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Management Challenges for the 21st Century
Peter F. Drucker discusses how the new paradigms of management have changed and will continue to change our basic assumptions about the practices and principles of management. Forward-looking and forward-thinking, Management Challenges for the 21st Century combines the broad knowledge, wide practical experience, profound insight, sharp analysis, and enlightened common sense that are the essence of Drucker's writings and "landmarks of the managerial profession." -- Harvard Business Review
224 pages, Paperback
First published September 1, 2009
79 people are currently reading
1661 people want to read
About the author
Peter F. Drucker
600 books2,008 followersPeter 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, Döbling). 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.
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, Döbling). 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.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 41 reviews
April 15, 2012
Peters concept of the "knowledge worker" in the 21st century. I have managed developers, engineers, and product managers most of my adult life, and this book helped me understand why they do the things they do, and what motivates them.
This is a great read.
Tom Ryker (author - http://tomryker.com/)
This is a great read.
Tom Ryker (author - http://tomryker.com/)
August 2, 2018
Yleissivistävä, terävä, oivaltava, hauska ja yllättävän ajankohtainen kirja (vuodelta 1999), joka johtamisen sijaan käsitteli isoja yhteiskunnallisia muutoksia tulevaisuudessa.
August 14, 2016
I feel the most important factor for me to buy/read this book was the fact, it was written by Drucker, whom some refer to as the father of modern management, and the tittle was about the future challenges. And also, my “initiation” to this book through the pre-published version of Chap 6 in HBR.
Now, I beg to differ from many that have to say this book is easy to understand. This was one of the few books that I had to try vv. hard to keep my “flow” and concentration. One reason, I could attribute reading Chap 6 from this book is - this isn’t for my personality, this isn’t written in the style where in I can perform at my best… or … could this book be overloaded with mumbo-jumbo of management (terms) which isn’t easy to comprehend?
No doubt you are to gain a swift knowledge about - history of management, fascinating insights into some of the key business leaders and politicians of the last century, etc. This book meets its objective in making the reader rethink the basic assumptions we hold, makes us aware of what the future has. As the author himself writes as part of the introduction - this is not a book of PREDICTIONS, not a book about FUTURE…it deals with exclusively with TOMORROW’S “hot issues” …The challenges and issues discussed in it are already with us in every one of the developed countries. So this should have universal appeal, to everyone connected to the 21st century and it comes from DRUCKER himself!
The book essentially is a collection of six essays on future management issues organization and individuals need to address.
Management’s New Paradigms Basic assumptions that underline the management as a discipline are proved to have outlived their usefulness.
Management is not just restricted to business alone – any more than say medicine is Obstetrics (PP 8). So management is as relevant in non-business as in business. But of course there is difference in the application between different organization based on their need.
There can’t be ONE right organization structure. Each structure has their own strengths and limitations for specific applications. So organization structure is just a tool for making people productive (PP 11).
Similarly there can’t be ONE right way to mange people. Individuals have to be managed in the way they can perform at their best. The issue is not “managing people” the issue should be to manage for performance (PP 21)
Like wise four assumptions on the management practice to have outlived their purpose –
Neither technology nor end-user is linked to any one product or service. The foundation for management should be customer’s perceived values and their decision on the distribution of their disposable income.
The scope of managing has to move away for legal bounds, while encompassing the entire process focusing on results and performance across the entire economic chain (PP 34)
Management and national boundaries are no longer congruent… hence the bounds of management practice has to be defined operationally rather than politically (PP 36-37)
Management has to move out of the bounds of “inside” and concentrate on the “non-customers” to improve the results and performance of the organization.
Strategy - The New Certainties Drucker contends, there are five social and political certainties that will shape business strategy in future:
The collapsing birthrate in the developed world
Shifts in distribution of disposable income
As a result of the above point strategy shift, organization stakeholders invest having a in mind a in time frame of 30-40 years, contrary tot he current need to short/immediate term. In addition organization need to attract and retain good talents to last as long as 3-40 years profitably. Hence the term performance has to be redefined to meet the above criteria. (PP 60-61)
Low labor costs can no longer give competitive advantage. So the only way to gain advantage is to perform at standards set by the each industry’s leader anyplace in the world (PP 62-63)
As discussed earlier, national boundaries and their economy can’t restrict the scope of organization business. But political boundaries are realties to limit your business. Hence we need to accept incongruence between economic and political reality ( PP 63)
The Change Leader In this essay Drucker proves many of us right by stating “One cannot manage change, one can only be ahead of it”. And states being a change leader would be the biggest challenge in this century. He provides a roadmap to become a change leader through – what policies we need to make for the future. How to anticipate changes. What is the right way to introduce change and finally how to balance change and continuity (PP 73)
Information Challenges To be a leader you need to focus on the meaning of information not technology, speed, etc. The IT revolution what we are all hyped up about is about the revolution in the concept as to how individuals are to use information to improve performance. It is definitely not about computers. Internet is just a means for this change.
