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Re: I confess... (Reply to this comment)
by asafono
Very late reply... thanks!
I highly recommend Prof. Parkinson's non-fiction books, though you will probably disagree with some of his political views (I read the recent comment sections on some of the *controversial* epinions where you participated.)
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Apr 12 '07
11:18 am PDT
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I confess... (Reply to this comment)
by lammet
I didn't know where the term "Parkinson's Law' came from. So there was a Parkinson after all (not like Murphy :o)!
I first heard of P's law in College; a professor of Marketing used to say to us: 'Remember, a job will take as long as it has. If it has 3 months, it will take 3 months to complete. If it has 3 weeks, it will take that. If it has 3 days it will take 3 days. And do not make the mistake of thinking that the job that took 3 days to do is by necessity inferior to the one that took 3 months!'
Time and again, I have seen the truth of that statement in myself. If I have 3 months, I will take it easy, throw half-serious ideas around my head and colleagues, start and stop, postpone, think and re-think angles and solutions I ought to know are dead-ends. It's only when the few-days away deadline breaths hard down my neck that the energy kicks in, and an amazing internal filter materialises that effortlessly weeds away all false avenues, letting through only the good ideas.
As for committees, I read someplace this succinct epigram: 'A camel is a horse designed by a committee'. Tops!
Terrific review, apparently terrific book. I shall seek it out. Thanks for sharing.
-Vasilis
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Jan 13 '07
9:47 pm PST
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Re: Re: ! (Reply to this comment)
by virtuelle2
Oh, anything in the last half-century is of recent vintage to me. (I'd always thought Parkinson's Law dated back to the early 20th century.) I think I saw a paperback copy of this book in my dad's library a long time ago. Of course, I was much too young to understand it. Not that I'd do better today, several decades later!
I like that quote very much! Hee!
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Dec 19 '05
1:38 pm PST
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Re: ! (Reply to this comment)
by asafono
Thank you for your kind words.
It is, alas, not so recent, and many bookstores and libraries do not carry the volume.
To quote despair.com, "Hard work may pay off eventually, but procrastination pays off right away."
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Dec 19 '05
8:14 am PST
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! (Reply to this comment)
by virtuelle2
I didn't realize that Parkinson's Law was of such recent vintage! That law does seem to hold in my case...due mostly to procrastination!
Excellent treatise on a classic here. Thanks for the very enlightening read.
-Teresa
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Dec 18 '05
5:59 pm PST
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Re: Thanks for reminding us--- (Reply to this comment)
by asafono
Hello Gavia (or is it Gavium?)
Thank you for your encouragement. I enjoy reading and re-reading Parkinson's books, enjoying their combination of sociopolitical insights and dry British wit. I hope to review Mrs. Parkinson's Law and The Fur-Lined Mousetrap in the future.
On Peter: in one of his books (The Law and the Profits?), Parkinson devotes a chapter, appropriately titled Peter's Predicament, to the esteemed professor's works. Fascinating critique...
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Nov 09 '05
8:51 pm PST
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Thanks for reminding us--- (Reply to this comment)
by gaviidae
---of the revolutionary contribution of Parkinson to the language of economics, and of humor!
Together with the Peter Principle, they are the most profound social/economic insights of my time.
Peter Principle is, of course, that everyone tends to rise to their level of incompetency---thereby assuring that virtually all leadership is incompetetent!
As a retiree I can vouch for the validity of Parkinson's First Law. Tasks I would have done in a half hour now keep me occupied for the entire day---but I'd like to think Johngo has the right perspective about that!
Thanks for your very fine review of this interesting book!
Gavia
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Nov 08 '05
10:09 am PST
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Re: As one of the few readers old enough (Reply to this comment)
by asafono
John,
glad you had the time to read and comment.
My own response was always to interpret it as a particularly dry satire, and because of this, to take its conclusions sceptically. I do not think that they are generally applicable in principle.
Of course this is dry satire - in the best Swiftian sense. The author, in my opinion, exaggerates the real trends and concepts to make his point. Surely Swift did not earnestly propose cannibalism as a solution to the problem of hunger and overpopulation.
There is a difference in that military logistics, medical services, and supplies of food, bedding, and clothing are very much better during the Iraq war than in the Crimean war.
This is a very good point, and I tried to address it when describing Parkinson's rather mechanistic, non-systemic approach - "a ship is always (the same) ship."
The illustration of the effects of leisure in the writing of a postcard also ignore the fact that leisure provides one with the opportunity to refine one's powers of discrimination.
But of course! I don't believe Parkinson meant to put down the leisurely old lady in any way, and I apologize if this can be inferred from my essay. His point was, I speculate, that even the same lady would have spent much less time, with the same artistically superior results, had she been operating under any time constraint.
