The Effective Executive

by Peter F. Drucker

In other words, up to recent times, the major problem of organization was efficiency in the performance of the manual worker who did what he had been told to do. Knowledge workers were not predominant in organization.

The knowledge worker cannot be supervised closely or in detail. He can only be helped. But he must direct himself, and he must direct himself toward performance and contribution, that is, toward effectiveness.

If 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 “operating.” 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.

The truly important events on the outside are not the trends. They are changes in the trends. These determine ultimately success

The tremendous amount of computer information may thus shut out access to reality.

The effective executives I have seen differ widely in their temperaments and their abilities, in what they do and how they do it, in their personalities, their knowledge, their interests—in fact in almost everything that distinguishes human beings. All they have in common is the ability to get the right things done.

1. Effective executives know where their time goes. They work systematically at managing the little of their time that can be brought under their control.

2. Effective executives focus on outward contribution. They gear their efforts to results rather than to work. They start out with the question, “What results are expected of me?” rather than with the work to be done, let alone with its techniques and tools.

3. Effective executives build on strengths—their own strengths, the strengths of their superiors, colleagues, and subordinates; and on the strengths in the situation, that is, on what they can do. They do not build on wea...

4. Effective executives concentrate on the few major areas where superior performance will produce outstanding results. They force themselves to set priorities and stay with their priority decisions. They know that they have no choice but to do first things first—and second things not at all. The alternative is to get nothing done.

5. Effective executives, finally, make effective decisions. They know that this is, above all, a matter of system—of the right steps in the right sequence. They know that an effective decision is always a judgment based on “dissenting opinions” rather than on “consensus on the facts.” And they know that to make many decisions fast means to make the wrong decisions. What is needed are few, but fundamental, decisions. What is needed is the right strategy rather than razzle-dazzle tactics.

people are either “readers” or “listeners”

If there is any one “secret” of effectiveness, it is concentration. Effective executives do first things first and they do one thing at a time.

Effective executives periodically review their work programs—and those of their associates—and ask: “If we did not already do this, would we go into it now?”

These are the elements of the effective decision process. 1. The first question the effective decision-maker asks is: “Is this a generic situation or an exception?”

the effective decision-maker always tries to put his solution on the highest possible conceptual level.

One of the most obvious facts of social and political life is the longevity of the temporary.

The effective executive does not need to make many decisions. Because he solves generic situations through a rule and policy, he can handle most events as cases under the rule; that is, by adaptation.

The second major element in the decision process is clear specifications as to what the decision has to accomplish.

3. One has to start out with what is right rather than what is acceptable (let alone who is right) precisely because one always has to compromise in the end. But if one does not know what is right to satisfy the specifications and boundary conditions, one cannot distinguish between the right compromise and the wrong compromise—and will end up by making the wrong compromise.

5. Finally, a feedback has to be built into the decision to provide a continuous testing, against actual events, of the expectations that underlie the decision.

To determine what is a fact requires first a decision on the criteria of relevance, especially on the appropriate measurement.

The only rigorous method, the only one that enables us to test an opinion against reality, is based on the clear recognition that opinions come first—and that this is the way it should be.

Finding the appropriate measurement is thus not a mathematical exercise. It is a risk-taking judgment. Whenever one has to judge, one must have alternatives among which one can choose. A judgment in which one can only say “yes” or “no” is no judgment at all. Only if there are alternatives can one hope to get insight into what is truly at stake.

The first rule in decision-making is that one does not make a decision unless there is disagreement.

There are three main reasons for the insistence on disagreement. It is, first, the only safeguard against the decision-maker’s becoming the prisoner of the organization. Everybody always wants something from the decision-maker. Everybody is a special pleader, trying—often in perfectly good faith—to obtain the decision he favors.

Second, disagreement alone can provide alternatives to a decision.

The effective decision-maker, therefore, organizes disagreement.

In this situation the effective decision-maker compares effort and risk of action to risk of inaction. There is no formula for the right decision here. But the guidelines are so clear that decision in the concrete case is rarely difficult. They are: Act if on balance the benefits greatly outweigh cost and risk; and Act or do not act; but do not “hedge” or compromise.