Peter Drucker, 1909-2005

It is a fitting tribute that this year’s survey of more than 1,000 senior executives confirmed what we already suspected: that Peter Drucker, who died this month at the age of 95, was the world’s most respected thinker and writer on management.

Lesser gurus come and go, their ideas in vogue for a time then falling from favour. Equally, the reputations of practising chief executives wax and wane with the fortunes of the companies they lead. But Drucker had staying power. The acuity of his insight and the breadth of his learning spoke to generations of managers.

- Financial Times, 17 November 2005

Peter Drucker, whose death, aged 95, was announced this week, was a man who persistently stayed ahead of his time. As begetter of the science of management he towered above the imitators he spawned. Long before the computer revolution he predicted a society moulded by knowledge and information.

- The Guardian, November 17 2005

The arch-mentor of the great sages of the business world certainly got a phenomenal number of things right during his long life. He made predictions about the future that in retrospect seem totally obvious, but at the time were seminal.

- David Bolchover in the Telegraph, November 28 2005

He was the creator and inventor of modern management. In the early 1950s, nobody had a tool kit to manage these incredibly complex organisations that had gone out of control. Drucker was the first person to give us a handbook for that.

- Tom Peters

The world knows he was the greatest management thinker of the last century

- Jack Welch