Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve Camray. It's ready. Are you welcome to stuff you should know? Front House Stuff Works dot Com. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. There's Chuck Bryant about fall Asleep and I'm Josh Clark. This is stuff you should know. How's it going? You just went on? He Hall, I totally did. Didn't I get the price tag? I'm a little hat. Did you watch that as a kid? No, I never did. That was more solid gold guy, Yeah, see that now Big Time and Muppets. Muppets Actually I think came on before after solid Gold, cal Burnet schell. Yeah. Yeah, My mom was a big tribe. Me too. I thought Tim Conway was the funniest human being. You're gonna bring up to Tim Conway. Chuck always talks about Tim Conway's assess it. It's always about Tim Conway. Tim Conway, This Tim Conway that you know what? Never happened to Tim Conway. He never got promoted to a job he wasn't qualified for. We've been doing this way too long, Chuck, way too long. Together. You can predict my every move. He can just point and he knows what I'm about to do. Sometimes I wonder if I actually do things because he's telling me to with his mind. Yeah, tell me that power, dude. Oh, I'd be in big trouble, he would. Yeah, so chuck, Um, let's talk about the Peter principle. Have you ever heard of this before? Well, I've read your article when it was initially published a while ago, But I mean, were you disappointed with it then too? I actually thought it was better than I do now. But I see, I grew up with this, Like my dad had this book and it was like it was like sixties kind of like intelligent ha ha ha kind of joke, you know, like hotail party humor. Yeah, and I grew up around that kind of thing, so I you know, intelligence. So uh, this was like the Peter principal to me is something that like I've known forever. So it's odd to meet people who don't who hadn't really heard of it before. Well, my parents were both educators and maybe, um, like I knew nothing about business in corporate life and that kind of thing. My dad was an engineer, a train engineer. Yeah, dude, dude, no, no, okay, Now he's a mechanical engineer. For untrained. Yep. Okay, so, Chuck, that what we're talking about is based on a uh, let's see, I think it's a nineteen sixty nine book, nineteen sixty seven, nineteen sixty nine, we'll say, somewhere in there, and it's called the Peter Principal Why Things Always Go Wrong? And it definitely was based on an article written by a guy named Dr Lawrence J. Peter who was a an educator, and apparently it was an Esquire magazine initially in January nineteen sixty seven. Yes, there was a huge response to it, right uh. And basically what it was it was tongue in cheek. It's an unnatural law like Parkinson's law, which we'll get to, right sure, or Murphy's law, which we won't get to. We've already done that one, I think. Or was that pre Chuck. I think it was pre Chuck. Those days don't exist in my mind. Uh yeah. So anyway, Chuck, it's a it's a kind of tongue in cheek, but it actually does reveal, um, kind of this this rye observation that you know, all of us have seen at one time or another that eventually, if you promote somebody based on good work, you're going to promote them to a point where they're no longer they're so far out of their field they've become incompetent in their current job. That's pretty funny. There's one stertling example that comes to mind. Oh, I don't know, back in the heavy days of two thousand five, maybe late August early September two thousand five, a little thing called Hurricane Katrina struck New Orleans with a vengeance. And there's this, um I think it's a federal agency and it's charged with handling natural disasters or disasters of any kind that occur in the US. That would be the Federal Emergency Management Agency a FEMA. Uh And um, it just so happened that in late August of two thousand five, FEMA was headed by a guy named Michael Brown who you may know and love is Brownie. So Brownie was running the show when herr Kane Katrina hit and basically it took days for the FEDS to respond. I remember reading an article or several maybe where Bush was questioning whether it's even the federal government's role to help out in this kind of disaster. Right, Well, sure enough, FEMA finally gets around to helping. I think they got a few bottles of water down there and truck some people out. That kind of thing. Uh. And amid this complete cluster of a rescue humanitarian mission, mismanagement totally and in every form of the word. Yeah, the good people of FEMA, and we want to say we're probably working very hard, but it was missing. It was a top down day and and just ease off. I'm gonna, I'm gonna. I'm gonna bail Brownie out here in a second. Um. But amid this