The fear of failure has already permeated the knowledge society.
The upward mobility of the knowledge society comes at a high price: the psychological pressures and emotional traumas of the rat race. There can be winners only if there are losers. This was not true of earlier societies.
Japanese youngsters suffer sleep deprivation because they spend their evenings at a crammer to help them pass their exams. Otherwise they will not get into the prestige university of their choice, and thus into a good job. Other countries, such as America, Britain, and France, are also allowing their schools to become viciously competitive. That this has happened over such a short time—no more than thirty or forty years—indicates how much the fear of failure has already permeated the knowledge society. Given this competitive struggle, a growing number of highly successful knowledge workers—business managers, university teachers, museum directors, doctors—“plateau” in their forties. If their work is all they have, they are in trouble. Knowledge workers therefore need to develop some serious outside interest.
ACTION POINT: Develop a serious satisfying outside interest.
Managing in the Next Society
* Source: The Daily Drucker by Peter F. Drucker