Knowledge-Worker Productivity In the current century wealth and asset of an organization would be defined in terms of its knowledge worker and their productivity. So the factors contributing are - Identifying what hampers performance, they need to have independence (accountable), continuous learning & innovation, OPTIMUMM product/service quality and finally a mind set change to treat knowledge workers as a corporate asset rather than as cost (PP 142)
Future is for what Drucker calls as technologist – whose job scope involves both knowledge related and manual work (PP 149)
Managing Oneself Finally this last essay provides tips on the responsibilities that knowledge workers must assume in managing themselves and their careers. The central thesis of this essay is – due to declining birth rate, affluence, etc an average knowledge worker may not retire at a set age, as was the case with manual workers. They tend to work through late at their age and would outlive the life of their employing organization.
To wrap up this is review, as Drucker in his introduction calls this book - a call of action. That is
“ read a chapter at a time, ask… what do these challenges mean for my organization and me? .. think through what actions to take to turn the challenges into opportunities..” Hence don’t expect solutions of the “hot issues of the future”
Now, I beg to differ from many that have to say this book is easy to understand. This was one of the few books that I had to try vv. hard to keep my “flow” and concentration. One reason, I could attribute reading Chap 6 from this book is - this isn’t for my personality, this isn’t written in the style where in I can perform at my best… or … could this book be overloaded with mumbo-jumbo of management (terms) which isn’t easy to comprehend?
No doubt you are to gain a swift knowledge about - history of management, fascinating insights into some of the key business leaders and politicians of the last century, etc. This book meets its objective in making the reader rethink the basic assumptions we hold, makes us aware of what the future has. As the author himself writes as part of the introduction - this is not a book of PREDICTIONS, not a book about FUTURE…it deals with exclusively with TOMORROW’S “hot issues” …The challenges and issues discussed in it are already with us in every one of the developed countries. So this should have universal appeal, to everyone connected to the 21st century and it comes from DRUCKER himself!
The book essentially is a collection of six essays on future management issues organization and individuals need to address.
Management’s New Paradigms Basic assumptions that underline the management as a discipline are proved to have outlived their usefulness.
Management is not just restricted to business alone – any more than say medicine is Obstetrics (PP 8). So management is as relevant in non-business as in business. But of course there is difference in the application between different organization based on their need.
There can’t be ONE right organization structure. Each structure has their own strengths and limitations for specific applications. So organization structure is just a tool for making people productive (PP 11).
Similarly there can’t be ONE right way to mange people. Individuals have to be managed in the way they can perform at their best. The issue is not “managing people” the issue should be to manage for performance (PP 21)
Like wise four assumptions on the management practice to have outlived their purpose –
Neither technology nor end-user is linked to any one product or service. The foundation for management should be customer’s perceived values and their decision on the distribution of their disposable income.
The scope of managing has to move away for legal bounds, while encompassing the entire process focusing on results and performance across the entire economic chain (PP 34)
Management and national boundaries are no longer congruent… hence the bounds of management practice has to be defined operationally rather than politically (PP 36-37)
Management has to move out of the bounds of “inside” and concentrate on the “non-customers” to improve the results and performance of the organization.
Strategy - The New Certainties Drucker contends, there are five social and political certainties that will shape business strategy in future:
The collapsing birthrate in the developed world
Shifts in distribution of disposable income
As a result of the above point strategy shift, organization stakeholders invest having a in mind a in time frame of 30-40 years, contrary tot he current need to short/immediate term. In addition organization need to attract and retain good talents to last as long as 3-40 years profitably. Hence the term performance has to be redefined to meet the above criteria. (PP 60-61)
Low labor costs can no longer give competitive advantage. So the only way to gain advantage is to perform at standards set by the each industry’s leader anyplace in the world (PP 62-63)
As discussed earlier, national boundaries and their economy can’t restrict the scope of organization business. But political boundaries are realties to limit your business. Hence we need to accept incongruence between economic and political reality ( PP 63)
The Change Leader In this essay Drucker proves many of us right by stating “One cannot manage change, one can only be ahead of it”. And states being a change leader would be the biggest challenge in this century. He provides a roadmap to become a change leader through – what policies we need to make for the future. How to anticipate changes. What is the right way to introduce change and finally how to balance change and continuity (PP 73)
Information Challenges To be a leader you need to focus on the meaning of information not technology, speed, etc. The IT revolution what we are all hyped up about is about the revolution in the concept as to how individuals are to use information to improve performance. It is definitely not about computers. Internet is just a means for this change.
