The Effective Executive: The Definitive Guide to Getting the Right Things Done (Harperbusiness Essentials)

by Peter F. Drucker

Everything requires time. It is the one truly universal condition.

If one wants to get anything across, one has to spend a fairly large minimum quantum of time.

“What should we at the head of this organization know about your work? What do you want to tell me regarding this organization? Where do you see opportunities we do not exploit? Where do you see dangers to which we are still blind? And, all together, what do you want to know from me about the organization?”

“the span of control,”

Time in large, continuous, and uninterrupted units is needed for such decisions as whom to put on a task force set up to study a specific problem;

“What one does not have in one’s feet, one’s got to have in one’s head.”

This requires asking oneself a number of diagnostic questions.

“What do I do that wastes your time without contributing to your effectiveness?”

Too many meetings always bespeak poor structure of jobs and the wrong organizational components. Too many meetings signify that work that should be in one job or in one component is spread over several jobs or several components. They signify that responsibility is diffused and that information is not addressed to the people who need it.

“The former director was writing for us; your new man writes at us.”

It needs direct results; building of values and their reaffirmation; and building and developing people for tomorrow.

“What contribution from me do you require to make your contribution to the organization? When do you need this, how do you need it, and in what form?”

“What are the contributions for which this organization and I, your superior, should hold you accountable? What should we expect of you? What is the best utilization of your knowledge and your ability?”

“Who has to use my output for it to become effective?”

“What self-development do I need? What knowledge and skill do I have to acquire to make the contribution I should be making? What strengths do I have to put to work? What standards do I have to set myself?”

“Why are we having this meeting? Do we want a decision, do we want to inform, or do we want to make clear to ourselves what we should be doing?”

He always, at the end of his meetings, goes back to the opening statement and relates the final conclusions to the original intent.

The focus on contribution imposes an organizing principle. It imposes relevance on events.

To focus on contribution is to focus on effectiveness.

He does not make staffing decisions to minimize weaknesses but to maximize strength.

“Here lies a man who knew how to bring into his service men better than he was himself.”

Effective executives know that their subordinates are paid to perform and not to please their superiors.

Effective executives never ask “How does he get along with me?” Their question is “What does he contribute?” Their question is never “What can a man not do?” Their question is always “What can he do uncommonly well?”

A good tax accountant in private practice might be greatly hampered by his inability to get along with people. But in an organization such a man can be set up in an office of his own and shielded from direct contact with other people.

By and large they follow four rules:

forever on guard against the “impossible” job,

It is its capacity to make common people achieve uncommon performance.

make each job demanding and big.

“Am I in the right work and in the right place for my strengths to tell?”

Those that are deeply frustrated all say, in one way or another: “My abilities are not being put to use.”

They quenched the fire by making the young man’s job too small.

start with what a man can do rather than with what a job requires.

They always look for strength.

four questions:

But their absence faults everything else.

“Does this man have strength in one major area? And is this strength relevant to the task? If he achieves excellence in this one area, will it make a significant difference?” And if the answer is “yes,” he will go ahead and appoint the man.

“What can this man do?”

only concerned with weaknesses when they limited the full development of a man’s strength.

A superior has responsibility for the work of others. He also has power over the careers of others. Making strengths productive is therefore much more than an essential of effectiveness. It is a moral imperative, a responsibility of authority and position. To focus on weakness is not only foolish; it is irresponsible.

“I have no great trouble managing my subordinates. But how do I manage my boss?”

effective executives make the strengths of the boss productive.

Because the superior is human, he has his strengths; but he also has limitations.

“What can my boss do really well?” “What has he done really well?” “What does he need to know to use his strength?” “What does he need to get from me to perform?”

the boss, being human, has his own ways of being effective.

It is generally a waste of time to talk to a reader. He only listens after he has read. It is equally a waste of time to submit a voluminous report to a listener. He can only grasp what it is all about through the spoken word.

Some people need to have things summed up for them in one page.

Others need to be able to follow the thought processes of the man who makes the recommendation and therefore require a big report before anything becomes meaningful to them. Some superiors want to see sixty pages of figures on everything. Some want to be in at the early stages so that they can prepare themselves for the eventual de...

All of us are “experts” on other people and see them much more clearly than they see themselves.

But even if superficial, these work habits are a source of effectiveness.

“What are the things,” he asks, “that I seem to be able to do with relative ease, while they come rather hard to other people?”