The Peter Principle (5 page)

The Paradox Explained

These cases illustrate the fact that, in most hierarchies,
super-competence is more objectionable than incompetence.

Ordinary incompetence, as we have seen, is no cause for dismissal: it is simply a bar to promotion. Super-competence often leads to dismissal,
because it disrupts the hierarchy,
and thereby violates
the first commandment
of hierarchal life:
the hierarchy must be preserved.

You will recall that in Chapter 2 I discussed three classes of employees: the incompetent, the moderately competent and the competent. At that time, for simplicity’s sake, I chopped off the two extremes of the distribution curve and omitted two more classes of employees. Here is the complete curve.

Employees in the two extreme classes—the super-competent and the super-incompetent—are alike subject to dismissal. They are usually fired soon after being hired, for the same reason: that they tend to disrupt the hierarchy. This sloughing off of extremes is called
Hierarchal Exfoliation.

Some Horrible Examples

I have already described the fate of some super-competent employees. Here are some examples of super-incompetence.

Miss P. Saucier was hired as a salesgirl in the appliance department of the Lomark Department Store. From the start she sold less than the average amount of merchandise. This alone would not have been cause for dismissal, because many other salespeople were below average. But Miss Saucier’s record keeping was atrocious: she punched wrong keys on the cash register, accepted competitors’ credit cards and—still worse—inserted the carbon paper with the wrong side up when filling in a sales-contract form. She then managed to give the customer the original of the contract. He left with the two records (one on the front of the contract and the other in reverse on the back) and she was left with none. Worst of all, she was insolent to her superiors. She was dismissed after one month.

W. Kirk, a Protestant clergyman, held radical views on the nature of the Deity, the efficacy of the sacraments, the second coming of Christ, and life after death—views sharply opposed to the official doctrines of his sect. Technically, then, Kirk was incompetent to give his parishioners the spiritual guidance they expected. He received no promotion, of course; nevertheless he retained his post for several years. Then he wrote a book which condemned the stodgy church hierarchy and propounded a reasoned argument favoring taxation of all churches. He asked that ecclesiastical recognition be extended to such social problems as homosexuality, drug abuses, racial injustices and the like. . . . He had moved, at one jump, from incompetence to super-incompetence, and was promptly dismissed.

The super-incompetent exfoliate must have two important characteristics:

       
1) he fails to produce (output).

       
2) he fails to support internal consistency of the hierarchy (input).

Is Exfoliation for You?

We see, then, that super-competence and super-incompetence are equally objectionable to the typical hierarchy.

We see, too, that hierarchal exfoliates, like all other employees, are subject to the Peter Principle.

They differ from other employees in being the only types who, under present conditions, are subject to dismissal.

Would you like to be somewhere else? Is your present placement in military service, school or business your choice or are you a victim of legal or family pressure? With planning and determination
you, too,
can make yourself either super-competent or super-incompetent.

Apparent Exception No. 5:
The Paternal In-Step

Some owners of old-fashioned family businesses used to treat their sons like regular employees. The boy would start at the bottom of the hierarchy and rise in accordance with the Peter Principle. Here, of course, the owner’s love for his hierarchy, his desire to keep it efficient and profitable, and his stern sense of justice, outweighed his natural familial affections.

Often, though, the owner of such a business would bring his son in at a high level with the idea that in time, without rising through the ranks, he should take over the supreme command or, as the phrase went, should “step into his father’s shoes.”

This type of placement, therefore, I call
The Paternal In-Step.

There are two principal means by which the Paternal In-Step is executed.

P.I-S Method No. 1

An existing employee may be dismissed or removed by lateral arabesque or percussive sublimation, to make a place for the In-Stepper. Used less often than Method No. 2, this technique may cause considerable ill-feeling toward the new appointee.

P.I-S Method No. 2

A new position,
with an impressive title, is created for the In-Stepper.

The Method Explained

The Paternal In-Step is merely a small-scale example of the situation that exists under a class system, where certain favored individuals enter a hierarchy above the class barrier, instead of at the bottom.
2

The infusion of new employees at a high level may sometimes increase output. The Paternal In-Step, therefore, arouses no ill-feeling outside the hierarchy.