Knowledge-Worker Productivity In the current century wealth and asset of an organization would be defined in terms of its knowledge worker and their productivity. So the factors contributing are - Identifying what hampers performance, they need to have independence (accountable), continuous learning & innovation, OPTIMUMM product/service quality and finally a mind set change to treat knowledge workers as a corporate asset rather than as cost (PP 142)
Future is for what Drucker calls as technologist – whose job scope involves both knowledge related and manual work (PP 149)
Managing Oneself Finally this last essay provides tips on the responsibilities that knowledge workers must assume in managing themselves and their careers. The central thesis of this essay is – due to declining birth rate, affluence, etc an average knowledge worker may not retire at a set age, as was the case with manual workers. They tend to work through late at their age and would outlive the life of their employing organization.
To wrap up this is review, as Drucker in his introduction calls this book - a call of action. That is
“ read a chapter at a time, ask… what do these challenges mean for my organization and me? .. think through what actions to take to turn the challenges into opportunities..” Hence don’t expect solutions of the “hot issues of the future”
October 1, 2021
Ok, if I had read this book in 1999/2000 when it was first published, I'd probably have rated it 4* or 5*. In fact, Drucker was truly far-sighted considering this was written more than 20 years ago when the impact of the internet wasn't yet clear.
I'm giving it 3* because:
1. I'm reading it in 2021 and it does sound a little dated in some parts.
2. It's quite hard to read with all the CAPS inserted everywhere. And the language is somewhat old-school and abstract/hard to digest.
Basically, there are 6 major management challenges for the 21st century identified by Drucker:
1. 7 paradigm shifts
2. 5 certainties that will affect organizational strategies
3. Leading change (4 ingredients)
4. The new information revolution (focused on information, not technology)
5. Knowledge worker productivity
6. Managing oneself
I actually found this book because I keep hearing about "Managing Oneself", and finally realized that it's 1 of the 6 key challenges in this book (though HBR did separately publish a mini book titled "Managing Oneself). This is indeed a good chapter which gives the 5 questions you need take charge of your career as a knowledge worker. The rest of the chapters/challenges are good, but not exactly life-changing.
Book summary at: https://readingraphics.com/book-summa...
I'm giving it 3* because:
1. I'm reading it in 2021 and it does sound a little dated in some parts.
2. It's quite hard to read with all the CAPS inserted everywhere. And the language is somewhat old-school and abstract/hard to digest.
Basically, there are 6 major management challenges for the 21st century identified by Drucker:
1. 7 paradigm shifts
2. 5 certainties that will affect organizational strategies
3. Leading change (4 ingredients)
4. The new information revolution (focused on information, not technology)
5. Knowledge worker productivity
6. Managing oneself
I actually found this book because I keep hearing about "Managing Oneself", and finally realized that it's 1 of the 6 key challenges in this book (though HBR did separately publish a mini book titled "Managing Oneself). This is indeed a good chapter which gives the 5 questions you need take charge of your career as a knowledge worker. The rest of the chapters/challenges are good, but not exactly life-changing.
Book summary at: https://readingraphics.com/book-summa...
March 30, 2026
Takeaways from reading the book:
Changes in technology
- Page 108: The inventor of the steam engine, James Watt, saw only one use for the steam engine: To pump water out of a coal mine. He sold steam engines only to coal mines. His partner Matthew Boulton, saw that the steam engine could also be used in the textile industry - especially in the spinning and weaving of cotton. That helped the price of cotton textiles fall significantly - thereby creating a mass market.
- Page 125: Before Gutenberg introduced the Gutenberg press in the 15th century, monks used to copy books by hand. With Gutenberg's innovation prices of books fell dramatically. In the decades after the invention of the Gutenberg press, several universities were founded throughout Europe.
- Page 131: When television came in 1950, it was widely believed that it would be the end of the printed book. It did not. The number of printed books published and bought in the USA has grown close to 20-fold.
- Page 150: Molecular biology and genetic engineering were developed outside the pharmaceutical industry.
Changes in education
- Page 69: Education will continue to be a growth sector.
- Page 64: It is possible that having fewer children means that the child becomes more and more precious.
- Page 123: Education may extend to continuing professional education of adults during their entire professional lives. This is likely to move education to lots of new places - including in the home and on the train.
Changes in healthcare
- Page 57: In developed countries, the birthrate is collapsing. The older population is growing much faster than the young population. This phenomenon is new in the world. There is no precedent for a population structure in which old people past any traditional retirement age outnumber young people.
