Peter Drucker held that what made successful captains of industry effective is that they followed the same eight practices:
201 They asked, “What needs to be done?”
202 They asked, “What is right for the enterprise?”
203 They developed action plans.
204 They took responsibility for decisions.
205 They took responsibility for communicating.
206 They were focused on opportunities rather than problems.
207 They ran productive meetings.
208 They thought and said “we” rather than “I.”
The first two practices gave them the knowledge they needed. The next four helped them convert this knowledge into effective action. The last two ensured that the whole organization felt responsible and accountable.
Please note that Drucker refers to practices, not principles. Indeed a wise man.
Now we get to the practical expression of the fundamental principles. If the fundamental principles are sound and the practices of Drucker are indeed a sign of human effectiveness, then showing how the fundamental principles can be linked to the practices, will show the usefulness of the fundamental principles.
I will use a cause-and-effect diagram to link some of the fundamental principles to the Drucker Eight. I used Dettmer’s TransformationLogicTree software.
First, please note that these logical links are what are known as long arrows. Long arrows mean that the logic is not complete and that other links are missing. Another way of saying this is, it is false to say that the fundamental principle directly causes the practice. More is required.
For today’s blog it will suffice to express the long arrows.
The diagram is read: if the cause (bottom block) is present then the effect (top block) will also be present. This is sufficiency logic. For sufficiency logic, we need more detail because we often need more than one cause to ensure that the effect is present. We say that the one cause might be necessary but it is not sufficient to cause the effect.
But that is too much for one blog.
For today, please read the above diagram as If “People are interconnected”, then “They thought and said “we” rather than “I””. There might be something else required for this to be true and there definitely are assumptions underlying such a connection. That’s a lot to read into two boxes connected with an arrow, isn’t?
Green Octahedron Blogging 