A couple of years ago, Frances Hesselbein at the Leader to Leader Institute asked me to take on a new project—an update of a book that Peter Drucker wrote for the Institute (then known as the Drucker Foundation) way back in 1993. Of course, it’s not every day that I get asked to create an updated version of a book by Peter Drucker, so I of course jumped at the chance. Long story short, the new book—The Five Most Important Questions You Will Ever Ask About Your Organization—was published by Jossey-Bass earlier this year. As it turns out, Drucker’s five questions are just as relevant for companies today as they were when he wrote about them more than a decade ago.
Question 1: What is our mission? As Drucker said, “The effective mission statement is short and sharply focused. It should fit on a T-shirt. The mission says why you do what you do, not the means by which you do it.”
Question 2: Who is our customer? According to Drucker, “Answering the question Who is our customer? provides the basis for determining what customers value, defining your results, and developing the plan.”
Question 3: What does the customer value? Said Drucker, “The question What do customers value?—what satisfies their needs, wants, and aspirations—is so complicated that it can only be answered by customers themselves…What does the customer value? may be the most important question. Yet it is the one least often asked.”
Question 4: What are our results? In Drucker’s words, “Progress and achievement can be appraised in qualitative and quantitative terms. These two types of measures are interwoven—they shed light on one another—and both are necessary to illuminate in what ways and to what extent lives are being changed.”
Question 5: What is our plan? As Drucker points out, “A plan…is a concise summation of the organization’s purpose and future direction. The plan encompasses mission, vision, goals, objectives, action steps, a budget, and appraisal.”
Do you have a systematic way of questioning what your business is doing and why it is doing what it is doing? If not, Peter Drucker’s five most important questions can provide you with a highly effective framework for improving any business. Give them a try and let us know what you think.
