Buy used:

$19.56

FREE delivery May 12 - 18. Details

Or fastest delivery May 6 - 10. Details

Used: Very Good | Details

Sold by ThriftBooks-Atlanta

Share

Have one to sell?

Sell on Amazon

Flip to back Flip to front

Listen Playing... Paused You're listening to a sample of the Audible audio edition.
Learn more

See all 2 images

Follow the Authors

C. Northcote Parkinson

Parkinson's Law Hardcover – December 1, 1996

by C. Northcote Parkinson (Author)

72 ratings

See all formats and editions

Price

New from

Used from

Hardcover

"Please retry"

$19.56

$39.95

$19.56

Perfect Paperback

"Please retry"

$10.49

—

$10.49

Mass Market Paperback

"Please retry"

$49.74

—

$44.00

Title: Parkinson's Law Binding: Hardcover Author: C.NorthcoteParkinson Publisher: BuccaneerBooks

Print length

112 pages
Language

English
Publisher

Buccaneer Books
Publication date

December 1, 1996
Dimensions

5.75 x 0.75 x 8.75 inches
ISBN-10

1568490151
ISBN-13

978-1568490151
See all details

C Northcote Parkinson
75
Paperback
7 offers from $11.95
C. Northcote Parkinson
1
Paperback
14 offers from $10.20
Leo Gough
31
Paperback
15 offers from $11.73
Northcote C Parkinson
21
Paperback
13 offers from $40.84
. 50MINUTES
18
Paperback
5 offers from $9.99
C. Northcote Parkinson
3
Paperback
11 offers from $7.99

Derek De Solla Price
23
Paperback
21 offers from $7.39

Product details

Publisher ‏ : ‎ Buccaneer Books (December 1, 1996)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Hardcover ‏ : ‎ 112 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 1568490151
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1568490151
Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 10.4 ounces
Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 5.75 x 0.75 x 8.75 inches

Best Sellers Rank: #1,249,496 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #16,137 in Humorous Fiction (Books)
- #22,595 in Contemporary Literature & Fiction

Customer Reviews:
72 ratings

About the author

Follow authors to get new release updates, plus improved recommendations.

C. Northcote Parkinson

Brief content visible, double tap to read full content.

Full content visible, double tap to read brief content.

Discover more of the author’s books, see similar authors, read author blogs and more

Customer reviews

5 star		84%
4 star		9%
3 star		4%
2 star		3%
1 star 0% (0%)		0%

How customer reviews and ratings work

Top reviews from the United States

There was a problem filtering reviews right now. Please try again later.

Henry and Janine

Some great insights to human behavior

Reviewed in the United States on February 22, 2007

Verified Purchase

Parkinson's Law, written by C. Northcote Parkinson, is a wonderful book which explores the realities of human behavior within a bureaucracy. The author doesn't pay attention to theories or the idealized world, but instead writes about how people really function in organizations.

The title of the book is from Parkinson's statement that "Work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion." He explains that "an elderly lady of leisure can spend the entire day in writing and dispatching a postcard to her niece at Bognor Regis." In contrast if all you have is five minutes to write a postcard, it takes just five minutes to write the postcard.

At a higher level this idea applies to many situations. For example people's stuff expands to fill their house and use up their income. Or in the computer world: Data expands to fill the space available for storage

Parkinson writes that it takes great discipline to fight the tendency to use up all the time available to do some job. And likewise it takes great discipline to save some of your income, or to avoid buying stuff just because you have room for it.

Parkinson has a number of other interesting observations. For example in his Law of Triviality he explains how a group of managers might spend hours on selecting a coffeepot and minutes on deciding matters of much greater importance.

I also appreciated his explanation on the effective size of a governing group. He says that the right number of people to lead an organization, like a business or a country, is about five. As the group gets larger, it takes longer and longer to get together and to agree on matters.

There are many other insightful comments on a variety of topics related to organizations. This is a great book to have teenagers read, and then to be reread every couple years. Just over a hundred pages it is a quick read, as well as being enjoyable.

If you haven't read Parkinson's Law before, I encourage you to read it this week.

10 people found this helpful

Helpful

T. Sznigir

Excellent Satire on the Ineffectiveness of Bureaucracy

Reviewed in the United States on September 23, 2010

Verified Purchase

"Heaven forbid that students should cease to read books on the science of public or business administration -- provided only that these works are classified as fiction...intermingled with volumes about ape men and space ships, these textbooks could harm no one"

This quote, from the preface, sets the tone for the rest of the book. We've all seen just how efficient government and corporate bureaucracy is, but Parkinson shows us that we still give them too much credit. This devastating and witty satire goes after every aspect of administration and really makes one wonder how anything ever gets done at all. And it was written in the 50s. Given the expansion of government and the rise of multinational corporate conglomerates since then, this book is as relevant now as when it was written. Pick it up and find out just how deep the rabbit hole of incompetence goes.

