Peter Principle - Why Things Always Go Wrong PDF
Preview Peter Principle - Why Things Always Go Wrong
A Note About the Authors LaurenJc.Pe e ter & Laurence J. Peter was born in Canada and received an Ed.D. from Washington State University. With wide experience as a RaymondH ull teacher, counselor, school psychologist, prison instructor, con sultant, and university professor, he has written more than thirty articles that have appeared in professional journals, and a book, Prescriptive Teaching ( 1965). He is now Associate Professor of Education, Director of the Evelyn Frieden Center for Pre scriptive Teaching, and Coordinator of Programs for Emotion ally Disturbed Children at the University of Southern California. TheP eter Raymond Hull, the son of an English Methodist minister, has Principle lived in British Columbia since 194 7. He has had thirty TV and stage plays produced and four stage plays published. His articles have been featured in such magazines as Punch, Macleans and Esquire. Copyrig1h9t6b 9yW © i llMioarmr &oC wo I.n,c . Publibsyah rerda ngweimtWehilliamn t Morr&oC wo . InternatSitoannadBlaor oNdku mber1:- 56849-161-1 Foorr deirnifonrgm actoinotna,c t: BuccaBnoeoekrIs n,c . P.OB.o x16 8 CutchoNg.uY1e.1, 9 35 BuccaneBooeksr (63713)4 -5F7a2x4(,673314)-7920 Catebopae, NewY ork www. BuccanereBooks.com Cont ents byR aymoHnudl9 l Thibsoi odske dictaaotl telhd ow sheo , INTRODUCTION 1. 1 9 ThPee tPerri nciple CHAPTER workpilnagy,li onvgil,ni gva,in ndg 2. 28 ThPer inicnAi cptlieo n 3. 36 dyianttg h eLiervo efIl n competence, AppaErxecnetp tions 4. 53 Pu&l Plr omotion provtihddeea dtf aot rhf eo unadnidn g 5. Pus&h P romot59ion develoopftm hseean ltu stcairoeyfn ce 6.Follo&w Leerasd e6r4s 7. 69 Hierarc&h Pioolliotgiyc s Hi erarchiology. 8. 79 Hin&t Fso reshadowings Earlwireirts epreasab ko tuhtPe r inciple, incluOd.Ki hnagy yAa.Pm o,p Se.S, m ith, W.IrviEn.Dg i,c kiPn.Bs .oS nh,e lley, K.MarSx.F, r euSd.P, o tatnedr C.N.P arkinson 91 Thesya voetdh tehresm:s tehlcevoyeu nslo dst a ve. 9. ThPes ychoofHl ioegyr archiology 10. 103 PetSepri'rsa l 11. 108 ThPea thoolfSo ugcyc ess 12. Non-MeIdnidcioal,cfF e isnP alla ce 11 6 ment 13. 128 Heal&t Hha ppiantZe esrPsoQ PossiobrPi ilpDiert eya m 14. CreaItnicvoem pe13t9ence Howt oA votihdUe l tiPmraotmeo tion 15. 150 ThDea rwiEnxitaenn sion 169 GLOSSARY 175 A NOTOEN T HEI LLUSTRATIONS Introduction by RAYMOND HULL As autahnojdro urnaIhl aivhseate d,x cepotpional AN porttiutenossi t utdhwyeo rkoifcn igvsi lizIeh da vseo ciety. invesatniwdgr aittaetbdeo gnuo tv ernimnednubtsu,ts riy, nesesd,u caatntidho aenr Ith sa.vt ea ltkoea,dn l di stened caretfomu,el mlbyoe mfra snt yr aadnepdsr ofepsesoipolnes , ofl ofmtiyd,d alnildno gws ltya tions. Ih anvoe titchweaidtft ,eh ew x cepmteibnou nnstg,hl eei r affaEivresr.y Iws heeiern ec ompreatmepniacnnect o,m pe tence triumphant. Ih avseea et nh ree-quarhtiegrhb-wrmaiiycdl ogele- long lapasnfeda ilnltt hose eb ae caduessep,i taen ddco huecks ble-cshoemcehkoasnbd,eo tcthhdeeed s oifags nu pporting pier. Ih avseet eonw pnl ansnuepresrt vhdiees vienlgo opfm ent ac iotnty h fleo od opfalg ariernai tvw ehrei,rit ecs e rtain tob ep erioidniucnadlaltye d. LatIer leyaa db othuetc olloaftp hsrgeei eac noto ling towaeatrB sr iptoiwsehr -tshtceaoytas im toi nl:dl oilolna rs eacbhuw,te rneos tt reonnogut gowh i thasg toaobndld o w ofw i.n d In otweidit nht etrhteahstiet n dboaosre sbtaaldalit u m HousTteoxnwa,as fs,o uonncd o mplteobt epi eocnu liarly ililt-tesobdu a seobnab lrlid:gha tyfi se,l dceorunslo dst e e flyb alalgsat ihngesl tao rfte hs ek ylights. Io bsetrhavapetp liance amrsae nguupfloaalcrit cuyr,e rs, 9 10 Introduction Introduction 11 establish regional service depots in the expectation-justi contract was performed . .. no check was enforced. fied by experience-that many of their machines will break Some of the new men of war were so rotten that, unless down during the warranty period. speedily repaired, they would go down at their moorings. Having listened to umpteen motorists' complaints ;tbout The sailors were paid with so little punctuality that they faults in their new cars, I was not surprised to learn that were glad to find some usurer who would purchase their roughly one-fifth of the automobiles produced by major tickets at forty percent discount.M ost of the ships which