Knowledge Worker

From Wikimedia

Peter Drucker coined this descriptor about forty years ago. His original interest was triggered by his prescient insight that the U.S. economy was shifting from a manufacturing to service orientation. Thus, Knowledge and Service worker productivity (not dumb machine) would become management’s primary challenge. In The Age of Discontinuity, he defined a Knowledge Worker as a man or woman who applies to productive work ideas, concepts, and information rather than manual skill or brawn. Other elements of his discussion on Knowledge Workers include the concepts that they do not simply engage in pre-configured routines and they know more about solution creation than their supervisors. In a 1994 article, he estimated that 40% of the workforce were Knowledge Workers. It would be safe to assume that he believes more than half of today’s workforce are Knowledge Workers.