While I’m sure everyone thinks I’m going to write about Tom Peters, instead, there is another, more famous Peter Principle out there:
The Peter Principle is the principle that “In a Hierarchy Every Employee Tends to Rise to His Level of Incompetence.” While formulated by Dr. Laurence J. Peter and Raymond Hull in a humorous book which also introduced the “salutary science of Hierarchiology” “inadvertently founded” by Peter, their 1968 The Peter Principle, the principle has real validity.
The principle holds that in a hierarchy members are promoted so long as they work competently. Sooner or later they are promoted to a position at which they are no longer competent (their “level of incompetence”), and there they remain. Peter’s Corollary states that “in time, every post tends to be occupied by an employee who is incompetent to carry out his duties” and adds that “work is accomplished by those employees who have not yet reached their level of incompetence”. ((wikipedia.com))
The whole point of talent management is that people should be prepared to take on the next role because we in HR have done a decent job creating and coordinating programs that actually force them to prepare. The question is whether there is some innate point at which a person simply reaches his capacity to learn and simply can’t progress any further. Each and every employee has a set of strengths and competencies that are probably defined outside of their work skills. Some leaders are simply leaders while others may be logical choices but don’t seem to have the ability to emotionally draw in the employee base. Regardless of your political inclination, look at the recent sparring between Obama and Clinton in the U.S. presidential campaigns. Where their platforms are identical, and Clinton has more experience, Obama is able to reach the public more charismatically.
This is all to say that there are skills that can be learned through development and experience, but there may be others that are simply not trainable.
4 responses to “Management Gurus: Peter Principle and HR”
that I haven’t done much posting of my own lately. In that vein, I wanted to extend a hat tip to systematicHR for a series of great posts recently. HBR on SOA – Good commentary on the potential and limitations of SOA as a productivity driverThe Peter Principle and HR
Nice to see the Peter Principle rediscovered, since it’s one reason I haven’t worked for a corporation in 19 years. It is most clearly seen in the case of the “individual contributor,” terrific at his or her job, who is promoted to manage others good at the same job and just can’t do it!
Yes, perhaps this can be tested for and even trained for. But enlightened companies now have an individual contributor track (most often seen in IT) where such people can still be promoted in title and pay (normally only given for managing more people and larger budgets) while still doing what they’re good at.
Not enough companies, though.
Same boat here Bill !
I think in America we do Peter one better: we fail you upward- the more you fail, the faster you go !
Correct, Martin. Have you noticed how when someone gets to be a CEO, they continue to be hired as CEO (unless jailed) no matter how many times they fail at it?
Bill not only have I noticed: I’m counting on it !!