16 Assorted Peter Drucker Quotes on Change, Decisions, and Marketing

Following up on my earlier posts about Peter Drucker quotes to energize your work week (and beyond), this new post concentrates on quotes covering a 50-year period on topics that will never lose their importance:

Change

“Business is society’s change agent.” – The Executive in Action, 1996

“An organization must be organized for constant change.” – The Daily Drucker, 2004

“It is therefore a central 21st- century challenge for management that its organization become a change leader.” – Management Challenges for the 21st Century, 1999

“The most effective way to manage change successfully is to create it.” – A Functioning Society, 2003

“To survive and succeed, every organization will have to turn itself into a change agent.” – A Functioning Society, 2003

“One cannot manage change. One can only be ahead of it.” – Management Challenges for the 21st Century, 1999

Decisions

“Every decision is risky: it is a commitment of present resources to an uncertain and unknown future.” – The Daily Drucker, 2004

 “A decision will not become effective unless needed actions have been built into it from the start.” – The Daily Drucker, 2004

 “Planning is frequently misunderstood as making future decisions, but decisions exist only in the present.” – Peter Drucker’s Five Most Important Questions, 2015

 “Nobody in the world is as good at making decisions as the Japanese.” – Managing for the Future, 1990

 “Decision making is a time machine that synchronizes into a single time – the present – a great number of divergent time spans.” – Management: Tasks, Responsibilities, Practices, 1974

Marketing

“Marketing starts with all customers in the market rather than with our customers.” – Managing for the Future, 1990

“Marketing is the distinguishing, the unique function of Business.” – The Practice of Management, 1954

“A major decision underlying marketing objectives is market standing.” – Management: Tasks, Responsibilities, Practices, 1974

“Of the top marketing lessons for the highly competitive twenty-first century, the most crucial one is that buying customers doesn’t work.” – The Daily Drucker, 2004

“Despite the emphasis on marketing and the marketing approach, marketing is still rhetoric rather than reality in far too many businesses.” – Management: Tasks, Responsibilities, Practices, 1974

All of the above books are worth exploring. Some are well known; others (particularly A Functioning Society) are more under-the-radar. I hope the explorations provide clarity and forward-thinking to your life and work!