There are many, many literary works that defend the "right and duty to leisure", Brodsky's In Praise of Boredom and Kundera's Slowness being the ones that come to mind right away.
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Jul 18 '05
10:31 am PDT
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As one of the few readers old enough (Reply to this comment)
by johngo
to remember (just) the fuss provoked by the book in Britain when it was first published, I was sorry to see that it is now out of print. I was too young to take the book in when it first appeared, but I remember that for a while 'Parkinson's law' was a catchphrase on everybody's lips. My own response was always to interpret it as a particularly dry satire, and because of this, to take its conclusions sceptically. I do not think that they are generally applicable in principle. Take, for example, the minimal administrative support of the British Army in the Crimean war, and the maximal support in the current war in Iraq. There is a difference in that military logistics, medical services, and supplies of food, bedding, and clothing are very much better during the Iraq war than in the Crimean war. Things are not perfect now, and it is not likely that increasing the numbers of ancillary staff would produce a proportional increase in the welfare of the soldiers in the field, but the expansion of work to use up the available resources can mean that useful work that would not otherwise have been done can be done.
The illustration of the effects of leisure in the writing of a postcard also ignore the fact that leisure provides one with the opportunity to refine one's powers of discrimination. One is able to apply one's powers in the choosing of a postcard, the best of the set, the one chosen to be most pleasing to the equally discriminating recipient. One then thinks carefully, drafts the message, re-drafts the message, and when at last one is satisfied that the message expresses exactly what one wishes to express one takes the care to write out the final draft using a decent pen and ink, in a fair round hand. One doesn't mumble in speech so why should one mumble in writing? Then, at last, one posts the card. One does not think about the effort, and the recipient may not recognize it either, because part of the skill is to make the message as pleasing and perspicuous as possible. An indiscriminating person would be just as happy to receive 'Dear Aunty Mabel and Uncle Bill,' (with Uncle Bill scratched out)'Weather lovely, having a wonderful time. Love, John
ps I was sorry to hear that Uncle Bill has died.'
Best wishes,
John
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Jul 13 '05
6:08 am PDT
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Re: Sounds like a pearl! (Reply to this comment)
by asafono
Vittorio,
thank you for reading and commenting (r/r/c?)
A common fallacy is that bloated bureaucracies are typical of public institutions.
Very true. That's why I made a point of explicitly mentioning government/civil AND corporate bureaucracies in this review - both are subject to Parkinson's law.
I would contend that yes, reading minutes is really unproductive, but considering that many "productive" activities that raise the GDP consist in destroying the environment to create stupid products nobody really needs, I feel a surge of pride when I go home at night, having spent my whole day at meetings, writing and reading minutes, and having accomplished absolutely nothing.
While I dislike telemarketers and despise scammers, I think it is in the eye of the beholder which products are needed and which are not. What is a luxury or a frivolity to some is a convenience or a necessity by the others.
I recommend the book highly - I quoted from it in the review rather heavily to give a taste of the author's reasoning and style, but this is of course not sufficient. Parkinson's Law is available at many public and most university libraries, and for purchase through places like Amazon.
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Jul 11 '05
7:31 am PDT
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Sounds like a pearl! (Reply to this comment)
by vicfar
I had never heard of this book. A common fallacy is that bloated bureaucracies are typical of public institutions. I work for a multinational company which must compete on the pharma markets (if you can call the "markets" really competitive - if they were, we would not exist), and I can assure the same behavior takes place here. We can set in motions huge initiatives where director-level people meet internationally for months and months to compose silly strategic documents, hundreds of pages long, which top management praises the more lavishly the less they actually say. After tens of millions of dollars spent, everything goes back to normal and these strategies, which nobody reads, are filed somewhere, and are used only to attack people who are inconvenient - like byzantine laws that are fished out as pretexts to remove undesirables in countries with semi-democratic, facade-preserving regimes.
As to the statement:
"...the stability of an economy based upon reading each other's minutes."
I would contend that yes, reading minutes is really unproductive, but considering that many "productive" activities that raise the GDP consist in destroying the environment to create stupid products nobody really needs, I feel a surge of pride when I go home at night, having spent my whole day at meetings, writing and reading minutes, and having accomplished absolutely nothing.
Those ladies who spend a day writing a postcard to their niece are an infinitely better asset to society than those lowly busybodies who start phone solicitation schemes and other marketing scams, although the latter contribute to our GDP and the former do not (unless you consider the 50 cents for the postcard and the 37 cents for the stamp a contribution to GDP).
Having said that, I have begun to take notes, privately, about how large organizations work. If you stop trying to climb the ladder and just observe, it is better than going to the circus!
Thought-provoking essay. I will look for this book.
Vittorio
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Jul 09 '05
11:19 am PDT
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