Week 52 of 52. Welcome to Drucker Mondays, a 52-week journey through the book, A Year with Peter Drucker: 52 Weeks of Coaching for Leadership Effectiveness, by Joseph A. Maciariello. Each Monday in 2015, we've featured a Drucker fan and his or her favorite snippet from the week's topic. Today is the 52nd and almost final edition, written by John Pearson. Watch for the final edition next Monday, Jan. 4, 2016, featuring a master list, highlights, and your invitation to the Awards Luncheon!
Week 52: Peter Drucker's 10 Principles for Finding Meaning in the Second Half of Life (As Reported by Bob Buford)
THE BIG IDEA FROM THE BOOK: Author Joseph Maciariello calls on Bob Buford to summarize Drucker’s 10 principles for finding significance in life. If you like lists, you’ll love Week 52!
JOHN PEARSON'S FAVORITE DRUCKER INSIGHTS from Week 52, pages 393-400:
• Maciariello: “Staying in a position when you are out of sync with its values will either corrupt you or make you cynical.”
• Drucker: “Whenever people are on the road to success, they tend to think of repositioning as something they do if they’re a failure. But I would say that you ought to reposition when you’re a success, because that’s when you can afford it.”
• Drucker: “Know the difference between harvesting and planting.”
JOHN PEARSON'S COLOR COMMENTARY:
This 52nd week of wisdom from Peter Drucker highlights Bob Buford’s “Ten Principles for Finding Meaning in the Second Half of Life from Peter Drucker.” Click here to download the 10 principles.
Buford, the author of Halftime: Moving From Success to Significance, Drucker & Me: What a Texas Entrepreneur Learned from the Father of Modern Management, and other books, writes, “Listen for the spirituality in Drucker’s 10 life principles and expect to discover your own success and more importantly your own significance.”
I especially appreciate these three Drucker Principles summarized by Bob Buford:
#1. “Find out who you are.”
#5. “Planning doesn’t work. ‘Opportunity comes in over the transom,’ Drucker insisted, and that means one has to be flexible, ready to seize the right opportunities when they come. ‘Too much planning can make you deaf to opportunity,’ Drucker said. ‘Opportunity knocks, but it knocks only once. You have to be ready for the accident.’”
#10. “Recognize the downside to ‘no longer learning, no longer growing.’” Here, Drucker identified three groups:
• Group 1: People who retire—and don’t live very long.
• Group 2: People who don’t retire, but lose their enthusiasm.
• Group 3: People who “keep doing what they’ve been doing, but they’re looking for ways to make a contribution.”
Buford quotes Drucker on the third group: “’They feel they’ve been given a lot and they’re looking for a chance to give back. They’re not satisfied with just writing checks; they want to be involved, to help other people in a more positive way.’ And they’re the ones, Drucker said, who finish well.”
THIS WEEK’S QUOTES & COMMENTARY BY JOHN PEARSON:
John Pearson, editor and publisher of Drucker Mondays, is a board governance and management consultant, and grandfather to five, including soon-to-be 13-year-old triplets.
TO-DO TODAY:
• Download the 10 principles and pick three that arrest your attention—and discuss with a friend.
• Discuss the difference between planting (output) and harvesting (results).
Read Bob Buford's Halftime: Moving from Success to Significance (20th Anniversary Deluxe Edition), with a foreword by Jim Collins (published this fall with more than 750,000 previously sold).
NEXT MONDAY:
On Jan. 4, 2016, watch for the final summary of this 52-week journey and your invitation to the Awards Luncheon, honoring our 52 guest writers!
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