The law of triviality - organizations give disproportioate weight to trivial matters
Summary
- Parkingson's law of triviality states that people within an orgnaization give disproportionate weight to trivial issues.
Details
- He gives an example of a committee who was to approve plans for a nucleur power plant, but spent majority of the time discussing east to grasp issues such as a staff bike shed while ignoring the more important but more complex design of the plant iteslef
- It is also known as the bike shed effect
- time spent on an agenda item will be in inverse proportion to the sum of money involved.
References
Quotes
Behavioral research has produced evidence which confirms theories proposed by the law of triviality. People tend to spend more time on small decisions than they should, and less time on big decisions than they should. A simple explanation is that during the process of making a decision, one has to assess whether enough information has been collected to make the decision. If people make mistakes about whether they have enough information, then they will tend to feel overwhelmed by large and complex matters and stop collecting information too early to adequately inform their big decisions. The reason is that big decisions require collecting information for a long time and working hard to understand its complex ramifications. This leaves more of an opportunity to make a mistake (and stop) before getting enough information. Conversely, for small decisions, where people should devote little attention and act without hesitation, they may inefficiently continue to ponder for too long, partly because they are better able to understand the subject.[^5]