Table Of ContentA 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.
