Managing Leadership^®

The late Peter Drucker will likely be remembered as the most influential management thinker of the last fifty years – perhaps of all time. He was at once profound and prolific, writing widely on management and other topics. Certainly much has been written about him, as well. But the author of The Definitive Drucker, Elizabeth Haas Edersheim, wrote this book at the specific request of Drucker, and with the help of his close collaboration over the last sixteen months of his life.

It is neither a biography nor a retrospective of Drucker’s life and work. He did ask Edersheim to write it after reading her biography of Marvin Bower, the great force behind the management consulting firm of McKinsey & Company. But Edersheim herself describes The Definitive Drucker as a biography of Drucker’s ideas. Moreover, she decided to interpret them with a focus on the present, as well as to direct the trajectory of his thinking toward the challenges facing management practice and theory in the twenty-first century.

That makes this an interesting book, and one you should have. After all, Drucker himself wrote all we need to know about his own thinking, and it can be accessed efficiently enough. But this elaboration of his ideas in the context of today’s and tomorrow’s problems has produced insight that is well worth examining.

You should be prepared for a few things, however. First, the narrative is simply peppered with figures, flowcharts, quizzes, sidebars, text highlights, and even chapter conclusions/summaries. The result is a faintly condescending textbook-like quality that seems to be a hallmark of the American business publishing industry in recent years.

It also is filled with the peculiar management-speak that seems to be a tribal mark of authors with roots in the larger consulting firms. The barrage of assumptions that accompany this sort of thing can be experienced like a headwind of static you have to struggle through to reach your objective. This book has some of that, and you may find that it obscures rather than highlights the considerable value the book does contain. But that value is clearly there, and the attention you devote to picking it out from that background noise will be well rewarded.

Moreover, you will want to bear in mind that this is not Peter Drucker‘s book, and it does not include his writing except for the purpose of illustrating the author’s interpretations of his thinking. This is Elizabeth Haas Edersheim’s book. She uses her own voice, animated by her own experience and judgement (albeit informed by Drucker’s) to apply his observations over the last fifty years to problems companies and managers face today.

And that is why you want to read it. After all, as a practicing consultant Edersheim has developed working expertise at examining situations anew and then translating related theory and thinking into action that managers can use operationally. In The Definitive Drucker, she uses Drucker’s ideas to help us all reexamine the situations we contend with and that we foresee, and then advises us – again, with his specific oversight and collaboration – how to transform that into practical action.

It is worth adding at this point that a basic presentation feature of business books these days is the use of lots of anecdotal examples. These are usually just another part of the page-filling background noise that dull the reader to the paucity of the messages of many of the lesser books in this category. But in addition to the really valuable thinking and insights this particular book offers, Edersheim does possibly the best job I’ve seen of amplifying them with stories and cases from the real world. Her mastery of this device is rare and strong, and of real benefit in effectively illustrating the points it is used to highlight.

Many people read Drucker’s own work with a sort of uncritical awe. But you should go into this book aware that you are not going to accept everything you see there. You may come away from your reading of it feeling that it lacks the simply-stated authority that filled Drucker’s own writing. You will likely, as I did, dispute some of its specific prescriptions as vigorously as you agree with others. But I think you will find this to be one of the book’s strengths.

This is partly because the book is inspired by Drucker’s writing of the past half century, expressed and interpreted by both his and Edersheim’s experience in the present, and, due to her rare insight into both, given a powerful impetus for continued influence in the next half century. You can think of this book as the intersection – a collision, even – of all of these influences. You will sense them bustling about as you read it, and they will make your engagement with it more productive for you. You will find it a creative experience.

—

Note: The book reviewed above was provided to me by its author. It should be observed that there was neither a request for nor an expectation of a review. I nevertheless made the decision to offer it here, and I only do so for books that I recommend. Moreover, in such circumstances, in order to help preserve the basis for an objective review, I provide a copy of the book, as well, to a colleague; this has been done in this case.

—

Today’s tip: Speaking of trying to anticipate and influence the future from the perspective of some of today’s best thinking, please see this fascinating piece, a bag full of sunshine, from The Economist magazine’s current Technology Quarterly section. There are plenty of other articles in the collection worth viewing, so bookmark the site and return to browse when you can.

—

Why not try out this feature provided here by Answers.com: If you double-click on any (non-hypertext-linked) word on the main page of the site, a window will open providing definitions or encyclopedic material about that term, together with links to additional sources of information. Try it out – it’s interesting and fun.

And, of course, while you’re clicking around, don’t forget to click on your choice of an email or RSS-feed subscription to these pages – we’ll be proud to have you join us!

Technorati Tags: management, Elizabeth Haas Edersheim, Marvin Bower, consulting, McKinsey, practice, theory, insight, American, Peter Drucker, experience, judgement, manager, consultant, theory, influence, Economist, Technology Quarterly