- Page 69: Healthcare will continue to be a growth sector.
- Page 123: Healthcare will extend to maintenance of physical and mental functioning.
Needs of users
- Page 40: What the customer views as value is often different from what the supplier views as value. This applies as much to a business as to a university or to a hospital.
- Page 106: The test of an innovation is to what extent users want it.
Leading change
- Page 31: Increasingly, management is a marketing job. It is about understanding what people want. What values do people have? What goals do they have?
- Page 31: The goal of management is to make productive the specific strengths and knowledge of each person.
- Page 41: Increasingly, managing will start with customer values and customer decisions on the distribution of their disposable income.
- Page 53: Management must focus on the results and performance of the organization.
- Page 91: Look for change. What is changing?
- Page 91: Abandon what is not working anymore - including products, services, processes, markets, and/or distribution channels.
- Page 97: Abandon how you do things when that is not working anymore. For every product, service, market, or process, ask: If you were to start doing this now, would you do it in the way we are doing it now? In this regard, keep in mind that distribution channels tend to change faster than anything else.
- Page 100: Whatever you do now, improve it continuously. In order to improve "performance", define what "performance" means.
- Page 104: See change as opportunity. Look for windows of opportunity - including unexpected successes and changes that are happening.
- Page 108: The new needs someone that really wants the new. It needs someone who says, "I am going to make this succeed" and then goes to work on it. It can be an external person.
Offerings
Page 111: Invest in successful products, services and technologies.
Resources
- Page 62: A growing part of work will be done by people beyond working age, who are not employees and who do not work fulltime.
- Pages 152-153: To produce information people need for their work, they have to start with 2 questions: 1. What information do people, with whom I work, need from me? 2. What information do I need myself from people, with whom I work? What other people need comes first because it establishes communication.
- Page 161: It is a very old observation that few things improve the performance of a physician as much as being a hospital patient for two weeks. Why? Because thereby he or she gets true information.
- Page 162: Information from the outside may be the most important information leaders need to do their work.
Organization
- Page 10: The basic assumption of the one right organization is no longer tenable.
- Pages 19-20: In any one enterprise there is a need for a number of different organization structures that coexist side by side. There are strong differences in organisation structure depending on the nature of the task.
- Page 21: An organization has to be transparent. People have to understand the structure they work in.
- Page 21: One person must have the authority to make the final decision.
- Page 21: In an organisation, one person should only have one manager.
- Page 21: An organisation should have as few management layers as possible.
- Page 22: Depending on task that a person does, the way work is organized may be very different.
- Page 25: Management needs to look for, to develop and to test the organization that fits the task.
- Page 27: An increasing number of people, who provide services for organizations, are not employed.
Costs
Page 137: Service companies cannot start with the cost of individual operations, as manufacturing companies have done with traditional costs accounting. They must start with the assumption that there is only one cost: that of the total system. And it is a fixed costs over any given time period. The famous distinction between fixed and variable costs, on which traditional cost accounting is based, does not make sense in services. Neither does another basic assumption of traditional cost accounting: That capital can be substituted for labor. In fact, in knowledge work especially, additional capital investment will require more rather than less labor.
Principles of manual work productivity
- Page 166: Analyze motions in doing a task - including what specific motions are done and how long time each motion takes to do.
- Page 166: Eliminate motions that are not needed.
- Page 166: Set up essential motions to be done in the simplest, easiest and fastest way.
- Page 166: Redesign tools needed to do the motions so the tools have the right shape, size and handle.
- Page 174: The key question of manual worker productivity is "How should the work be done?"
- Page 174: What is to be done is always obvious in manual work.
Factors that determine knowledge worker productivity
- Pages 172, 174 and 178: The key question in knowledge work is: "What is the task?" Defining the task is part of quality in knowledge work.
- Page 172: Knowledge workers have to have freedom, for example to define what the task should be and what contributions should be made.
- Page 172: Continuing innovation has to be part of the work, the task and the responsibility of knowledge workers.
- Pages 172 and 176: Continuous learning and teaching have to be built into the work.
- Pages 172-174: Quality is the essence of knowledge worker output. Thereafter, we can ask what the quantity is. We need to ask what quality is.
- Page 172: Knowledge worker productivity requires that the knowledge worker is both seen and treated as an asset rather than a cost.
- Page 174: Unlike manual work, knowledge work does not program the worker.
- Page 178: To be productive, knowledge workers must be considered a capital asset. Assets need to be made to grow.
- Page 180: Knowledge workers own the means of production which is knowledge in their brain.