manufacturers in recent years have been found to contain were afloat were commanded by men who had not been bred potentially dangerous production defects. to the sea." Please do not assume that I am a jaundiced ultra-conserv Wellington, examining the roster of officers assigned to ative, crying down contemporary men and things just be him for the 1810 campaign in Portugal, said, "I only hope cause they are contemporary.I ncompetence knows no bar that when the enemy reads the list of their names, he trem riers of time or place. bles as I do. " Macaulay gives a picture, drawn from a report by Samuel Civil War General Richard Taylor, speaking of the Battle Pepys, of the British navy in 1684." The naval administra of the Seven Days, remarked, "Confederate commanders tion was a prodigy of wastefulness, corruption, ignorance, knew no more about the topography ...wi thin a day's and indolence . . . no estimate could be trusted . .. n o march of the city of Richmond than they did about Central Africa. " Robert E. Lee once complained bitterly, "I cannot have my orders carried out. " For most of World War II the British armed forces fought with explosives much inferior, weight for weight, to those in German shells and bombs.E arly in 1940, British scien tists knew that the cheap, simple addition of a little powdered aluminum would double the power of existing explosives, yet the knowledge was not applied till late in 1943. In the same war, the Australian commander of a hospital ship checked the vessers water tanks after a refit and found them painted inside with red lead.I t would have poisoned every man aboard. These things-and hundreds more like them-I have seen and read about and heard about.I have accepted the univer In the expectation that many of their machines will break down during the warranty period. sality of incompetence. 12 13 Introduction Introduction I have stopped being surprised when a moon rocket fails This morning I set out to buy a desk lamp. In a large to get off the ground because something is forgotten, some furniture and appliance store I found a lamp that I liked. thing breaks, something doesn't work, or something ex The salesman was going to wrap it, but I asked him to test it plodes prematurely. first. ( I'm getting cautious nowadays. ) He was obviously I am no longer amazed to observe that a government unused to testing electrical equipment, because it took him employed marriage counselor is a homosexual. a long time to find a socket. Eventually he plugged the lamp I now expect that statesmen will prove incompetent to in, then could not switch it on! He tried another lamp of the fulfill their campaign pledges. I assume that if they do any same style: that would not switch on, either. The whole I thing, it will probably be to carry out the pledges of their consignment had defective switches. left. opponents. I recently ordered six hundred square feet of fiber glass This incompetence would be annoying enough if it were insulation for a cottage I am renovating. I stood over the confined to public works, politics, space travel and such vast, clerk at the order desk to make sure she got the quantity remote fields of human endeavor. But it is not. It is close at right. In vain! The building supply firm billed me for seven hand, too--an ever-present, pestiferous nuisance. hundred square feet, and delivered nine hundred square As I write this page, the woman in the next apartment is feet! talking on the telephone. I can hear every word she says. It Education, often touted as a cure for all ills, is apparently is 10 P.Ma.n d the man in the apartment on the other side no cure for incompetence. Incompetence runs riot in the of me has gone to bed early with a cold. I hear his intermit halls of education. One high-school graduate in three cannot tent cough. When he turns on his bed I hear the springs read at normal fifth-grade level. It is now commonplace for squeak. I don't live in a cheap rooming house: this is an colleges to be giving reading lessons to freshmen. In some expensive, modem, concrete high-rise apartment block. colleges, twenpteyr coef nfretsh men cannot read well What's the matter with the people who designed and built it? enough to understand their textbooks! The other day a friend of mine bought a hacksaw, took it I receive mail from a large