Management by Peter F. Drucker

Author:Peter F. Drucker
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 2009-10-12T14:00:00+00:00

Defining a Manager’s Job

A manager’s job is defined in several ways.

1. There is first the specific function, the job itself. This should always be a permanent, continuing job, one that is considered, in the light of the best available knowledge at the time, to be needed for a good long time to come. An example would be manager of market research or manufacturing manager. Both obviously are jobs which will have to be done for the foreseeable future.

2. But the functional definition of the job, which is what is expressed in the typical job description or position guide, does not define the specific contribution which a specific manager is expected to make. While the function is, at least in intent, permanent, there are assignments “here and now” which are what the enterprise and the manager’s boss should hold the man accountable for. They contribute the second definition of a managerial position and job.

As I have said elsewhere, every manager should ask himself the question at least once a year, and always when taking on a new job: “What specific contribution can I and my unit make which, if done really well, would make a substantial difference to the performance and results of my company?”5

The position guide and job description are, so to speak, the mission statement of a managerial job. They correspond to the definition of “what is our business and what should it be” for the enterprise as a whole. The assignments are the objectives and goals and therefore need specific targets, a deadline, a clear statement of who is accountable, and a built-in measurement by feedback from results.

It is the mark of a performing manager that these assignments always exceed the scope of the job as outlined in the job description. One can only codify what has already been done; and a job description is codification. What needs to be done to make the future always exceeds and goes beyond what has been done in the past.

3. A managerial job is defined by relationships—upward, downward, and sideways.

4. It is finally defined by the information needed for the job and by a manager’s place in the information flow.

Every manager should ask himself: “What information do I need to do my job and where do I get it?” He should make sure that whoever has to provide that information understands the manager’s needs—not only in terms of what is needed but also how it is needed.

This is particularly important today, when “management information” means increasingly “computer.” The basic problem with the computer in business is not that computer technicians do not understand the managers’ needs. It is that the managers do not take the time and trouble to think through their needs and to communicate them to the computer people.6 How the computer people satisfy the needs of the manager is their business. What the needs are is the manager’s business. To expect the computer people to define the information needs of the managers is abdication.

Managers need to think through

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