Preface
The title of this volume notwithstanding, I really have no idea what Peter Drucker would do. The truth is, nobody does. Charles Handy, the British social philosopher, remarked that Drucker “revels in surprising you.” The writer Jeffrey Krames has observed that Drucker had a penchant for coming up with “counterintuitive ideas,” while one of his former Ph.D. students explained it like this: Drucker was “frequently unpredictable and almost always provocative and original.”
Nevertheless, for nearly four years now, I have written “The Drucker Difference” column for Bloomberg Businessweek (formerly BusinessWeek) online, in an effort to provide a sense of how Drucker might react to issues dominating today’s headlines.
To say that mining Drucker’s 39 books, along with his countless magazine and newspaper articles, has been a privilege would be a gross understatement. I love crafting “The Drucker Difference” in what I’ve come to regard as a biweekly attempt to achieve some kind of mind meld with one of the greatest minds of the twentieth century.
I must confess, however, that I took up the column somewhat reluctantly. When I first became executive director of the Drucker Institute in 2007, after a 20-year career as a reporter and editor at The Wall Street Journal and Los Angeles Times, I wrote a piece on spec for BusinessWeek on what Drucker might have thought about China’s spate of product recalls for lead paint and other dangers. Frankly, I did this because, at the time, I wasn’t quite sure what my new job entailed; writing was the one thing I felt qualified to do.
As it turned out, the essay was a hit. It attracted more eyeballs than any other that weekend on BusinessWeek’s website and elicited a string of thoughtful responses. Clearly, Drucker’s views or mine—or, more precisely, this combination of the two of us—had resonated with readers.
The next week, John Byrne, then BusinessWeek’s executive editor, called me and asked if I’d like to contribute a regular column based on Drucker’s teachings. “Absolutely,” I told him. This was, after all, a coup. What else was I going to say?
Inside, though, I was incredibly nervous. My mind, if not my heart, was racing: How long could I keep this gig going? Did Drucker (who died in 2005, just shy of his ninety-sixth birthday) really have enough to say, especially on contemporary subjects? Would it seem strange to be channeling a dead guy?
Nearly 100 columns later—and with the help and support of two terrific editors, Patricia O’Connell and Rebecca Reisner—I am happy to report that all my fears have long been laid to rest. Not only have I been able to sustain “The Drucker Difference,” but I’ve been able to use it to cover an extraordinary amount of terrain.
I’ve tackled the collapse of Lehman Brothers; the federal bailout of General Motors; Toyota’s sticky-accelerator problems; and innovation at Apple, Google, Wikia, and Sony. But I’ve also been able to write about the service and volunteering movement, the complexities of race in America, the soaring cost of college tuition, President Obama’s health-care plan, women in the workplace, the role of spirituality on the job—even music, art, and baseball.
The reason for this range is simple: The breadth and depth of Drucker’s body of work are nothing short of remarkable. Much more than a management thinker, Drucker inhabited and helped shape “the world of ideas,” as Warren Bennis has described it. He adds that unless this is truly appreciated, “we risk placing Drucker in too narrow an intellectual context and will fail to do full justice to his unique contribution.”
Indeed, because of Drucker’s scope—and the 10,000 book pages he left behind—I’ve actually been able to compose all of these columns without using the same quotation twice. (OK, I goofed once and belatedly discovered that I’d accidentally duplicated a quote.) Drucker had so many insights to share, there’s no need to repeat myself.
As for drawing so heavily on the work of a person who has passed away, that hasn’t been odd in the least. There are three reasons for this. First, Drucker’s writing is so foundational—he was, as BusinessWeek declared, “the man who invented management”—that his work possesses a timeless quality. Kenneth Wilson, a Nobel Prize–winning scientist and education reformer, once told me that what Newton was to mathematics, Darwin to biology, and Einstein to physics, Drucker was to our understanding of organizations and society.
Second, Drucker was so farseeing, we’re just beginning to get a handle on many of the topics he wrote about toward the end of his life, including what it means—from multiple dimensions—to live in a knowledge age.
Third, there is my own strong connection to Drucker. Above all, our values are in sync. What’s more, although Drucker wore various hats, including professor and consultant, he considered himself a writer first and foremost; that’s an identity I share.
I should point out that I never had a chance to meet Drucker. But, as you might imagine, I feel as if I knew him. Through his words, he has certainly taught me more than anyone else.
Of course, I am hardly alone in expressing this sentiment. “A goodly share of productive organizations worldwide are led by men and women who consider Drucker their intellectual guide, if not their personal mentor,” noted T. George Harris, the former editor of Harvard Business Review.
He has similarly inspired new generations of scholars, who see him as their exemplar. As Gary Hamel and C.K. Prahalad once put it: Drucker “has been an unfailing beacon, lighting the way toward the management issues of tomorrow.” I hope “The Drucker Difference” is helping to keep that light alive and making it shine just a little brighter.