ABOUT THIS POST: On my podcast, I recently discussed Peter F. Drucker’s best quotes on leadership. This was Preceded by an episode about Drucker’s best quotes on leadership, a third episode on his humorous quotes and fourth on his profound quotes.
I created this post so that anyone listening to the podcast can grab the quotes here. Conversely, you can listen or watch the podcast here:
Listen: https://leadersmith.podbean.com/e/notable-quotables-peter-f-drucker-s-humor-and-wit-episode-158/
Watch: https://youtu.be/AJ_4SnYoBYg
Enjoy!
HUMOROUS AND INSIGHTFUL QUOTES
“Great wisdom not applied to action and behavior is meaningless data.”
“When a subject becomes totally obsolete we make it a required course.”
“Success always obsoletes the very behavior that achieved it.”
“Do not measure your life by your goals but what you are doing to achieve them.”
“The best way to predict the future is to create it.”
“So much of what we call management consists in making it difficult for people to work.”
“My greatest strength as a consultant is to be ignorant and ask a few questions.”
“The most important thing in communication is hearing what isn’t said.”
“Plans are only good intentions unless they immediately degenerate into hard work.”
“People who don’t take risks generally make about two big mistakes a year. People who do take risks generally make about two big mistakes a year.”
“The computer is a moron.”
“There is only one ethics, one set of rules of morality, one code: That of individual behavior in which the same rules apply to everyone alike.”
“Quality in a product or service is not what the supplier puts in. It is what the customer gets out and is willing to pay for. A product is not quality because it is hard to make and costs a lot of money, as manufacturers typically believe. This is incompetence. Customers pay only for what is of use to them and gives them value. Nothing else constitutes quality.”
“Brilliant men are often strikingly ineffectual. They fail to realize that the brilliant insight is not by itself achievement. They never have learned that insights become effectiveness only through hard systematic work.”
“People in any organization, including bureaucrats and politicians, are always attached to the obsolete; the obsolescent; the things that should have worked but didn’t; the things that once were productive and no longer are.”
“The aim of marketing is to know and understand the customer so well the product or service fits him and sells itself.”
“The critical question is not ‘How can I achieve?’ but ‘What can I contribute?’”
“Culture eats strategy for breakfast.”
“Meetings are a symptom of bad organization. The fewer meetings the better.”
“Meetings are by definition a concession to a deficient organization. For one either meets or one works. One cannot do both at the same time.”
“You can either take action, or you can hang back and hope for a miracle. Miracles are great, but they are so unpredictable.”
“There are two types of people in the business community: those who produce results and those who give you reasons why they didn’t.”
“We know nothing about motivation. All we can do is write books about it.”
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Dr. Darin Gerdes is a tenured Professor of Management in the College of Business at Charleston Southern University He is also the host of the Leadersmith Podcast and a Co-founder of the Excellence in Leadership Institute.
All ideas expressed on www.daringerdes.com are his own.
FTC Disclosure: When I refer to a book, I often add a link to Amazon (#ad) so you can purchase it easily. I may earn a few cents if you buy it, but I never recommend any books unless they are worth reading.
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