Yet the arrival of the In-Stepper is to a degree resented by other members of the hierarchy. Employees actually have a sentimental feeling (Peter’s Penchant) for the promotion process by which they themselves have risen and by which they hope to rise further. They tend to resent placements made by other means.

The Paternal In-Step Today

The family business, controlled by one man with the authority to place his sons in its higher ranks, is nowadays something of a rarity. Nevertheless, the Paternal In-Step is still executed in just the same way, except that the In-Stepper need not be related to the official who appoints him.

Let me cite a typical example.

P
ATERNAL
I
N
-S
TEP
F
ILE
, C
ASE
N
O
. 7 A. Purefoy, Director of the Excelsior City Health and Sanitation Department, found that by the end of one financial year he was going to have some unexpended funds. The citizens had suffered no epidemics; the Excelsior River had not, as it often did, overflowed its banks and silted up the drainage system; both his assistant directors (one for health, the other for sanitation) were earnest, competent, economically minded men.

So the budgeted funds had not been spent. Purefoy realized that unless he took rapid action he would suffer a cut in the coming year’s budget.

He determined to create a third assistant directorship whose incumbent would organize an Anti-Litter and City Beautification Program. To fill the new post he engaged W. Pickwick, a young graduate from the School of Business Administration of his own alma mater.

Pickwick, in turn, created eleven more new posts: an anti-litter supervisor, six litter inspectors, a three-girl office staff, and a public relations officer.

N. Wordsworth, the P.R.O., organized essay contests for school children, adult contests for jingles and poster designs, and commissioned two films, one of anti-litter propaganda, the other on city beautification. The films were to be made by an independent producer who had been with Wordsworth and Pickwick in the university dramatic society.

Everything worked out well: Director Purefoy exceeded his budget and was successful in obtaining a larger budget for the following year.

Modern Father Substitutes

Nowadays governments set up the “Father’s Shoe Situation.” Federal grants are offered for many new purposes—war on pollution, war on poverty, war on illiteracy, war on loneliness, war on illegitimacy and research into the recreational potential of interplanetary space travel for the culturally disadvantaged.

As soon as money is offered, a way must be found to spend it. A new position is created—anti-poverty co-ordinator, head-start director, book-selection advisor, organizer for Senior Citizens’ Welfare and Happiness Projects, or what have you. Someone is recruited to occupy the position, to wear, if not necessarily to
fill,
the shoes.

The In-Stepper may or may not solve the problem that he was set to solve: that does not matter. The important point is that he must be able and willing to spend the money.

The Principle Not Breached

Such a placement is in accordance with the Peter Principle. Competence or incompetence is irrelevant so long as the shoes are filled. If they are filled competently the In-Stepper will in time be eligible to step up and out of them and find his level of incompetence on a higher plane.

Conclusions

The apparent exceptions
are not exceptions.
The Peter Principle applies to all employees in all hierarchies.

CHAPTER 4
Pull & Promotion

“A long pull, and a strong pull, and a pull all together.”

C. D
ICKENS

Y
OU HAVE SEEN
that the Peter Principle is immutable and universal but you may still want to know how long your hierarchal ascension will take. Chapters 4 and 5 will help reveal this to you. First let us turn our attention to accelerated elevation through pull.

“Pull” Defined in Sixteen Words

I define Pull as “an employee’s relationship—by blood, marriage or acquaintance—with a person above him in the hierarchy.”

Unpopularity of the Pullee

Winning promotion through Pull is a thing we all hate—
in other people.
Co-workers dislike the beneficiary of Pull (the Pullee) and usually express that dislike in comments on his incompetence.

Soon after W. Kinsman became superintendent of schools in Excelsior City, his son-in-law, L. Harker, was promoted to the post of music supervisor. Some teachers criticized this appointment on the ground that Harker was
hard of hearing!
They said the music supervisor’s post belonged by right of seniority (input) to D. Roane.

