英文分享现代管理学大师杜鲁克:自我管理(1)

2023年12月28日发(作者：山河故人影评)

What Are My Strengths?Most people think they know what they are good at. They are usually wrong. More often, people know what they arenot good at—and even then more people are wrong than right. And yet, a person can perform only from strength. Onecannot build performance on weakness, let alone on something one cannot do at hout history, people had little need to know their strengths. A person was born into a position and a line ofwork:The peasant’s son would also be a peasant; the artisan’s daughter, an artisan’s wife; and so on. But now peoplehave choices. We need to know our strengths in order to know where we only way to discover your strengths is through feedback analysis. Whenever you make a key decision or take akey action, write down what you expect will happen. Nine or 12 months later, compare the actual results with yourexpectations. I have been practicing this method for 15 to 20 years now, and every time I do it, I am surprid. Thefeedback analysis showed me, for instance—and to my great surpri—that I have an intuitive understanding oftechnical people, whether they are engineers or accountants or market rearchers. It also showed me that I don’treally resonate with ck analysis is by no means new. It was invented sometime in the fourteenth century by an otherwi totallyobscure German theologian and picked up quite independently, some 150 years later, by John Calvin and Ignatius ofLoyola, each of whom incorporated it into the practice of his followers. In fact, the steadfast focus on performance andresults that this habit produces explains why the institutions the two men founded, the Calvinist church and theJesuit order, came to dominate Europe within 30 ced consistently, this simple method will show you within a fairly short period of time, maybe two or three years,where your strengths lie—and this is the most important thing to know. The method will show you what you are doingor failing to do that deprives you of the full benefits of your strengths. It will show you where you are not particularlycompetent. And finally, it will show you where you have no strengths and cannot l implications for action follow from feedback analysis. First and foremost, concentrate on your strengths. Putyourlf where your strengths can produce , work on improving your strengths. Analysis will rapidly show where you need to improve skills or acquire newones. It will also show the gaps in your knowledge—and tho can usually be filled. Mathematicians are born, buteveryone can learn , discover where your intellectual arrogance is causing disabling ignorance and overcome it. Far too many people—especially people with great experti in one area—are contemptuous of knowledge in other areas or believe thatbeing bright is a substitute for knowledge. First-rate engineers, for instance, tend to take pride in not knowing anythingabout people. Human beings, they believe, are much too disorderly for the good engineering mind. Human resourcesprofessionals, by contrast, often pride themlves on their ignorance of elementary accounting or of quantitativemethods taking pride in such ignorance is lf-defeating. Go to work on acquiring the skills andknowledge you need to fully realize your is equally esntial to remedy your bad habits—the things you do or fail to do that inhibit your effectiveness andperformance. Such habits will quickly show up in the example, a planner may find that his beautiful plans fail becau he does not follow through on them. Like so manybrilliant people, he believes that ideas move mountains. But bulldozers move mountains; ideas show where thebulldozers should go to work. This planner will have to learn that the work does not stop when the plan is must find people to carry out the plan and explain it to them. He must adapt and change it as he puts it into finally, he must decide when to stop pushing the the same time, feedback will also reveal when the problem is a lack of manners. Manners are the lubricating oil ofan organization. It is a law of nature that two moving bodies in contact with each other create friction. This is as true forhuman beings as it is for inanimate objects. Manners—simple things like saying “plea” and “thank you” and knowinga person’s name or asking after her family—enable two people to work together whether they like each other or people, especially bright young people, often do not understand this. If analysis shows that someone’s brilliantwork fails again and again as soon as cooperation from others is required, it probably indicates a lack of courtesy—thatis, a lack of manners.

