Thursday, January 04, 2007

The Peter Principle


In a hierarchy every employee tends to rise to his level of incompetence."

The idea that people are promoted to their level of incompetence comes from the book The Peter Principle written by Dr. Laurence Peter in 1968.

The Amazon editorial review says -

"This bestselling business classic of more than twenty-five years' duration is a dead-on account of why boredom, bungling, and bad management are built into every organization. Through hilarious case histories and cartoons adapted from Punch, Dr. Peter shows how America's corporate career track drives employees relentlessly
upward -- until they get promoted into jobs they just can't do and wind up desperately treading water, driving their colleagues crazy, and dragging down productivity and profit."

Before Dr. Laurence Peter's death in 1988, he was a professor of education at the University of Southern California and at the University of British Columbia.

Peter Principle - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

_________________________________