- Page 189: The first step in making knowledge workers productive is to work with a small group who want to be productive.
- Page 189: When the productivity of this small group has been strongly increased, it is time to help others become more productive.
- Page 195: Knowledge workers need to place themselves where they can make the greatest contribution.
Tips to contribute in the best possible ways
- Page 196: One can only perform with one's strengths.
- Pages 196 - 198: To find your strengths, get feedback. That helps you to know what to improve.
- Page 196: Finding your strengths is important to know where you belong.
- Page 198: Place yourself where your strengths can produce performance and results.
- Page 199: The main reason for poor performance is the result of not knowing enough.
- Page 200: Find out what your bad habits are.
- Page 201: Waste as little effort as possible on improving areas of low competence.
Additional research from the book
- Page 10: As the social universe has no natural laws like the physical universe, the social universe changes continuously.
- Page 13: The first job, to which the term "manager" was applied, was the city manager.
- Page 13: The first conscious and systematic application of management principles was the reorganization of the US Army in 1901.
- Page 16: The growth sector in the 21st century is likely to be in the social sector. This is also the sector where management today is most needed and where systematic, principled, theory-based management can yield the greatest results the fastest.
- Page 59: Increasingly, the strategy of all institutions will have to be based on a shrinking population, especially a shrinking young population.
- Page 169: After having lost World War I, the German general staff applied Taylor's Scientific Management to military training. This enabled Hitler to create a superb fighting machine. In the USA, scientific management principles were applied as well. Since 1950, economic development outside the Western world has been based on applying scientific management to make the manual worker more productive. All earlier economic development had been based on technological innovation.
To be updated.
Changes in technology
- Page 108: The inventor of the steam engine, James Watt, saw only one use for the steam engine: To pump water out of a coal mine. He sold steam engines only to coal mines. His partner Matthew Boulton, saw that the steam engine could also be used in the textile industry - especially in the spinning and weaving of cotton. That helped the price of cotton textiles fall significantly - thereby creating a mass market.
- Page 125: Before Gutenberg introduced the Gutenberg press in the 15th century, monks used to copy books by hand. With Gutenberg's innovation prices of books fell dramatically. In the decades after the invention of the Gutenberg press, several universities were founded throughout Europe.
- Page 131: When television came in 1950, it was widely believed that it would be the end of the printed book. It did not. The number of printed books published and bought in the USA has grown close to 20-fold.
- Page 150: Molecular biology and genetic engineering were developed outside the pharmaceutical industry.
Changes in education
- Page 69: Education will continue to be a growth sector.
- Page 64: It is possible that having fewer children means that the child becomes more and more precious.
- Page 123: Education may extend to continuing professional education of adults during their entire professional lives. This is likely to move education to lots of new places - including in the home and on the train.
Changes in healthcare
- Page 57: In developed countries, the birthrate is collapsing. The older population is growing much faster than the young population. This phenomenon is new in the world. There is no precedent for a population structure in which old people past any traditional retirement age outnumber young people.
- Page 69: Healthcare will continue to be a growth sector.
- Page 123: Healthcare will extend to maintenance of physical and mental functioning.
Needs of users
- Page 40: What the customer views as value is often different from what the supplier views as value. This applies as much to a business as to a university or to a hospital.
- Page 106: The test of an innovation is to what extent users want it.
Leading change
- Page 31: Increasingly, management is a marketing job. It is about understanding what people want. What values do people have? What goals do they have?
- Page 31: The goal of management is to make productive the specific strengths and knowledge of each person.
- Page 41: Increasingly, managing will start with customer values and customer decisions on the distribution of their disposable income.
- Page 53: Management must focus on the results and performance of the organization.
- Page 91: Look for change. What is changing?
- Page 91: Abandon what is not working anymore - including products, services, processes, markets, and/or distribution channels.
- Page 97: Abandon how you do things when that is not working anymore. For every product, service, market, or process, ask: If you were to start doing this now, would you do it in the way we are doing it now? In this regard, keep in mind that distribution channels tend to change faster than anything else.
- Page 100: Whatever you do now, improve it continuously. In order to improve "performance", define what "performance" means.
- Page 104: See change as opportunity. Look for windows of opportunity - including unexpected successes and changes that are happening.
- Page 108: The new needs someone that really wants the new. It needs someone who says, "I am going to make this succeed" and then goes to work on it. It can be an external person.
Offerings
Page 111: Invest in successful products, services and technologies.
Resources
- Page 62: A growing part of work will be done by people beyond working age, who are not employees and who do not work fulltime.