Comparing your expectations with your results also indicates what not to do. We all have a vast number of areas inwhich we have no talent or skill and little chance of becoming even mediocre. In tho areas a person—and especiallya knowledge worker—should not take on work, jobs, and assignments. One should waste as little effort as possible onimproving areas of low competence. It takes far more energy and work to improve from incompetence to mediocritythan it takes to improve from first-rate performance to excellence. And yet most people—especially most teachers andmost organizations—concentrate on making incompetent performers into mediocreones. Energy, resources, and timeshould go instead to making a competentperson into a star Do I Perform?Amazingly few people know how they get things done. Indeed, most of us do not even know that different people workand perform differently. Too many people work in ways that are not their ways, and that almost guaranteesnonperformance. For knowledge workers, How do I perform? May be an even more important question than What aremy strengths?Like one’s strengths, how one performs is unique. It is a matter of personality. Whether personality be a matter ofnature or nurture, it surely is formed long before a person goes to work. And how a person performs is a given, just aswhat a person is good at or not good at is a given. A person’s way of performing can be slightly modified, but it isunlikely to be completely changed—and certainly not easily. Just as people achieve results by doing what they aregood at, they also achieve results by working in ways that they best perform. A few common personality traits usuallydetermine how a person I a reader or a listener?The first thing to know is whether you are a reader or a too few people even know that there are readers and listeners and that people are rarely both. Even fewer knowwhich of the two they themlves are. But some examples will show how damaging such ignorance can Dwight Einhower was Supreme Commander of the Allied forces in Europe, he was the darling of the press conferences were famous for their style—General Einhower showed total command of whatever questionhe was asked, and he was able to describe a situation and explain a policy in two or three beautifully polished andelegant ntences. Ten years later, the same journalists who had been his admirers held President Einhower inopen contempt. He never addresd the questions, they complained, but rambled on endlessly about something they constantly ridiculed him for butchering the King’s English in incoherent and ungrammatical ower apparently did not know that he was a reader, not a listener. When he was Supreme Commander inEurope, his aides made sure that every question from the press was prented in writing at least half an hour before aconference was to begin. And then Einhower was in total command. When he became president, he succeeded twolisteners, Franklin D. Roovelt and Harry Truman. Both men knew themlves to be listeners and both enjoyed free-for-all press conferences. Einhower may have felt that he had to do what his two predecessors had done. As aresult, he never even heard the questions journalists asked. And Einhower is not even an extreme ca of anonlistener.A few years later, Lyndon Johnson destroyed his presidency, in large measure, by not knowing that he was a predecessor, John Kennedy, was a reader who had asmbled a brilliant group of writers as his assistants,making sure that they wrote to him before discussing their memos in person. Johnson kept the people on his staff—and they kept on writing. He never, apparently, understood one word of what they wrote. Yet as anator, Johnson hadbeen superb; for parliamentarians have to be, above all, listeners can be made, or can make themlves, into competent readers—and vice versa. The listener who triesto be a reader will, therefore, suffer the fate of Lyndon Johnson, whereas the reader who tries to be a listener will sufferthe fate of Dwight Einhower. They will not perform or do I learn?The cond thing to know about how one performs is to know how one learns. Many first-class writers—Winston Churchill is but one example—do poorly in school. They tend to remember their schooling as pure few of their classmates remember it the same way. They may not have enjoyed the school very much, but the worstthey suffered was explanation is that writers do not, as a rule, learn by listening and reading. They learnby writing. Becau schools do not allow them to learn this way, they get poor grades.

Schools everywhere are organized on the assumption that there is only one right way to learn and that it is thesameway for everybody. But to be forced to learn the way a school teaches is sheer hell for students who learndifferently. Indeed, there are probably half a dozen different ways to are people, like Churchill, who learn by writing. Some people learn by taking copious notes. Beethoven, forexample, left behind an enormous number of sketchbooks, yet he said he never actually looked at them when hecompod. Asked why he kept them, he is reported to have replied, “If I don’t write it down immediately, I forget it rightaway. If Iput it into a sketchbook, I never forget it and I never have to look it up again.” Some people learn by learn by hearing themlves talk.A chief executive I know who converted a small and mediocre family business into the leading company in its industrywas one of tho people who learn by talking. He was in the habit of calling his entire nior staff into his office once aweek and then talking at them for two or three hours. He would rai policy issues and argue three different positionson each one. He rarely asked his associates for comments or questions; he simply needed an audience to hearhimlf talk. That’s how he learned. And although he is a fairly extreme ca, learning through talking is by no meansan unusual method. Successful trial lawyers learn the same way, as do many medical diagnosticians (and so do I).Of all the important pieces of lf-knowledge, understanding how you learn is the easiest to acquire. When I askpeople, “How do you learn?” most of them know the answer. But when I ask, “Do you act on this knowledge?” fewanswer yes. And yet, acting on this knowledge is the key to performance; or rather, not acting on this knowledgecondemns one to non I a reader or a listener? and How do I learn?are the first questions to ask. But they are by no means the only manage yourlf effectively, you also have to ask, Do I work well with people,or am I a loner? And if you do workwell with people, you then must ask, In what relationship?Some people work best as subordinates. General George Patton, the great American military hero of World War II, isaprime example. Patton was America’s top troop commander. Yet when he was propod for an independentcommand, General George Marshall, the U.S. chief of staff—and probably the most successful picker of men in y—said, “Patton is the best subordinate the American army has ever produced, but he would be the worstcommander.”Some people work best as team members. Others work best alone. Some are exceptionally talented as coaches andmentors; others are simply incompetent as r crucial question is, Do I produce results as a decision maker or as an advir? A great many people performbest as advirs but cannot take the burden and pressure of making the decision. A good many other people, bycontrast, need an advir to force themlves to think; then they can make decisions and act on them with speed,lf-confidence, and is a reason, by the way, that the number two person in an organization often fails when promoted to the numberone position. The top spot requires a decision maker. Strong decision makers often put somebody they trust into thenumber two spot as their advir— and inthat position the person is outstanding. But in the number one spot, the sameperson fails. He or she knows what the decision should be but cannot accept the responsibility of actually making important questions to ask include, Do I perform well under stress, or do I need a highly structured andpredictable environment? Do I work best in a big organization or a small one? Few people work well in all kinds ofenvironments. Again and again, I have en people who were very successful in large organizations floundermirably when they moved into smaller ones. And the rever is equally conclusion bears repeating: Do not try to change yourlf—you are unlikely to succeed. But work hard to improvethe way you perform. And try not to take on work you cannot perform or will only perform Are My Values?To be able to manage yourlf, you finally have to ask, What are my values? This is not a question of ethics. Withrespect to ethics, the rules are the same for everybody, and the test is a simple one. I call it the “mirror test.”

