The Effective Executive
02 Jun 2024| Book | The Effective Executive: The Definitive Guide to Getting the Right Things Done |
| Author | Peter Drucker |
Effectiveness of Knowledge Work
Two hundred people, of course, can do a great deal more work than one man. But it does not follow that they produce and contribute more.
Knowledge work is not defined by quantity. Neither is knowedge work defined by its costs. Knowledge work is defined by its results.
The effectiveness of knowledge work needs to be measured by results, not by time. Drucker knew this in the 60s.
True now more than ever.
Excess Meetings is a Sign of Dysfunction
In an ideal world, we wouldn’t need meetings and everyone could just do their job. That should be the underlying atmosphere of every meeting (that it shouldn’t be necessary).
Another common time-waster is malorganization. Its symptom is an excess of meetings.
Meetings are by definition a concession to deficient organization for one either meets or one works. One cannot do both at the same time. In an ideally designed structure (which in a changing world is of course only a dream) there would be no meetings. Everybody would know what he needs to know to do his job. Everyone would have the resources available to him to do his job.
We meet because people holding different jobs have to cooperate to get a specific task done. We meet because the knowledge and experience needed in a specific situation are not available in one head, but have to be pieced together out of the experience and knowledge of several people.
Perform, Don’t Aim to Please
As a subordinate, perform well and don’t aim to please. As a leader, trust subordinates that perform, despite pushback or inconvenience.
High performers need independence to be great.
Another story about General Robert E. Lee illustrates the meaning of making strength productive. One of his generals, the story goes, had disregarded orders and had thereby completely upset Lee’s plans-—and not for the first time either. Lee, who normally controlled his temper, blew up in a towering rage. When he had simmered down, one of his aides asked respectfully, “Why don’t you relieve him of his command?” Lee, it is said, turned around in complete amazement, looked at the aide, and said, “What an absurd question—he performs.”
Effective executives know that their subordinates are paid to perform and not to please their superiors. They know that it does not matter how many tantrums a prima donna throws as long as she brings in the customers. The opera manager is paid after all for putting up with the prima donna’s tantrums if that is her way to achieve excellence in performance. It does not matter whether a first-rate teacher or a brilliant scholar is pleasant to the dean or amiable in the faculty meeting. The dean is paid for enabling the first-rate teacher or the first-rate scholar to do his work effectively— and if this involves unpleasantness in the administrative routine, it is still cheap at the price.