingly prescient. He talks about how big American car companies needed to change. He talks about Government being made ineffective by competing priories. He scolds that global labor is cheap and the only way to stay competitive in to empower our resources and innovate. Beyond all the histrionics this little book is also chock full of great tips for anyone who is in business. I particularly liked the chapters on decision making. Perhaps these chapters might help those currently embroiled in their New Year鈥檚 Resolutions? How do you set your priorities? If you don鈥檛 set your priorities, circumstance or 鈥榩ressures鈥� will set your priorities for you. If you let 鈥榩ressure鈥� drive your priorities and decisions you鈥檒l always be focusing on the past. This is what Drucker amuses himself by calling them Priorities vs Posterities. Pressure causes us to react and the future-looking priorities are crowded out by the backward-looking posterities. Decisions that are posterities, when analyzed will likely be someone else鈥檚 priority, not yours. What are some other ways to make bad decisions? Postponing a decision usually makes it less relevant because decisions are rooted in the time of decision. You can also try to make decisions that spread a compromise around to make everyone happy. That guarantees an ineffective solution. What are the attributes of a good decision? - Aim high and make it meaningful. - Make the decision unique to you and your business, don鈥檛 put on someone else鈥檚 decision. - Make decisions outward facing. - Make decisions future focused. - Make the decision take advantage of an opportunity, not solve a problem. Good decisions will require courage. Truly great decisions will seem like heresy to the rest of the world. Good decisions are going to make someone mad. That鈥檚 ok. As a matter of fact, if you don鈥檛 have a dissenting opinion you haven鈥檛 looked at the decision well enough. Most effective decisions are disagreeable. Above all, the thing that makes a decision effective is follow through and execution. The executive must use grit and will power to drive the execution of that decision for it to have effect. How do you do this? How do you execute a game-changing decision so that it propagates throughout the organization? In the new (at the time) knowledge worker stacked organization you leverage those knowledge workers to implement the decisions. This is really the key and ties the whole work together. The old capitalist regimes with a handful of executives making decisions and everyone else hopping to were no longer effective and were a dying breed. In order to compete in the post WWII world the knowledge workers throughout the organization needed to be capable of making decisions on their own that aligned with and drove the organization to effectiveness. That鈥檚 what Drucker saw. Organizations that could learn to leverage the knowledge worker would be more effective and more competitive. This is still the hallmark of effective organizations. The ability to communicate and leverage the individual genius of each worker in a way that is passionately aligned with the goals of the organization. Think about Starbucks or Zappos or any other company that uses culture to enable knowledge workers to do the right thing at the right time for the benefit of the company. We owe a lot to Peter Drucker. He was a smart observer of the times at a time when modern business was being born. The Effective Executive is a worthy investment of your time, even now in 2016. If not for the timeless business tenants, then for the context it gives us. Chris Russell 鈥� January 2017
Don't know what's the hype about this book, it's simple common sense. Anyone who ever was in "meeting" knows its waste of time, why I should read book about that? The thing executives come in various shapes and sizes was mentioned in various other, earlier books. Management books are second after self help nonsense. Sad, no one over-hypes evidence or data based approaches...
I found this book out in the wild and, overcome by morbid curiosity, I decided to look into what the wannabe hustlers are fetishizing, and I am glad I did so. Oh, what a delightful bunch of boomer ideas! I can see how these ideas brought us to where we are today.
I am sure that CEOs all across the world have this book on their night stand. I can also see freshly minted MBAs are swallowing heaps of this gobbledygook of a message on effectiveness and decision making. While the fantasy of a a steely gazed and self obsessed capitalist corpo man (yes, most likely man and most probably white) who navigates the politics of THE ORGANIZATION while self developing and finding fulfilment might give a raging hardon to some, it's not my cup of tea.
Singular obsession with effectiveness and "effective" decision making of the past has brought us DuPont and its Teflon, Enron, the 2008 financial crisis, the Shell environmental catastrophes, and the totally chaotic handling of COVID by world governments. This book is entertaining if you'd like a sneak peak in the brain space of the average corpo white man of the past (the guys that brought you the end of the world) while they breezely wave away ethics, morals and human decency in their terrible exalted pursuit of effectiveness.
The book is repetitive, uninspired, old and obsolete (women are mentioned 1-ce or twice, I know these were different times but damn, it shows) and its best use might be to make sense of the psyche of ordinary, common men making detached decisions in corpo rooms that translate to destroying of natural habitats (Nestle, DuPont, Shell, Monstanto, really the list is endless) or poisoning the world population with the forever chemicals they made in their chase of being effective.
Yay the hustle, effectiveness and having your profile photo with a tie and a suit on Linkedin!
I loved this book - so packed with wisdom that I moved through it slowly, filing away many quotes for reference.
There are two main thoughts which might dissuade you from reading this. I don鈥檛 want you to miss out, so I鈥檇 like to address both:
鈥淓ffective Executive? This sounds like it's only for people who wear suits and spend their days in board meetings..."
