The Peter Principle: Why Things Always Go Wrong: As Featured on Radio 4

I had heard about the Peter principle many years ago, and thought it was an easy thing to understand, you are born with a given set of talents and you would rise in the ladder based on your performance according to those talents and skills until they will be not sufficient to keep you growing.I enjoyed reading the book and was surprised with its humor and simplicity, yet the wisdom contained is lots. I have had a very successful career and had experienced myself the effect of growing and moving into higher positions without thoughtful analysis of what the consecuences of new jobs will be.The analysis of Hierarchies is interesting and was the first attempt to think of what happened to individuals who had grown to their level of incompetence. I made a research of later writings from researchers who studied the validity of the principle. "In a Hierarchy , every employee tends to rise to his level of incompetence" - in a study made in the 1970's in the UK, reasearchers found that executives which had grown to their level of incompetency, were exposed to a variable component of a new job, without giving the executive any training for the new position, this creates a greater challenge for the executive and this tension and anxiety becomes the fire starter for odd behaviour and mistakes of judgement. If we take for example the great Steve Jobs' case when he was fired from Apple in the 1980's, many people thought he was done, and his companies were silently moving in strategic directions, while the press critiqued and ridiculed his efforts and made people believe he was in a crash course. We all know what happened afterwards, he rose again to greater heights and was capable to lead Apple to what it is today. His abiliy to learn from mistakes is what distinguised him from people who have already arrived to their level of incompetence, we all know examples which really confirm all the findings in the principle. The challenge for us is to study ourselves and make the best of what we were given by nature!

If you have ever reflected (whether in detached bemusement or disgust) on the sheer incompetence which seems to pervade your world, from your place of employment, to the businesses from which you purchase your everyday goods and services, to the financial and political spheres, you will very likely enjoy this book. Even if you know its basic premise, this little tome is worth a read. Though the work was first published more than forty years ago, hardly any part of it is dated. Quite to the contrary, the arrival of the latest edition in 2009 could not have been more timely. Indeed, some of its insights, for example the power of information technology to magnify the effects of incompetence, astonish, now more than ever, by their prescience. My favorite chapter explains the tendency of our political system to propel to the top politicians with minimal governing skills. You will probably find some agreement with Prof. Peter's observations on this point, whatever your political stripes. Finally, while its nomenclature and "case studies" are over the top, the book is, in my view, very funny, much as it is meant to be. One tip: read the introduction and the glossaries first; it'll add to the overall experience.

With this simple phrase on p.15 of my edition of The Peter Principle he explained nearly every problem the human species has faced as we have entered increasingly complex organizations in the development of our civilization,In a hierarchy every employee tends to rise to his level of incompetence given enough time and enough levels in the hierarchyAnd the more I've thought about it, internalized it, experienced corporate hierarchy... the more I've realized that it explains everything.A housing bubble caused by artificially low inflation rates? Some blame Greenspan but the reality is that he was just serving above his level of competence. It makes sense. America's colony in Iraq flubbed? Some blame Bush or his subordinates but the reality was that they were serving above their level of competence. We all do from time to time. We all think we are the exception.As acquaintances enter the work force and through my own witness to the mindset of the low level employee, everyone seems to be focused primarily on ascending to the higher levels. Why? I think it is what we do as a species. It is our fate. I don't mean to dissuade blame from individuals, removing responsibility from personal action. I only intened to explain that we shouldn't expect success, we should expect blindingly stupid failure and then be pleasantly surprised when things aren't flubbed up. That's not being cynical or "realist". It is just recognizing human nature. Incompetence knows no boundaries of time or place.The Peter Principle when published in 1969 raised a storm because many did not want to accept that they existed at their level of incompetence. Business people didn't take it seriously because it was written tounge-in-cheek with full blown laugh out loud moments. Far different from the bland, dry language they were used to while obtaining their MBAs. I thoroughly enjoyed the book because it is an opportune time for me to examine if I have already achieved my level of incompetence.While the explanations of the Principle could easily be redundant... (the plot is summarized at the beginning as Dr. Peter states the principle) this book isn't redundant, like a Dilbert cartoon with some acute wisdom. Dr. Peter describes, through various case studies and examples, that every perceived exception to the Principle isn't really an exception at all. Complex hierarchies will see its members achieve the ominous final placement. Someday I too can reach this level.I can get stressed out while making poor decisions. I too can wear the badge of administrative "success": the ulcer.This might all seem a bit pessimistic. A little defeatist. But not at all. The solution is to focus our species on moving forward instead of upwards. We see our cohorts in groups struggling for status on a, "treadmill to oblivion." But Dr. Peter clearly states that we can rescue ourselves by seeing where this unmindful escalation is leading us. If we focus on the quality of our situation we can achieve previously ignored success without obtaining a literal or figurative promotion.By applying this principle to our everyday experience, we witness many byproducts. For example, the applied Peter Principle approximates that employees in a hierarchy, "do not truly object to incompetence, they merely gossip about incompetence to mask their envy of employees who have pull." ... with pull being the ability to develop a relationship with someone above you in the hierarchy who can pull you up with them. How poignant. We decry good `ol boy networks but rarely focus on the one thing that could break them up, changing our focus from output to input. I can put in a 40-50 hour work week but would I be more productive if I worked 30-35 hours? We may never know because a full-time job insists that I work 40-50 crushing and life imbalancing hours. Society has focused on input in this situation. Can we think of a better solution to this situation? I'll apply Peter's Bridge to this question: if you can't think of a better solution you have already reached your level of incompetence.Although the observations made in the Peter Principle are obviously applicable to corporate environments, Laurence Peter made some other candid observations of society in these pages. Such as, exposing our modern caste system on p.64 and p.83 of the 2009 edition:...we have a class system, it is based not on birth but on the prestige of the university one has attended. The graduate of an obscure college does not have the same opportunity for promotion... but as college degrees become the prerequisite for more jobs, soon everyone will have access to his or her level of incompetence....with incompetent handling, the test system is only a disguised form of random placement. The purpose of testing is to place the employee as soon as possible in a job which will utilize the highest competence level on his profile. Obviously, any promotion will be to an area of less competence.Brilliant stuff that has played out over the last 30+ years just as Dr. Peter predicted.

The writing style is suitably dry for this type of material but the fictional names the authors make up for their examples are sometimes amusing and sometimes groan-worthy. The authors do a nice job of demonstrating why just because someone is good at their job, they won’t necessarily be good at managing other people who do that job. Probably every adult has seen an example in real life but couldn’t give the phenomena a name.The bonus, for me anyway, was the hand-written dedication inside the front cover and the dedication was dated December 1969. A little bit of someone’s personal history in the book!

Just a short, fun book that occasionally makes you question your life choices (in a good way.)

Boken gav mig strukturerade tankar på ett humoristiskt sätt kring ett fenomen jag funderat länge på när det gäller vilka som blir chefer.....

This book will change how you view your seniors and workplace. It helped me understand and identify patterns in people

Interessante, è piccino e si legge in fretta anche se il lessico a volte è complesso per uno straniero che legge in inglese

Love this book. Funny yet informative. Great for anyone looking for deep thought and easy laughs