Parkinson begins, appropriately enough, by describing Parkinson's Law: "Work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion." Thus, a retired old lady can spend hours writing and mailing a postcard, while a busy man will get it done in a few minutes. Closely related is the steady expansion of bureaucracies: every bureaucrat wants assistants both to increase his importance and lighten his workload, but it turns out that managing these assistants (who will eventually want assistants of their own) takes up any time he might have saved, and before long there are five people doing a job that one man was perfectly capable of doing himself. Bureaucrats create work for each other. To illustrate this point, Parkinson points out how the staff at the Colonial Office swelled while the Empire was losing its overseas colonies and how the Royal Navy hired more clerks and officials at a time when most of the capital ships were decommissioned and the number of seamen fell by 30%.

That's all in the first chapter. Later, Parkinson shows how budget committees spend their time. Nobody on those committees knows much about nuclear reactors, so there's not much to discuss about a $10 million proposal for a new reactor; it's approved within minutes. However, most of the committee knows about bicycle sheds, so they can have a lively debate on how to cut costs on a proposed bicycle shed for employees--and everyone knows about coffee, so naturally they'll have the longest, best-informed debate on the subject of whether to get a new coffee machine. Penny wise, pound foolish.

Later chapters detail the inverse ratio between the size of a cabinet and its effectiveness as well as why the best indicator of an organization's decline is the construction of a new headquarters, among other morsels of wisdom. Some of the content might be a bit dated (and one chapter is arguably racist), but the rest of the book more than compensates. I highly recommend it.

4 people found this helpful

Helpful

Insane, funny and useful

Reviewed in the United States on January 27, 2007

Verified Purchase

Parkinson's law is a collection of short articles about administration of which the first article, called "parkinson's law" is the most well know. Most of the stories are incredibly funny. They contain reality but then overdone and made fun of. "Parkinson's law" is a good example. The article explains that "work expands in the time available", in other words, people wil keep themselves busy. It's a good example of something that has probably some truth in it, but in the article made ridiculous and made fun of.

Personally I loved the story in chapter 3 "high finance or the point of vanishing interest" in which the author explains why, in management decisions, the decisions on the lower cost items take longer time to make than the decisions on higher cost items. Also story 8 was extremly funny. It's called "injelititis" which describes a decease of incompetence in organizations, how it starts and how it can kill a whole company.

One interesting sidenote to "Parkinson's law". It's a law which is often quoted in project management literature. The law itself nor the whole book states anything about projects or project management. Personally I consider references to this law from project management area as invalid.

An excellent book, recomended read. 4 stars just because there are other books even more worth reading :)

One person found this helpful

Helpful

P. Yoshida

Wonderul book.

Reviewed in the United States on July 30, 2013

Verified Purchase

On the one hand this book is very funny but when you think about it, it's a sad statement about human nature. This book was originally written in the 1950's, but I first read it about 20 years ago. It is still relevant today. This is one of those books you need to keep on your bookshelf so you can take out from time to time and remind yourself, the world really is crazy. It's not in your mind. That is how it works.

I would recommend this book to everyone.

3 people found this helpful

Helpful

Top reviews from other countries

J. B. Awford

Brexit - what went wrong .

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on December 8, 2018

Verified Purchase

An excellent review of what has gone wrong with Brexit .
Should be part of every PPE course !

2 people found this helpful

Boyz

Back with The Book

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on April 28, 2016

Verified Purchase

excellent condition and just what I wanted. I lent my previous one which was a paperback to someone15 years ago so guess I am not going to get it back now

Paul Morris

life before personal computers

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on October 14, 2013

Verified Purchase

This book takes you straight back to the era of musty offices and quiet diligent office workers were the norm.
An amusing book written by a perceptive gent who never ever got his hands dirty with manual work.

One person found this helpful

Affairs, (the band) fan.

Excellent.

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on September 6, 2013

Verified Purchase

Parkinson may have written it in the late 50's but his observations still ring true today.
Excellent.
Wish they had it as an e- book.
He was a head of his time.

2 people found this helpful

Egroeg

Nostalgic read

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on March 13, 2015

Verified Purchase

Bought this as a piece of nostalgia as I'd first read it over 40 years ago. The units of measurement and numbers involved date it but the satire is right up to date. Seller's description was "as new" and it looked, felt and even smelled like it was just off the press!

One person found this helpful

See all reviews

Follow the Authors

Similar authors to follow

Similar authors to follow

Parkinson's Law Hardcover – December 1, 1996

Customers who viewed this item also viewed

Customers who bought this item also bought

Product details

About the author

C. Northcote Parkinson

Customer reviews

Top reviews from the United States

There was a problem filtering reviews right now. Please try again later.

Top reviews from other countries