Parkinson’s Law
We’ve already learned about Pareto’s Principle (the 80/20 rule)—Now I would like to share another productivity principle to eliminate wasted time:
Parkinson’s Law: Work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion.
What does this mean? It means that although you normally take 8 hours per day to accomplish your work, you probably could get it done in 6 on a regular basis, or even 4 if you were really pressed.
Most people drag out their 9-5 days with paper shuffling, constant email checking, and unnecessary meetings rather than focusing on the most important tasks and getting them done.
Consider the following example from The 4-Hour Workweek by Tim Ferriss about when he learned this lesson at Princeton:
I had arrived to class nervous and unable to concentrate. The final paper, worth a full 25% of the semester’s grade, was due in 24 hours. One of the options, and that which I had chosen, was to interview the top executives of a start-up and provide an in-depth analysis of their business model. The corporate powers that be had decided last minute that I couldn’t interview two key figures or use their information due to confidentiality issues and pre-IPO precautions. Game over.
I approached [my professor] after class to deliver the bad news.
“Ed, I think I’m going to need an extension on the paper.” I explained the situation, and Ed smiled before he replied without so much as a hint of concern.
“I think you’ll be OK. Entrepreneurs are those who make things happen, right?”
Twenty four hours later and one minute before the deadline, as his assistant was locking the office, I handed in a 30-page final paper, dissected with an intense all-nighter and enough caffeine to get an entire Olympic track team disqualified. It ended up being one of the best papers I’d written in four years, and I received and A.
Before I left the classroom the previous day, Ed had given me some parting advice: Parkinson’s Law.
Use aggressive time limits to force your focus on important tasks. For example, if you have a proposal to put together for a big commercial client, set yourself an aggressive deadline. The deadline will provide you with an intense focus that will allow you to finish sooner and produce superior results.
Application Action: If you have the freedom to make this decision, work two hours less per day for the next week. You will see that you can accomplish the same amount of work in less time. If you don’t have the freedom to take off work two hours per day, set a goal to be done with all of your normal responsibilities two hours early. When you are done, invest that time in learning a valuable skill that will help your company.
