Peter Drucker

ON PETER DRUCKER

Drucker had opened doors for countless managers. His books are as relevant today as they were to managers in the decades in which he wrote them. Drucker simply had the talent and ability to identify core truths about human workplace behaviour and the capacity to accurately predict outcomes from trends that were present but not easily seen without hindsight. He had, a convention panel agreed, made a huge and sustained contribution to the literature on the art of management which, strangely, seemed to be shunned by the world’s leading universities.

His wife, Doris Drucker, spoke to the topic “Information: Is It Everything?” We are, she said, engulfed by a maelstrom of information which, unless activated by knowledge, is meaningless. In the three years between 1999 and 2002 the amount of information available in the world increased by a third. “Do humans have the capacity to absorb the volume of information they are now bombarded with?” she asked.

Doris Drucker compared today’s information explosion with the Industrial Revolution of the 19th century when reformists fought for the abolition of child labour. Her fears may prove unfounded, she said, but whatever the situation “we now need farsighted leaders with the vision to manage this challenge for the future”.

Another global management guru, Tom Peters, chaired two convention sessions; the fi rst aimed at describing business in the future in a disruptive age – how to survive and how to thrive. His second session was designed to identify the essential skills and attributes managers need to be effective in today’s world. On business in the future Peters made two key points:

• Women are the key purchasing decision makers in today’s world. Men in management roles must understand this and realign their organisations’ targets.

• The world’s population is ageing and management needs to understand the repercussions of that process.