- Pages 152-153: To produce information people need for their work, they have to start with 2 questions: 1. What information do people, with whom I work, need from me? 2. What information do I need myself from people, with whom I work? What other people need comes first because it establishes communication.
- Page 161: It is a very old observation that few things improve the performance of a physician as much as being a hospital patient for two weeks. Why? Because thereby he or she gets true information.
- Page 162: Information from the outside may be the most important information leaders need to do their work.
Organization
- Page 10: The basic assumption of the one right organization is no longer tenable.
- Pages 19-20: In any one enterprise there is a need for a number of different organization structures that coexist side by side. There are strong differences in organisation structure depending on the nature of the task.
- Page 21: An organization has to be transparent. People have to understand the structure they work in.
- Page 21: One person must have the authority to make the final decision.
- Page 21: In an organisation, one person should only have one manager.
- Page 21: An organisation should have as few management layers as possible.
- Page 22: Depending on task that a person does, the way work is organized may be very different.
- Page 25: Management needs to look for, to develop and to test the organization that fits the task.
- Page 27: An increasing number of people, who provide services for organizations, are not employed.
Costs
Page 137: Service companies cannot start with the cost of individual operations, as manufacturing companies have done with traditional costs accounting. They must start with the assumption that there is only one cost: that of the total system. And it is a fixed costs over any given time period. The famous distinction between fixed and variable costs, on which traditional cost accounting is based, does not make sense in services. Neither does another basic assumption of traditional cost accounting: That capital can be substituted for labor. In fact, in knowledge work especially, additional capital investment will require more rather than less labor.
Principles of manual work productivity
- Page 166: Analyze motions in doing a task - including what specific motions are done and how long time each motion takes to do.
- Page 166: Eliminate motions that are not needed.
- Page 166: Set up essential motions to be done in the simplest, easiest and fastest way.
- Page 166: Redesign tools needed to do the motions so the tools have the right shape, size and handle.
- Page 174: The key question of manual worker productivity is "How should the work be done?"
- Page 174: What is to be done is always obvious in manual work.
Factors that determine knowledge worker productivity
- Pages 172, 174 and 178: The key question in knowledge work is: "What is the task?" Defining the task is part of quality in knowledge work.
- Page 172: Knowledge workers have to have freedom, for example to define what the task should be and what contributions should be made.
- Page 172: Continuing innovation has to be part of the work, the task and the responsibility of knowledge workers.
- Pages 172 and 176: Continuous learning and teaching have to be built into the work.
- Pages 172-174: Quality is the essence of knowledge worker output. Thereafter, we can ask what the quantity is. We need to ask what quality is.
- Page 172: Knowledge worker productivity requires that the knowledge worker is both seen and treated as an asset rather than a cost.
- Page 174: Unlike manual work, knowledge work does not program the worker.
- Page 178: To be productive, knowledge workers must be considered a capital asset. Assets need to be made to grow.
- Page 180: Knowledge workers own the means of production which is knowledge in their brain.
- Page 189: The first step in making knowledge workers productive is to work with a small group who want to be productive.
- Page 189: When the productivity of this small group has been strongly increased, it is time to help others become more productive.
- Page 195: Knowledge workers need to place themselves where they can make the greatest contribution.
Tips to contribute in the best possible ways
- Page 196: One can only perform with one's strengths.
- Pages 196 - 198: To find your strengths, get feedback. That helps you to know what to improve.
- Page 196: Finding your strengths is important to know where you belong.
- Page 198: Place yourself where your strengths can produce performance and results.
- Page 199: The main reason for poor performance is the result of not knowing enough.
- Page 200: Find out what your bad habits are.
- Page 201: Waste as little effort as possible on improving areas of low competence.
Additional research from the book
- Page 10: As the social universe has no natural laws like the physical universe, the social universe changes continuously.
- Page 13: The first job, to which the term "manager" was applied, was the city manager.
- Page 13: The first conscious and systematic application of management principles was the reorganization of the US Army in 1901.
- Page 16: The growth sector in the 21st century is likely to be in the social sector. This is also the sector where management today is most needed and where systematic, principled, theory-based management can yield the greatest results the fastest.
- Page 59: Increasingly, the strategy of all institutions will have to be based on a shrinking population, especially a shrinking young population.
- Page 169: After having lost World War I, the German general staff applied Taylor's Scientific Management to military training. This enabled Hitler to create a superb fighting machine. In the USA, scientific management principles were applied as well. Since 1950, economic development outside the Western world has been based on applying scientific management to make the manual worker more productive. All earlier economic development had been based on technological innovation.
To be updated.
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June 13, 2009Excellent, high level overview of the upcoming challenges of management worldwide.