university. Fifteen months ago home and began to cut an iron bolt. At his second stroke, I changed my address. I sent the usual notice to the univer the saw blade snapped, and the adjustable joint of the frame sity: my mail kept going to the old address. After two more broke so that it could not be used again. change-of-address notices and a phone call, I made a per Last week I wanted to use a tape recorder on the stage of sonal visit. I pointed with my finger to the wrong address a new high-school auditorium. I could get no power for the in their records, dictated the new . address and watched a machine. The building engineer told me that, in a year's secretary take it down. The mail still went to the old address. occupancy, he had been unable to find a switch that would Two days ago there was a new development. I received a tum on current in the base plugs on stage. He was beginning phone call from the woman who had succeeded me in my to think they were not wired up at all. old apartment and who, of course, had been receiving my 14 Introduction mail from the university.S he herself has just moved again, and my mail from the university has now started going to henrew address! As I said, I became resigned to this omnipresent incom petence.Y et I thought that, if only its cause could be discov ered, then a cure might be found.S o I began asking ques tions. I heard plenty of theories. A banker blamed the schools: "Kids nowadays don't learn efficient work habits." A teacher blamed politicians: "With such inefficiency at the seat of government, what can you expect from citizens? Besides, they resist our legitimate demands for adequate education budgets.I f only we could get a computer in every school. ..." An atheist blamed the churches: " ... drugging the peo ple's minds with fables of a better world, and distracting � them from practicalities. " Earrleyp reosfss eixoiunma plu clsaeusas s eusb condsecsiiorues tof ail. A churchman blamed radio, television and movies: ". .. many distractions of modem life have drawn people atonement for guilt feelings.A philosopher said, "Men are away from the moral teachings of the church. " human; accidents will happen. " A trade unionist blamed management: " ... too greedy A multitude of different explanations is as bad as no ex to pay a living wage. A man can't take any interest in his job planation at all.I began to feel that I would never under on this starvation pay." A manager blamed unions: "The worker just doesn't care stand incompetence. nowadays-thinks of nothing but raises, vacations and re Then one evening, in a theatre lobby, during the second tirement pensions." intermission of a dully performed play, I was grumbling An individualist said that welfare-statism produces a gen about incompetent actors and directors, and got into conver eral don't-care attitude.A social worker told me that moral sation with Dr.L aurence J.P eter, a scientist who had de laxity in the home and family breakdown produces irrespon voted many years to the study of incompetence. sibility on the job.A psychologist said that early repression The intermission was too short for him to do more than of sexual impulses causes a subconscious desire to fail, as whet my curiosity.A fter the show I went to his home and sat till 3 :00 listening to his lucid, startlingly original A.M. 17 1 6 Introduction Introd uction Don odte cliidgehT thldeye .c itsori eoaondn i isr revo exposoifat t ihoento hraaytt l asatn swemryqe ude s tion, cabIlyfeo .ru e aydo,cu a nne vreerg yaoiunpr r essetn att e "Whiyn cotmepne ce?" ofb lisisgfnuolry aonwuci nele;lv aegrau innt hinvkeinngly DrP.e ter eAxdoanemar,ga ittaeandtad oc rcsi adne dnt, eraytoeus ru peorrid oormsi nyaotuseru bordNienvaetre!s . arraiognnee dfe oafot uusrro ec iaestt hpyee rpetarna dtor ThPee tPerri ncoinpchleee a,cr adn,bn eof to rgotten. rewaorfdi enrc ompetence. Whahta vyeot uog aibnyr eadoinBn?yg c onquienring IncompeextpelnacMieynm eidnfl!da maettd h teh ought. compeityne onucreas nebdly uf n,d ersitnacnodmipn egt ence Perhtahpnese sxttm eipgh btei ncompeertaedniccea ted! ion thyeorcusa ,dn oy ouorw wno rmko reea sgialipynr, o Witchh aracmtoedreiDssrttP.yie ,ct h earsd o f abre en motiaonmnda kmeo rmeo neYyo.uc aanv opiadi niflull satitsodfi iesdch uidssis s cowvietafrh ey fw r ieanncddo sl nessYeosuc. a bne coaml