Global Peter Drucker Forum 2014 – #GPDF14

“In the last 20 years the system seems to have been broken down“, says Clayton Christensen, one of the world’s top experts on innovation and growth. “Our toxic mindsets make us believe that efficiency matters most“, reckons Gary Hamel. Roger Martin sees the foundation of our Democratic Capitalism at stake and puts forward that “today more than 50% of our people don’t have any prospect to move themselves and their families forward!” Martin Wolf, chief economics commentator of the Financial Times, states that systemic failures of our economic system brought the lowest productivity rate in postwar periods, the highest inequality, and the longest slump with 50% of the people out of work. “Only through a change of the system these system failures can be overcome“. We are talking about the world economy and statements put forward at this year’s Global Peter Drucker Forum, which took place in Vienna on November 13 and 14, 2014. It has been the 6^th forum I attended and this time the tide seems to have changed. Analyses and statements could not have been clearer and more in agreement. The economic system is flawed and has to change! The Shareholder Value movement seems to have been buried another very last time. On the second day, Nilhofer Merchand, the Indian-born Californian network thinker, brought in some diversity. “The future is co-created”, she told the audience. Onlyness, a culture of trust, and purpose instead of organizations will lead to a tectonic shift. Here you could glimpse a bit of what will come after the great transformation, which actually was the sub-title of the conference. Then it was good old Steve Denning, the Author of “Radical Management”, who I admire for his continuous attempts to translate what happens in the software industry to normal management people, who brought things into perspective. “The future is already here — it’s just not very evenly distributed”, he used the quote of William Gibson and gave examples of the new world where

1. value creating has already replaced profit maximization,
2. collaboration of the many has replaced traditional hierarchies, and
3. contributions to wealth creation have replaced narrow financial metrics.

Can the Global Peter Drucker Forum make a difference?

I think this year’s Global Peter Drucker Forum was a great event and has the potential to make a difference. Of course, someone could criticize that the call for change was made mainly by intellectual, white, Anglo-Saxon, over 55 years old people while change can only come about by the diversity of people and organizations out there. However, rather than criticizing the missing diversity within the event, the role of the Global Peter Drucker Forum has to be seen as an important element embedded in our diverse global village. It has produced condensed ideas and theories which have the potential to become soon the obvious perception of reality.   See also Steve Denning’s Takeaways From The Drucker Forum 2014   …