The author defines executive broadly as someone who "is responsible for a contribution that materially affects the capacity of the organization to perform and to obtain results鈥�. I think that description can apply to most people I know, and certainly as a software engineer I found the advice in the book relevant.
鈥淭his sounds like cold, boring, business talk, about how to make you a more efficient cog in the machine..."
The author actually comes across as incredibly caring and insightful about people - their motivation, their happiness, their self-development etc. Some quotes which I loved, and which show what I mean: The motivation of the knowledge worker depends on his being effective, on his being able to achieve. If effectiveness is lacking in his work, his commitment to work and to contribution will soon wither, and he will become a time-server going through the motions from 9 to 5.
I have never seen anyone in a job for which he was inadequate who was not slowly being destroyed by the pressure and the strains, and who did not secretly pray for deliverance.
The knowledge worker is not poverty-prone. He is in danger of alienation to use the fashionable word for boredom, frustration, and silent despair.
A fantastic resource. Seminaries (often) do a phenomenal job of equipping people to be experts in the Word. Where most are weak is training church leaders to be time-managers, meeting-facilitators, action-planners, decision-makers, and priority-setters. These are all the products of general wisdom and stuff that can be learned from a wide variety of "secular" sources (see Proverbs). Peter Drucker's classic has literally changed the way I think about scheduling my time, choosing priorities, and thinking about leadership. The Church is a dynamic organism, but it's also a structured organization in which the NT gives general guidance, but not many specific, detailed instruction (e.g. we know we're supposed to have elders & deacons, but the NT offers no advice on how to run a session or consistory meeting).
Drucker's main point is that effectiveness can & must be learned in leadership, it's not a natural trait. For Drucker (after years of watching and studying executives) effectiveness consists in chiefly five practices: Effective executives: (1) know where their time goes and they work to manage it; (2) focus on the results expected of them, over the work they put in; (3) build on their own strengths--and those of their superiors, subordinates, and the organization; (4) set priorities and do firsts things first; (5) make effective decisions that begin with opinions and organized disagreement rather than "facts."
Outstanding book. Every pastor should read at least once.
Although the book was first released in 1967, it still presents relevant advice for today's management practices.
As a high-level overview, the book talks about: - time management (register how you are using your time) - prioritization of tasks (apply focus and minimum of no interrupted time to finish important work) - focus on work results (what are we aiming to achieve with this work at the end?) - focus on the direct reports (from your boss as well) forces instead of weaknesses, considering those weaknesses don't impact the goals - decision making (give space to divergence of opinions and check opinions with reality).
Some parts of the book are too dense because the stories used are a bit long (mainly on decision-making topic), and it was hard for me to stay along, but even with that, I think it still deserves five stars because of the excellent advice it brings.
I've had this book since I was in college, but never got around to reading it. I think it was actually very insightful. It talks about how you can learn to be an effective executive. Basically, it's about the person themselves learning to manage their time and make effective decisions rather than focusing on how to manage other people. I thought the time management chapter was probably the most useful. I know I struggle with time management. Also, I thought the concentrating chapter about how to focus on one thing at a time to be more effective was interesting. This book had a lot of examples to go along with what that author was trying to communicate. Sometimes those were a little boring. But overall, I did like the book, and I will come back to re-read it sometime in the future.
The preface makes this seem like perhaps this won't be a bad read, and that, hey, maybe you could get something out of this book, but no. By the end of chapter 1, my eyes started to gloss over. This is badly written, it features an antiquated writing style and an overbearing amount of "he" pronouns when referring to executives. Beyond that, it's so obviously drawn out, Drucker pussyfoots around before getting to the point. Examples that are given, are really just observations with what seems to be a total lack of fact checking.
A timeless Peter Drucker classic on time-tested aspects of strategy, planning, decision making, delegation, communicating, meeting management, and collaboration in being an effective executive. I like doing a periodic refresh of such books.
I found it amazing that a book written 55 years ago included so many of my favourite ideas that I have read about in other books such as the importance of prioritising and not multi tasking, getting the best people possible on your team, concentrating on your strengths etc. The chapter on decision making was very valuable too.
My issue now is which of Peter Drucker鈥檚 other 38 books to read next - does anyone have any recommendations?
The Effective Executive is filled with good advice. Peter Ducker predicts the importance of knowledge workers and recognizes that everyone will become an "executive" (as he defines it). The advice in this book is useful to most anyone working in a modern company.
Alas, there are two problems with the book that stop me from full-heartedly recommending this book:
* It's dated, and it shows. There's a lot of repetition and flowery language. * I've already read "The Effective Engineer" (one of my favorite books of 2016), which builds upon the concept of "effectiveness."
In the end, I liked this book by Peter Drucker, but just barely. If you're a software engineer, go read "The Effective Engineer" instead. If you're not, then this book might be worth a read, depending on how fast you become annoyed with dated language 馃檪.
