In the Prime

In 1955 Cyril Northcote Parkinson observed that work expands to fill the time allotted for its completion. Actually, he observed this some years before, but being a busy man it took him a while and he only actually finally (and ironically) wrote it down as the publisher’s deadline approached. Just as well he did because otherwise the world would have been deprived of Parkinson’s Law. Without these eponymous laws to guide us, negotiating this mortal veil would be a far more perilous journey. Thanks to such visionaries as Boyle, Hooke and Ohm and solid thinkers such as Parkinson, Murphy* and Sod we understand our world so much more clearly than did our forefathers.

Everybody knows from experience the inevitability of Parkinson’s, whereby your kids never start their homework until the day before it needs to be handed in and how when you start to catch up on your Sky-Plus listing suddenly you find you’ve been sitting on your arse all day. But old Parkie goes further than this simple principle and also notes such pithy realities as: “The time spent on any item of the agenda will be in inverse proportion to the sum involved” and ‘Orgmanship’ which is "The tendency of all administrative departments to increase the number of subordinate staff, 'irrespective of the amount of work (if any) to be done." 

These statements practically amount to mission statements for all government departments, the NHS and any organisation given any public funding for any purpose whatsoever. Panels of ‘climate experts’, economic think tanks and the administration of the BBC all spring to mind as exemplars. But even in the lowliest collection of human work units there is still room to see the machinations of these universal laws in action. One such law is the Peter Principle, in which the selection of a candidate for a position is based on the candidate's performance in their current role, rather than whether they possess any abilities relevant to the intended role. Thus, employees only stop being promoted once they can no longer perform effectively, and hence "managers rise to the level of their incompetence."

We all know at least one such co-worker, floundering around, doing more harm than good and often unaware of the chaos they leave in their wake. I sometimes think that a quiet cull might be in order but generally it is kinder to just let them do their thing, keep them out of harm’s way and give them an office in a quiet corner of the premises where they can do as little harm and generate as little expense as possible. Of course, this doesn’t always work; sometimes we have to promote them all the way out of trouble, elevating them to a position where they become entirely irrelevant. I’m calling this the Prime Minister Principle.

(* Murphy’s Law states, of course, “Anything that can go wrong will go wrong” but blog authors may be more familiar with its editorial counterpart:

Muphry's law – "If you write anything criticizing editing or proofreading, there will be a fault of some kind in what you have written.")

It's The Law

Nobody who has read 1984 can fail to be awed by Orwell’s prescience and to many readers of a centre right political persuasion his chillingly wrought world of grey, stalking horror is already with us in the form of Newspeak, Doublethink and Big Brother himself. Orwellian has become an accepted adjective and scarcely a day goes by without some columnist describing our society thus. Possibly the most sinister modern manifestation of Ingsoc is the willingness of the young to readily denounce others to the state on some trumped-up charge of bigotry, free speech being secondary these days to the eradication of any form of upset. (Unless, of course, you belong to certain promoted species of the congenitally thin-skinned.)

But while all eyes have been on the evolution of Airstrip One, another seer of equal perspicacity has passed quietly into history, although his observations are as true, if not truer than Orwell’s. While modern day managers will be well acquainted with The Dilbert Principle, those of an earlier vintage will remember with a happy sigh, the insights of one Cyril NorthcoteParkinson. I have regularly cited Parkinson’s Law since I first became aware of its existence. Imagine then, my delight that Radio Four last night devoted a delicious half hour to revisiting this seminal work. (Go on, iPlayer it; you won’t regret it.)

First published in 1955, Parkinson’s Law states, “Work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion.” How very true – we all recognise the laxity of production once a deadline is removed – I’m doing it now, being distracted by the cornucopia of the Internet while I’m supposed to be writing to my self-imposed daily deadline. But Cyril also saw so much more besides and in a world where your worth is measured by your busy-ness and bustle and bluster, rather than your actual productivity his arch words are more applicable than ever.

Parkinson said:

“In politics people give you what they think you deserve and deny you what they think you want.”

“The man who is denied the opportunity of taking decisions of importance begins to regard as important the decisions he is allowed to take.”

“The smaller the function, the greater the management.” And “Time spent on any item of the agenda will be in inverse proportion to the sum involved.“

He recognised the futility of allowing governments to govern, yet the equally frustrating futility of allowing the people to exercise democracy. He saw that people mistake activity for action and job titles for importance and that such mistakes are an inevitable part of the human condition. More academic tomes seek to give us ever deeper (and ever more costly) insights into our psyche yet despite the millions of man hours devoted to revealing humanity none have come even close to such succinct searing indictments as the bureaucratic imperative, “An official wants to multiply subordinates,  not rivals”

In a week in which The TaxPayers’ Alliance has published its latest Bumper Book of Government Waste identifying £120bn of worthless spending it might do us all good to revisit Cyril’s simple dissection of the truth of bureaucracy and the plethora of waste it inevitably produces. If every government department would man-up and recognise these truths we would have many fewer and leaner government departments. The deficit could be cut in no time.

Battsby's Bumper Book 

of Government

If I was running the show I’d have Cyril Parkinson at one hand and William of Ockham at the other, but sadly (or possibly thankfully) the world is not yet ready for our efficient ministrations. Much as I’d prefer not to piss on your chips, one thing is certain, although it’s a quote by neither man, “Whoever you vote for, the bloody government will always get in.”