October 2, 2013
Amazing! I don't believe Drucker wrote this back in 1999, seems even more relevant today, and he seems to understand that redefining tasks lead to institutional change. This is going to be my favorite Drucker quote.
"So far, for fifty years, Information Technology has centered on DATA -their collection, storage, transmission, presentation. It has focused on the 'T' in 'IT'. The new information revolutions focus on the 'I'. They ask, 'What is the MEANING of information and its PURPOSE?' And this is leading rapidly to redefining the tasks to be done with the help of information and, with it, to redefining the institutions that do these tasks." - Peter Drucker
I can think of marketing, and a few other business processes...
"So far, for fifty years, Information Technology has centered on DATA -their collection, storage, transmission, presentation. It has focused on the 'T' in 'IT'. The new information revolutions focus on the 'I'. They ask, 'What is the MEANING of information and its PURPOSE?' And this is leading rapidly to redefining the tasks to be done with the help of information and, with it, to redefining the institutions that do these tasks." - Peter Drucker
I can think of marketing, and a few other business processes...
February 26, 2022
I have to rate this as a 5 again for Drucker. Peter Drucker is visionary and intuitively prophetic in his style and arguments. I often find myself being mildly amazed by the strongly relevant perceptiveness he brings out in his writing and wishing I were able to have such insight and perspicacity in my own reasoning and thinking. As I alluded to with the other Drucker book I reviewed on this website (The Essential Drucker), I think he is worth reading even if you are not very interested in management theory as a subject--the reason being that the quality of his perspective and reasoning methods make it worth reading him purely for the standard of these methods alone!
February 9, 2014
My first "Drucker," so I didn't know what to expect. He's spot on with the knowledge worker concepts and how different these types of jobs and careers are turning out as opposed to 20th-century models. I didn't fully understand some of the accounting/financial management content, but I really enjoyed it when Drucker pulled in historical examples of companies and global leaders. He's got a weird editing/layout style, like some paragraphs are indented and some words in all caps, couldn't quite figure that out. But it's a sharp analysis, sort of a more intellectual and historically-based version of Seth Godin's Linchpin, now that I think of it (only b/c I just read that book last month.)
August 3, 2015
The last chapter on managing oneself is very good.
Crux of the book - - - over the past few years, and especially over the coming years, the nature of work is changing.
Knowledge workers, flexible work, difficult to measure work, the role of the boss and subordinate, loss of manual labour, and the importance of managing oneself to become better at work and life.
The current structure of most organisations is based on the factory work and the office work - and that foundation is changing.
Difficult to read. But the last chapter won me.
Crux of the book - - - over the past few years, and especially over the coming years, the nature of work is changing.
Knowledge workers, flexible work, difficult to measure work, the role of the boss and subordinate, loss of manual labour, and the importance of managing oneself to become better at work and life.
The current structure of most organisations is based on the factory work and the office work - and that foundation is changing.
Difficult to read. But the last chapter won me.
May 20, 2016
بصراحة انا استمتعت جدا بالكتاب هو علمنى اية اولا ان المجتمع الاقتصادى الرأسمالى هينهار و هيحل محلها العامل المعرفى
ثانيا ان الانسان دايما بيختار ومهنته فى سنة المراهقة و غالبا بتكون غلط ف الافضل ان الواحد يشتغل فى حاجات كتيرة و منها يقدر يعرف ايه هى مصادر قوته مش العكس
ثالثا الموظف لازم تتعامل معاه ع اساس ان المهمة هى اللى بتقود الموارد البشرية
و ان الادارة مش بس للاعمال التجارية و اهم حاجة تقدير العميل للمنتج حتى لو كان رخيص و لا يوجد.شى اسمه الاستحواذ
على شركة لانها سوف تؤدى الى كوارث بتحمل كل مصنع و مشاكله
ان ساعات العمل سوف تقل
ثانيا ان الانسان دايما بيختار ومهنته فى سنة المراهقة و غالبا بتكون غلط ف الافضل ان الواحد يشتغل فى حاجات كتيرة و منها يقدر يعرف ايه هى مصادر قوته مش العكس
ثالثا الموظف لازم تتعامل معاه ع اساس ان المهمة هى اللى بتقود الموارد البشرية
و ان الادارة مش بس للاعمال التجارية و اهم حاجة تقدير العميل للمنتج حتى لو كان رخيص و لا يوجد.شى اسمه الاستحواذ
على شركة لانها سوف تؤدى الى كوارث بتحمل كل مصنع و مشاكله
ان ساعات العمل سوف تقل
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December 26, 2019I had managed a small team of developers in IT department. It was a little overwhelming and I didn't quite enjoy it. The management concepts covered in this book are still eye opening to me. I wish I had read this book five years ago. Maybe I could be a better manager or have chosen a different career path.