ee aodfem re nY.o uc aenn joy leagaunegdsi avneo ccaslieocntoaunhlr i rese seHairsc h. youlre isYuoruce a.gn r atyiofufyrr iecnodnsf,oy uonudr vascto lleocfit nicoonm petheibnsrc iilaglnaiala,aon xfty enemiimepsr,ye osucsrh iladnreden nr aincrdhe vi talize incomptehteeonarcnifoeder sm ulhaanede, v aeprp eia nred youmra rriage. print. Thiksn owliends gheow,ri trl,el v oluytoiulorin fiez-e "PosmsyiP brliyn ccoiupblleden efit msaanPikedit nedr,." "BuIt'f mr antbiucswayil trlhoy u ttienaec hitnhgae s and perhsaapivs te . sociated tphatephnee arrrwfeeoa rckuc;lo tmmyi mteteete Soi,yf ohua vceo urraegaoedn,m , a rmke,m orainzde ingasnm,dy c ontirneusienSagor mcdeha .Iym ays oorut t apptlhyPe e tPerri nciple. thmea tearniadar lr ainftgo peru blicbaufttoi troh nnee, x t teonrfi ftyeeeanIsr ism plyh awvtoein m 'et. " Is tretshsdeea dn goefpr r ocrasatniadnt la atDsirt o. n Petaegrr teoaec do llabhoerw aotupillodan hc:iee sx te nsive reseraerpcohar nthdsu gmea nusactrm iypd ti spIo sal; wouclodn detnhseiemn taob ooTkh.ef ollopwaig negs presPernotf ePsestoeerrx 'psl anoafht iPisro inn ctih pele, mospte netsroactaiinanpdlgs ychodliosgcioocvfate lh r ey century. Daryeor ue aidt ? Daryeo u ifnoa ncee ,b lrienvdeiltnahgrte ei aosno,n why schodoonl osbt e stwoiws dwohmyg, o vernmecnatnsn ot maintoaridwneh ry,c oudrotn so dti spjeunsstewi h cye, prospfearitilopts ry o dhuacpep iwnheyus tso,p ia n plans nevgeern eurtaotp ei as? CHAPTER I The Peter Principle ___ "I begin to smell a rat." M. DE CERVANTES _________ WEN I was a boy I was taught that the men upstairs knew what they were doing. I was told, "Peter, the more you know, the further you go." So I stayed in school until I graduated from college and then went forth into the world clutching firmly these ideas and my new teaching certificate. During the first year of teaching I was upset to find that a number of teachers, school principals, supervisors and superintendents appeared to be unaware of their profes sional responsibilities and incompetent in executing their duties. For example my principal's main concerns were that all window shades be at the same level, that classrooms should be quiet and that no one step on or near the rose beds. The superintendent's main concerns were that no minority group, no matter how fanatical, should ever be offended and that all official forms be submitted on time. The children's education appeared farthest from the admin istrator mind. At first I thought this was a special weakness of the school system in which I taught so I applied for certification 19 20 The Peter Principle in another province. I filled out the special forms, enclosed the required documents and complied willingly with all the red tape. Several weeks later, back came my application and all the documents! No, there was nothing wrong with my credentials; the forms were correctly filled out; an official departmental stamp showed that they had been received in good order. But an accompanying letter said, "The new regulations re quire that such forms cannot be accepted by the Depart ment of Education unless they have been registered at the Post Office to ensure safe delivery. Will you please remail the forms to the Department, making sure to register them this time?" I began to suspect that the local school system did not have a monopoly on incompetence. As I looked further afield, I saw that every organization contained a number of persons who could not do their jobs. A Universal Phenomenon Occupational incompetence is everywhere. Have you noticed it? Probably we all have noticed it. We see indecisive politicians posing as resolute statesmen and the "authoritative source" who blames his misinforma tion on "situational imponderables." Limitless are the public servants who are indolent and insolent; military command ers whose behavioral timidity belies their dreadnaught rhetoric, and governors whose innate servility prevents their actually governing. In our sophistication, we virtually shrug aside the immoral cleric, corrupt judge, incoherent attorney, author who cannot write and English teacher who cannot spell. At universities we see proclamations authored by administrators whose own office communications are In our sophistication, we virtually shrug aside the immoral cleric.
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