Parkinson's law and how to manage it
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| + | == Abstract == | ||
The definition of Parkinson's Law is that work expands to fill the time alotted <ref name="Article"> Parkinson, C. Northcote (November 19, 1955) [https://www.economist.com/news/1955/11/19/parkinsons-law "Parkinson’s Law"], ''The Economist''. Retrieved 25 February 2021.</ref>. Cyril Northcote Parkinson, whos was a British author and historian outlined the concept in a humorous essay in The Economist in 1955. In the essay, Parkinson describes how assigned tasks will usually take up all the time available for its completion, and if more time can be made available, the task will also take up that added time. Sometimes the law is applied to limit increasing bureaucracy in a company or organisation. The growth of bureaucracy depends on mainly two factors: The Law of Multiplication of Subordinates and The Law of Multiplication of Work. The Law of Multiplication of Subordinates is the tendency of managers to hire two or more subordinates to report to them so that neither is in direct competition with the manager themself; and the fact that bureaucrats create work for other bureaucrats <ref name="BBC"> Wen, Tiffanie (May 22, 2020) [https://www.bbc.com/worklife/article/20191107-the-law-that-explains-why-you-cant-get-anything-done "A British historian famously wrote that work expands to fill available time – but what was he actually saying about inefficiency?"], ''BBC''. Retrieved 25 February 2021.</ref>. The Law of Multiplication of Work states that people will create deliverables for each other by complicating it to keep everyone occupied. Employees are the overworked, lacking resources amd therefore more an organisation will hire more employees. Parkinson determined from his analysis that a typical company had a staff increase per year to be around 5-7% completely unrelated to the amount of work in the organisation. The fact that there is no linear relationship between amount of staff and amount of people depicts Parkinson's law. Based on this, he formulated a mathematical formula to determine the annual increase in staff in any public administrative department. | The definition of Parkinson's Law is that work expands to fill the time alotted <ref name="Article"> Parkinson, C. Northcote (November 19, 1955) [https://www.economist.com/news/1955/11/19/parkinsons-law "Parkinson’s Law"], ''The Economist''. Retrieved 25 February 2021.</ref>. Cyril Northcote Parkinson, whos was a British author and historian outlined the concept in a humorous essay in The Economist in 1955. In the essay, Parkinson describes how assigned tasks will usually take up all the time available for its completion, and if more time can be made available, the task will also take up that added time. Sometimes the law is applied to limit increasing bureaucracy in a company or organisation. The growth of bureaucracy depends on mainly two factors: The Law of Multiplication of Subordinates and The Law of Multiplication of Work. The Law of Multiplication of Subordinates is the tendency of managers to hire two or more subordinates to report to them so that neither is in direct competition with the manager themself; and the fact that bureaucrats create work for other bureaucrats <ref name="BBC"> Wen, Tiffanie (May 22, 2020) [https://www.bbc.com/worklife/article/20191107-the-law-that-explains-why-you-cant-get-anything-done "A British historian famously wrote that work expands to fill available time – but what was he actually saying about inefficiency?"], ''BBC''. Retrieved 25 February 2021.</ref>. The Law of Multiplication of Work states that people will create deliverables for each other by complicating it to keep everyone occupied. Employees are the overworked, lacking resources amd therefore more an organisation will hire more employees. Parkinson determined from his analysis that a typical company had a staff increase per year to be around 5-7% completely unrelated to the amount of work in the organisation. The fact that there is no linear relationship between amount of staff and amount of people depicts Parkinson's law. Based on this, he formulated a mathematical formula to determine the annual increase in staff in any public administrative department. | ||
| + | == Explanation == | ||
| − | + | Imagine that | |
Parkinson describes how work is elastic in its demands on time. | Parkinson describes how work is elastic in its demands on time. | ||
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Work has a tendency to become increasingly more complex as to fill the time alotted when poeple are involved. Procrastination plays a big role in Parkinson's law. Knowing that a project or and undertaking has a deadline often inspires us to leave work to right before that deadline – and our delays in getting started mean the time required for that task expands. | Work has a tendency to become increasingly more complex as to fill the time alotted when poeple are involved. Procrastination plays a big role in Parkinson's law. Knowing that a project or and undertaking has a deadline often inspires us to leave work to right before that deadline – and our delays in getting started mean the time required for that task expands. | ||
Revision as of 16:16, 26 February 2021
Contents |
Abstract
The definition of Parkinson's Law is that work expands to fill the time alotted [1]. Cyril Northcote Parkinson, whos was a British author and historian outlined the concept in a humorous essay in The Economist in 1955. In the essay, Parkinson describes how assigned tasks will usually take up all the time available for its completion, and if more time can be made available, the task will also take up that added time. Sometimes the law is applied to limit increasing bureaucracy in a company or organisation. The growth of bureaucracy depends on mainly two factors: The Law of Multiplication of Subordinates and The Law of Multiplication of Work. The Law of Multiplication of Subordinates is the tendency of managers to hire two or more subordinates to report to them so that neither is in direct competition with the manager themself; and the fact that bureaucrats create work for other bureaucrats [2]. The Law of Multiplication of Work states that people will create deliverables for each other by complicating it to keep everyone occupied. Employees are the overworked, lacking resources amd therefore more an organisation will hire more employees. Parkinson determined from his analysis that a typical company had a staff increase per year to be around 5-7% completely unrelated to the amount of work in the organisation. The fact that there is no linear relationship between amount of staff and amount of people depicts Parkinson's law. Based on this, he formulated a mathematical formula to determine the annual increase in staff in any public administrative department.
Explanation
Imagine that Parkinson describes how work is elastic in its demands on time.
Work has a tendency to become increasingly more complex as to fill the time alotted when poeple are involved. Procrastination plays a big role in Parkinson's law. Knowing that a project or and undertaking has a deadline often inspires us to leave work to right before that deadline – and our delays in getting started mean the time required for that task expands.
Parkinson uses the example of how the bureaucracy of the British Civil Service grew unrelated to the amount of work. The growth depended on two factors: The Law of Multiplication of Subordinates and The Law of Multiplication of Work. He formulated a mathematical formula to determine the increase in staff in any public administrative departmment. Parkinson's Law explains the behavioural aspect of scheduling. If more time is available to complete a task, the task will most likely take up all the time. This results in inefficient use of time and effort. Project managers can use this to understand employees motivation for completing tasks. In project schedule management, this is valuable knowledge when estimating activity duration. The project manager should account for this tendency when scheduling a project and to ensure efficient use of time. To account for Parkinson's Law, a project manager needs to set deadlines. Deadlines ensure that a task only takes up the necessary time for completion while requiring the most effort.
Formula
- x – number of new employees to be hired annually
- k – number of employees who want to be promoted by hiring new employees
- m – number of working hours per person for the preparation of internal memoranda (micropolitics)
- L – difference: age at hiring − age at retirement
- n – number of administrative files actually completed
Incencitives to Encourage Early Finish
Risk Management
Monitoring and Controlling
Annotated bibliography
References
- ↑ Parkinson, C. Northcote (November 19, 1955) "Parkinson’s Law", The Economist. Retrieved 25 February 2021.
- ↑ Wen, Tiffanie (May 22, 2020) "A British historian famously wrote that work expands to fill available time – but what was he actually saying about inefficiency?", BBC. Retrieved 25 February 2021.
https://www.economist.com/news/1955/11/19/parkinsons-law https://www.atlassian.com/blog/productivity/what-is-parkinsons-law#:~:text=Parkinson%27s%20Law%20is%20the%20old,for%20the%20Economist%20in%201955.
