Parkinson's law
The Parkinson 's laws are some dressed in the garb of sociological tenets ironic representations of the British sociologist C. Northcote Parkinson for management and economics.
Parkinson's Law ...
Most famous is the Parkinson's Law for the growth of bureaucracy, first published in 1955, it is. :
"Work Expands so as to fill the time available for its completion. "
"Work expands in exactly the measure of how time is available for their execution are available. "
- And not to the extent that it actually is such a complex. As an example, an older lady is suggested that the need for half a day for her niece to send a postcard ( postcard selection, glasses, Address Search, Text constitution, deciding whether for the path to the mail box, a screen can be taken ). The contrast is formed by the busy man doing the same job in three minutes at his desk.
As a motivational tendency Parkinson are two other theorems that are valid in many offices in the world:
Parkinson explained this with the example of the Royal British Navy in 1930, officials in the number of British Colonial Office. Then the employees in each administrative staff developed according to the formula:
Here k is the number of employees who seek promotion by hiring new subordinates; m is the number of hours worked per person, serve the production of memoranda in the internal office circulation; L is the difference between the age of the setting and the age of retirement, and n is the number of administrative units that are actually done by the staff of the office. x is the number of new employees that must be hired from year to year.
According to Parkinson, the annual increase in staff is without regard to the variations in the quantity of labor between 5.2 % and 6.6 %. He even goes so far that the core tasks could also be omitted entirely without the administration would therefore shrink.
Parkinson formulated this in the 1950s. In modern administrations new terms have been introduced, such as controlling, new governance models, business ratios, etc. This often increases the proportion of staff in these areas of work, while stagnating for the actual core tasks the staff or even decreases.
... And other studies on the management
1957 appeared Parkinson's Law, together with nine other essays in book form ( Parkinson 's law, and other studies in administration; German Parkinson's Law and other studies on the administration).
In this paper high finance or the point where the interest goes out ( high finance, or the point of vanishing interest) Parkinson formulated the
"The time spent on any item of the agenda will be in inverse proportion to the sum Involved. "
" The time spent on a particular agenda item is inversely proportional to the respective costs."
Parkinson describes the meeting of the Finance Committee, which concerned the granting of funds for a nuclear reactor ( $ 10 million, discussion Duration 2 ½ minutes), a bicycle shed ( $ 2350, 45 minutes) and coffee for the meetings of other committees (monthly 4, $ 75, 5 ¼ hours) goes.
This means that in discussions the simplest issues are discussed in greatest detail because of this, most participants understand something (The matters most debated in a deliberative body tend to be the minor ones where everybody under stands the issues) - and not the topics that matter most are. Incompetence in important issues, is compensated by detailed floor on trivial points, making it come to devastating bad decisions and misallocation of resources over and over again.
In directors and cabinets or the coefficient of disability (directors and councils, or coefficient of inefficiency ) comitology (Committee teaching) is founded, and it comes to the number of members, from which the complete incapacity is reached ( disability or inefficiency coefficient, and after Parkinson 20 or 21 people).
Continuations
Continuations form, inter alia:
- Mrs. Parkinson 's law, and other studies in domestic science (1968; ger Mrs. Parkinson's Law and other studies in the field of Home Science, 1969) with eleven articles, including:
- Mrs. Parkinson's Law to stress formation and degradation:
"Heat produced by pressure Expands to fill the mind available, from Which it can pass only to a cooler at least "
" Generated by pressure heat expands and fills the existing mind from which they can escape only by delivery to a cooler mind. "
- The law (1979; German Parkinsons new law, 1982) with eight old and eight new contributions, including:
- The Law of waste (second Parkinson 's Law):
" Expenditures rise to meet income. "
" Expenditures rise always to the limits of income. "
- The law of inertia:
"Delay is the deadliest form of denial. "
"Delay is the deadliest form of denial. "
- The Law of vacuum as a generalization of the original Parkinson 's Law:
" Action Expands to fill the void created by human failure. "
" Work expands the time as far as arising from human error idle is present, the it is important to fill. "