Author: William A. Cohen, Ph.D.
Pub Date: 2007
ISBN: 9780814409190
Format: Hardback
Reviewed by: Today's Manager - the official bi-monthly publication of the Singapore Institute of Management (SIM) Publication Issue Date: April - May 2008
This book contains William Cohen's recollections of what
it was like to be in a Peter Drucker class. He has used some
of his notes, old papers, and other information to reconstruct
some of Drucker's lectures and conversations with him to
give the reader the best picture possible of how things actually
were.
The author relates that in all of the classes from Drucker
at Claremont Graduate School, he always used a single
text book, Management: Tasks, Responsibilities, Practices, an
830-page book. Most professors tend to try to cram an entire
text book into whatever time period over which the course was conducted. Drucker's syllabus always covered
reasonable amounts of the book to digest. He felt that books
needed to be mastered, not simply skimmed with a host of
facts and a few techniques committed to memory. So he did
not try to assign the entire 800-plus pages over one seven week
module. The idea was to focus on one section and to
master that.
Drucker frequently said: "The corporation is my laboratory."
He observed what was going on in a company or
companies, analysed what happened, and drew relevant conclusions
which he published in a way that could be understood
and put to use by management practitioners.
Most academics didn't buy that. To them, there is only
one kind of research: scientific research based on mostly
quantitative methods. This research is disseminated by publishing
in the scientific journals of business, not by books or
practitioner-read journals. Cohen believes that Drucker was
an academic, but he wrote to be understood. Most academics
didn't like it and resented his success.
This book relates why:
Everyone should approach problems with their
Ignorance
Top executives should stay in their positions no
longer than six years
Some so called menial tasks can only be done by
the boss, and