The best part of this book I think is 'The Second Half of Your Life' in Chapter 6. Managing Oneself. It is something I can apply to my life now.
Great book!
The best part of this book I think is 'The Second Half of Your Life' in Chapter 6. Managing Oneself. It is something I can apply to my life now.
Great book!
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
November 23, 2010
DRUCKER, Peter F. Management challenges for the 21 st century. Ljubljana: GV ZALOŽBA. 2001. ISBN 86-7061-248-8.
Str. 72- strategija pomaga podjetju, da namensko išče priložnosti.
str. 77- prvo vodilo v zvezi s spreminjanjem mora biti torej organizirano opuščanje preteklosti v celotni organizaciji.
str. - 83: naslednje vodilo...je organizirano izboljšanje.
Str. 72- strategija pomaga podjetju, da namensko išče priložnosti.
str. 77- prvo vodilo v zvezi s spreminjanjem mora biti torej organizirano opuščanje preteklosti v celotni organizaciji.
str. - 83: naslednje vodilo...je organizirano izboljšanje.
January 12, 2011
A book written for thought. As written by Peter Drucker this book does not present any definitive truth, but only tracks for thinking. Ideas are bright and still valid 10 years after writing.
On tghe downside, it has the taste of something not complete.
Maybe due to its translation in French, language is sometimes awkward, sentences are not really fluid.
On tghe downside, it has the taste of something not complete.
Maybe due to its translation in French, language is sometimes awkward, sentences are not really fluid.
November 30, 2014
كنت متشوق لقراءة خلاصة عطاء العالم بيتر دروكر في كتابه تحديات الإدارة إلا أن اسلوب السرد والتفصيل الممل يحول بينك وبين ما تريده وما تتوقعه من الكتاب، كثير ما يذكر شركة جينيرال موتورز كمثال في التحديات الإدارية، وقليلة تلك المواضيع التي تشد الإنتباه كالإدارة الذاتية ونماذج الإدارة الجديدة وضف عليها إدارة النصف الثاني من العمر .
October 4, 2018
Bra Peter Drucker-bok där han tittar in i framtiden för att se hur ledarskap behöver förändras. Nu skrevs den 2000 och utgångspunkten nu 2017 är annorlunda. Men boken tittar också bakåt för att kunna se framåt. Som med alla Drucker-böcker vimlar det av exempel från affärsvärlden både positiva sådana och negativa.
April 13, 2016
This was assigned in an Advanced Topics Project Management class in my grad certificate program for PM. It wasn't completely miserable, but the new certainties were not as profound as I would expect from the text. Maybe this one went over my head but most of it was dull reading.
February 3, 2019
Well, it is a classical Drucker book, it just isn't really so interesting. I mean it has some really interesting chapters and it does have some good knowledge. However, a lot of time the same things are repeated in multiple chapters and the writing becomes stale. He has had better books.
March 15, 2019
A great book. The ideas are not new but the context is. And Drucker explains it all in simple sentences, with relevant real life examples and drives home the points very effectively as always. A must read for all modern day mangers in all spheres of social activity.
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March 22, 2008Why the hell am I reading this?
September 2, 2011
Pretty much a classic in its area, as is most of Drucker's work.
February 22, 2013
Great book that may save your career
June 26, 2013
A whole book of filler.
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March 14, 2014read
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
August 4, 2014
One of the classic book in Management. In this book Peter Drucker explains about the challenges that Managers/Executives can face in a broad sense. Must read.
January 24, 2016
Very insightful re career transitions etc by famous management author. It gives big picture of change management and works from world issues down to individual.
December 8, 2017
Lietuviškas vertimas klaikus
May 14, 2023
Tikriausiai kvaila pradėti skaityti knygą apie tai, kas bus 21a, kai jis jau 20metų eina 😁 galbūt kiek keista suvokti, kad tai, kas knygoje rašoma vyks 21amžiuje, jau prasidėjus trečiam to amžiaus dešimtmečiui atrodo gili senovė ir visiškai nebeaktualu. Gal tai yik parodo, kaip greitai versle viskas keičiasi ir tobulėja, o nekintamų tiesų yra tikrai labai mažai. Vieninteliai skyriai knygoje, kurie ją šiek tiek “patempė” aukštyn buvo apie mūsų, kaip darbuotojų darbą, produktyvumą ir karjerą. Tai, kas yra žmogiška nekinta taip greit ir perskaičius ir po 30 metų dar galima rasti naudingų įžvalgų.
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