E
NVY
K
NOWS
N
O
L
OGIC
D. Roane had listened so long to so many school choirs and orchestras that
he hated music and children!
Obviously, he would have been no more competent (in terms of output) than Harker as music supervisor.

The teacher’s resentment, then, was not really against Harker’s incompetence, but against his violation of the time-honored seniority system.

Employees in a hierarchy do not really object to incompetence
(Peter’s Paradox): they merely gossip about incompetence to mask their envy of employees who have Pull.

How to Acquire Pull

One may study the careers of many employees who had Pull (Pullees), comparing them with employees of equal ability who had none. The results of my research can be reduced to five practical suggestions for the would-be Pullee.

1. Find a Patron

A Patron is a person above you in the hierarchy who can help you to rise. Sometimes you may have to do a good deal of scouting to find who has, and who has not, this power. You may think that your promotion rate depends on the good or bad reports written about you by your immediate superior. This
may be
correct. But management
may be
aware that your immediate superior is already at his level of incompetence, and therefore may attach
little importance
to his recommendations, favorable or otherwise! So do not be superficial: dig deep, and ye shall find.

2. Motivate the Patron

“An unmotivated Patron is no Patron.” See that the Patron has
something to gain
by assisting you, or
something to lose
by not assisting you, to rise in the hierarchy.

My research has yielded many examples of this motivation process, some charming, some sordid. I shall not cite them. I would rather make this point a test for the reader, a test which I call
Peter’s Bridge.
If you cannot cross it under your own steam, you have already reached your level of incompetence and no advice from me can help you.

3. Get Out from Under

“There’s no road like the open road.”

Imagine you are at a swimming pool, trying to climb to the high diving board. Halfway up the ladder, your ascent is blocked by a would-be diver who began to climb but has now lost his nerve. Eyes shut, he clings desperately to the handrail. He will not fall off, but he cannot go higher, and you cannot pass him. Encouraging shouts from your friend already on the top board are of no avail in this situation.

Similarly, in an occupational hierarchy, neither your own efforts, nor the Pull of your Patron, can help you if the next step above you is blocked by someone at his level of incompetence (a Super-incumbent). This awkward situation I denominate
Peter’s Pretty Pass.
(Things have come to a pretty pass, etc.)

Let us return mentally to the swimming pool. To reach the top of the diving board, you would get off the ladder that is blocked, cross over to the ladder on the other side, and climb without hindrance to the top.

To move up the job hierarchy, you get out from under the Super-incumbent and move into a promotion channel that is not blocked. This maneuver is called
Peter’s Circumambulation.

Before investing time and effort in Peter’s Circumambulation, make sure that you really are in Peter’s Pretty Pass—
i.e.,
that the man above you is a genuine Super-incumbent. If he is still eligible for promotion, he is not a Super-incumbent: you need not dodge round him. Simply exert a little patience, wait a while; he will be promoted, a gap will open up and Pull will be able to do its wondrous work.

To discover, without any doubt, whether your superior is a Super-incumbent, look for the medical and non-medical indices of Final Placement, which are described in Chapters 11 and 12 of this book.

4. Be Flexible

There is only so much that any one Patron can do for you. To draw an analogy, an experienced mountaineer can pull a weaker climber up to his level. Then the leader must himself climb higher before he can exert more pull.

But if the first Patron
cannot climb higher,
then the Pullee must find another Patron who can.

So be prepared, when the time comes, to switch your allegiance to another Patron of higher rank than the first.

“There’s no Patron like a new Patron!”

5. Obtain Multiple Patronage

“The combined Pull of several Patrons is the sum of their separate Pulls multiplied by the number of Patrons.” (Hull’s Theorem.) The multiplication effect occurs because the Patrons talk among themselves and constantly reinforce in one another their opinions of your merits, and their determination to do something for you. With a single Patron, you get none of this reinforcement effect. “Many a Patron makes a promotion.”

Why Wait? Escalate!!!

By following these hints,
you can obtain Pull.
Pull will speed your upward motion through the hierarchy. It can bring you to your level much sooner.