Although the book was first released in 1967, the ideas in this book still hold up today. I found the clarity of the ideas and the principles very helpful. I can recommend this book to everyone in a Leadership position or people interested in the topic.
Written in 1966, The Effective Executive alternates between dated and timeless. Dated, in that the language often rings tinny on the modern ear. Dated, in that there are six pages on Decision-making and these new-fangled Computers. Dated, in that Drucker urges tolerance of personal behavior that will bring on a flurry of lawsuits in today鈥檚 environment as long as the individual serves up exceptional results.
Timeless, because here we find the origins of personal and business management for the next 55 years. This is the first use of the phrase 鈥榢nowledge worker鈥�. Chapter by chapter, we find David Allen鈥檚 Getting Things Done in Chapter 2, Know Thy Time; we find the works of Marcus Buckingham and Tom Rath鈥檚 Strengths Finder 2.0 in Chapter 4, Making Strengths Productive. The title of Chapter 5 is, literally, one of Stephen Covey鈥檚 7 Habits 鈥� First Things First. The directive to test your hypotheses in the chapters of decision-making could be lifted straight out any modern book on strategy today.
Synopsis
鈥楨ffectiveness鈥� is getting the right things done. Effectiveness can, and must be, learned. Every knowledge worker is an executive.
The executive faces constraints: Their time belongs to everyone else in the organization. They have to keep doing their operation work even as they take on executive roles. They are effective only if others use their contributions. They are isolated from the outside, but to be effective, their contribution to results must be felt outside their organization.
The book presents the five key practices that lead to effectiveness.
KNOW YOUR TIME
Record your time in a time log to know where it is being spent. Likely, it is not where you think.
The key to managing time is to delete activities, delegate activities, and consolidate the remaining time into the largest chunks possible. An overlooked source of time for the organization is to not waste the time of others.
The major timewasters are too many meetings (obvious), lack of systems 鈥� re-solving the same problem again and again (see the chapter on decision-making), and over-staffing 鈥� too many personalities with too much time invites friction between people.
FOCUS ON RESULTS, NOT EFFORT
The primary area of focus should be contribution to the organization, not hours worked, not reports generated, not slide decks built. The three main areas are direct results (revenue, profits, accomplishments), building values, and people development 鈥� yourself and others.
The development results are two of the basic requirements of effective human relations, the others being teamwork and communication.
FOCUS ON STRENGTHS, NOT WEAKNESSES
Build on strengths of the team to make weaknesses irrelevant. The key question an executive should ask about another is, 鈥淲hat can this person DO?鈥�
When staffing, the main task is to fill the job, not structure jobs around people. That leads to favoritism and conformity. To avoid structuring jobs around the person, guard against building the 鈥榠mpossible鈥� job, but make each job big and demanding. Appraise people before testing them against the job.
To appraise people: 鈥� Do not focus on weaknesses, look for strengths 鈥� Realize weaknesses come with strengths. You hire the whole person. 鈥� Ask yourself: What have they done well in the past? What are they likely to do well in the future? What must they learn?
Focusing on strengths and not weaknesses applies to bosses and yourself as well as subordinates
FIRST THINGS FIRST
Do one thing at a time.
In setting priorities: 鈥� Favor the future over the past. Avoid the 鈥榮unk cost鈥� fallacy 鈥� that is, letting the time and money already spent on an activity drive decisions about the future. Set 鈥榮unset鈥� dates on activities to stop doing them unless consciously renewed. 鈥� Favor opportunities over problems. Focus on the important, not the urgent. In addition to a to-do list, have a stop-doing list. Kill old tasks to make room for new ones. Realize projects postponed become projects abandoned and remove them to not waste mental energy on them. 鈥� Favor making a difference over playing safe.
MAKE EFFECTIVE DECISIONS
Only executives make decisions, and they concentrate their time and efforts on important ones. They favor impact over technique and sound over clever reasoning.
The first question to consider is: is this decision necessary? Do the benefits of a decision greatly outweigh the risks of not deciding? If proceeding with a decision, follow this process:
Ask 鈥渋s this situation generic or an exception?鈥� Assume (in order):
1. The problem is generic, a symptom of a larger problem. This includes generic problems that may be unique to you (e.g., a merger). 2. Though the only instance (so far), the problem is emergent of a new (generic) class. 3. Truly one-off.
Develop a clear specification of what the decision must accomplish.
Start with what is right, not what is acceptable (compromises will come easy enough).
The decision must have its own 鈥榗onversion to action鈥�. That is, it must specify what action is to be taken, who takes it, who needs to know about the decision, and what roadblocks to the action need to be removed.
Decisions begin with a hypothesis 鈥� a point of view about how things work 鈥� which begins with an opinion, not facts. Consequently, the effective manager does not argue a decision, they test, test, test it. In testing it, start with the assumption that the traditional measurement is not the right measurement.
Finally, when a decision is made, execute it. Don鈥檛 study it to death or procrastinate waiting for more data.
These five practices, though simple in concept are not necessarily easy in practice. They require constant exercise because they are essential to getting the right things done.