In the early years of this century, the most highly respected diplomat of all the great powers was the Germanambassador in London. He was clearly destined for great things—to become his country’s foreign minister, at least, ifnot its federal chancellor. Yet in1906 he abruptly resigned rather than preside over a dinner given by the diplomaticcorps for Edward VII. The king was a notorious womanizer and made it clear what kind of dinner he wanted. Theambassador is reported to have said,“I refu to e a pimp in the mirror in the morning when I shave.”That is the mirror test. Ethics requires that you ask yourlf, What kind of person do I want to e in the mirror in themorning? What is ethical behavior in one kind of organization or situation is ethical behavior in another. But ethics isonly part of a value system— especially of an organization’s value work in an organization who value system is unacceptable or incompatible with one’s own condemns a personboth to frustration and to er the experience of a highly successful human resources executive who company was acquired by a biggerorganization. After the acquisition, she was promoted to do the kind of work she did best, which included lectingpeople for important positions. The executive deeply believed that a company should hire people for such positionsfrom the outside only after exhausting all the inside possibilities. But her new company believed in first looking outside“to bring in fresh blood.” There is something to be said for both approaches— in my experience, the proper one is to dosome of both. They are, however, fundamentally incompatible—not as policies but as bespeak differentviews of the relationship between organizations andpeople; different views of the responsibility of an organization to itspeople and their development; and different views of a person’s most important contribution to an enterpri. Afterveral years of frustration, the executive quit—at considerable financial loss. Her values and the values of theorganization simply were not rly, whether a pharmaceutical company tries to obtain results by making constant, small improvements or byachieving occasional, highly expensive, and risky “break throughs” is not primarily an economic question. The resultsof either strategy may be pretty much the same. At bottom, there is a conflict between a value system that es thecompany’s contribution in terms of helping physicians do better what they already do and a value system that isoriented toward making scientific r a business should be run for short term results or with a focus on the long term is likewi a question ofvalues. Financial analysts believe that business can be run for both simultaneously. Successful business peopleknow better. To be sure, every company has to produce short-term results. But in any conflict between short-termresults and long term growth, each company will determine its own priority. This is not primarily a disagreement abouteconomics. It is fundamentally a value conflict regarding the function of a business and the responsibility conflicts are not limited to business organizations. One of the fastest-growing pastoral churches in the UnitedStates measures success by the number of new parishioners. Its leadership believes that what matters is how manynewcomers join the congregation. The Good Lord will then minister to their spiritual needs or at least to the needs of asufficient percentage. Another pastoral, evangelical church believes that what matters is people’s spiritual growth. Thechurch eas out new comers who join but do not enter into its spiritual , this is not a matter of numbers. At first glance, it appears that the cond church grows more slowly. But itretains a far larger proportion of newcomers than the first one does. Its growth, in other words, is more solid. This isalso not a theological problem, or only condarily so. It is a problem about values. In a public debate, one pastorargued,“Unless you first come to church, you will never find the gate to the Kingdom of Heaven.” “No,” answered theother. “Until you first look for the gate to the Kingdom of Heaven, you don’t belong in church.”Organizations, like people, have values. To be effective in an organization, a person’s values must be compatible withthe organization’s values. They do not need to be the same, but they must be clo enough to coexist. Otherwi, theperson will not only be frustrated but also will not produce results.A person’s strengths and the way that person performs rarely conflict; the two are complementary. But there issometimes a conflict between a person’s values and his or her strengths. What one does well—even very well andsuccessfully—may not fit with one’s value system. In that ca, the work may not appear to be worth devoting one’s lifeto (or even a substantial portion thereof).If I may, allow me to interject a personal note. Many years ago, I too had to decide between my values and what I was

If I may, allow me to interject a personal note. Many years ago, I too had to decide between my values and what I wasdoing successfully. I was doing very well as a young investment banker in London in the mid-1930s, and the workclearly fit my strengths. Yet I did not e mylf making a contribution as an ast manager. People, I realized, werewhat I valued, and I saw no point in being the richest man in the cemetery. I had no money and no other job e the continuing Depression, I quit—and it was the right thing to do. Values, in other words, are and should bethe ultimate test.-----------------------To