The theory of incompetence


A few years back I picked up an interesting book in Luang Prabang called the Peter Principle. Written some 40 years ago, the Peter Principle is a theory which claims people are only promoted in an organization up to their level of incompetence - once this level is reached their incompetence ensures they will never advance any further in that particular organization. For example - an elementary school teacher, who is regarded by both his students and peers as an excellent teacher is promoted to a department head role. In his new role half his time is spent performing administrative activities which are completely foreign to him. Constantly buried under mounds of paperwork and held hostage to bureaucratic procedures even his teaching begins to suffer. He becomes a second-rate administrator and an average teacher i.e. he has reached his level of incompetence.

As I remember there were certain exceptions to this hypothesis - the employee who, despite having already attained his level of incompetence, is promoted purely because of the number of years of service given to an organization. A relevant example could be the inept individual who becomes a manager at McDonalds purely because anyone with any talent has moved on to a better job and the bungling fool is left as the only choice. Or that lying conniving sociopath whose only way to elevate themselves above the rest of the field is to gain the ear of his superiors by ratting on his co-workers.

I remember my first job out of University on the sixth floor of a large office block in the middle of Sydney. The department I worked in took up half the floor. I t was one of those dull, open plan style layouts with multiple workstations. Their were about twenty-five staff and three managers. Five of the staff including myself were under the age of 35. The remaining 80% were middle-age women. As a newcomer I didn’t take much notice of what other people were doing and just concentrated on proving myself as a valuable member of the team. It didn’t take long to master the job so I began to acquire more responsibilities. In addition, when people were sick or on vacation, I would get the opportunity to learn what their jobs entailed. I t quickly became apparent that half of the people in the organization were actually superfluous - these women had no doubt attained their level of incompetence. Working at a few different organizations over the next several years I was surprised at the frequency of encounters with incompetent fools at all levels.

Another classic example I witnessed first-hand was the recruiting of a reputable economist to run an entire research department. His job was to build up what was at the time a mid-sized research operation into an enterprise capable of competing with the big boys and thereby enlarging our share of the commission pie. In an industry where an ability to grease palms and acquire contacts is a must, his obvious lack of people skills ensured he would never succeed. He was after all, an economist in possession of a narrow array of technical skills, extremely useful for convincing someone of next months GDP figure but inapplicable to persuading a client he should do business with us. He tried to market the company as a “niche player” yet the research department churned out the same bland product as everyone else in the industry. Probably his biggest mistake however was his hiring policy, because he saw himself as the ideal employee he tended to hire people that mirrored his own false self-image - proof that the incompetent are the only ones who aren’t conscious of the fact. To be fair though, the failure of the organization to achieve its goals wasn’t entirely of his own doing. There were other equally incompetent fools in higher places doing their level best to screw things up.

Whilst the Peter Principle may not hold in all situations I believe it contains a fair degree of validity. As an expatriate I am often confronted with the question about my future. Should I be putting away something for a rainy day or at least have a contingency plan if things should go pear shape? I usually reply that I'm not particualrly concerned about the future and don't like to plan too far ahead. It's not that I hold some naive belief that 'everything will work out just fine' for me, rather, armed with the knowledge of the Peter Principle I have every confidence in the incompetence of others to ensure my survival.