Although a simple reading of Drucker’s advice may give the impression that following it is easy, this is not so.

Drucker expands this to mean that the leader must consider the possible harm that any act might cause the mission, the organization, its members, or society and he considers this to be the ultimate guide for the leader in ethical conduct in business. Hippocrates was cautioning that the physician must consider the possible harm that any intervention might cause. The statement 'above all do no harm,' is not mentioned in The Hippocratic Oath, but a close approximation to the phrase can be found Of the Epidemics, also written by Hippocrates. The Hippocratic Oath and Primum Non Nocere He developed the Oath of Medical Ethics, now known as the Hippocratic Oath for physicians to follow as their ethical and moral code. He observed disease symptoms and consequently was the first to accurately describe and catalog indications of various illnesses. Hippocrates believed that the body must be looked at as a whole, and not just individual parts analyzed, diagnosed, and treated separately. Hippocrates shared other commonalities with Drucker’s methods. Hippocrates rejected the common views of his age that considered illness to be caused by evil spirits or the disfavor of the gods. As Drucker looked at a business, Hippocrates looked at a patient and based his diagnoses on his observations. As Peter Drucker is known as 'The Father of Modern Management,' Hippocrates is known as the 'The Father of Medicine.' In the ancient western world Hippocrates was regarded as the greatest physician of his day. Hippocrates was a Greek physician born in 460 BC. Drucker summarized what he expected from the leader with one of Hippocrates’s concepts: primum non nocere.

Do no harm principle