this bungled crisis rescue mission, Bush goes down to New Orleans and says, Brownie, you're doing a heck of a job, which he wasn't now and he even knew he wasn't. No, this is not judgment on our part, right, I think even while the the rescue operation or the crisis alleviation operations going on, Brownie famously said, can I quit now? Why made me feel bad for the guy? Yeah? No, I agree, he's in over his head. I feel bad for him. Two And he was in way over his head why because of the Peter principle, because he was promoted to a position he was not qualified to manage correct, he period he was formerly his job right before the head of FEMA. He was in charge of the Commission on Judges for the Arabian Horse Association. He's good at it too. Yeah, he excelled in that position, right. That was part of the reason why I think, you know, maybe a little bit of helping your buddy out I had to do with it. So, which which everybody does? I mean, I got this job because of a friend, So that did you? Really? I got this job by my own blood sweat and tears, pal, blood sweat and tears, Josh, great band agreed, So is earth wind and fire right, But earth wind and fire won't get you a job. Blood sweat and tears as well, agreed? So well, cool in the gang. Okay, so Chuck um, you're right there. There is a certain level of nepotism or I'm not sure what it's called when you get friends jobs. Is it still nepotism relatively familiar? Yeah? Yeah, I'm not sure that we'll figure it out. Um so yeah. So, but Brownie doesn't fit the classic definition of the Peter principle because he got his job in large part because he knew the president right, Is it usually someone who's promoted from within? Is that the distinction? Yes? Okay, yeah, So what happens is you, I use the example in this article of a web designer. Think of when a guy's in DEBV right, right, So you're just excelling at your work. You're you're you're working your tail off. Everything you do is just golden. You're born developer. Right. Well, if you do that long enough, and you get to know the people around you long enough, you'll probably get promoted to a position of of manager where you're still over the dev department, but you're now telling the dev department what to do. Conceivably, if you're of a certain ilk, you you would be able to kind of carry that out. Yeah, if if you're capable of doing that. But let's say that you are kind of good at that, and you excel at that, but you're still really you're doing you're walking behind other people and fixing their mistakes, that kind of thing. You're still doing developing. Let's say you excel in that managerial position and you get promoted eventually out of development, and maybe you're over development like you're the ct O R, but you're no longer developing. Oh, you're managing, You're working with budgets, you're hiring people, you're firing, completely different skill set. You're likely going to be incompetent unless you're a born manager and you're good with budgets, you know, um, dealing with CEOs and CEOs and stuff like that. Right, that actually happened, same exact scenario at my last job, a web developer, and he was great at that. They promoted him, and um, he was not a good manager of people. No, I think. I think it takes a certain kind of person. It's like sales, right, I can't sell anything. Come on, come on, I think dude. Uh no, I I can't. Like I'm no good at sales. Um, I also suck at serving. I was a terrible waiter. Yeah, I was a decent waiter. I sucked at it. That's good. Thanks, Um, so thanks? Why is that good? Well, because that means you don't have to be a waiter. That's true. Well, you were good at it, and you're not a waiter. Well true, I'm a writer. It's only one letter different. Agreed. Um. So let's say you you you do get promoted to CTO and you're doing hiring and firing. Now here's where the Peter principle, which has just occurred because you've been promoted to your level of incompetence, Here's where it becomes a vicious cycle. Right, right, do you want to take where? Because okay, uh, the the since you're hiring and firing people, you're probably also likely promoting people. So if you're an incompetent manager, then you are probably going to make terrible decisions on who to promote. So the problem with it is that eventually, in a hierarchy which all businesses are based on, or it's a top down, top down process for pyramid, most of the work is being done by the lower levels the base of the pyramid, and then you go further and further up, and the least amount of work is being done by the people at the top. Supposedly, I hear. Uh, So eventually the top of the hierarchy becomes populated exclusively by incompetent people in a worst case Peter principal scenario. But if this is what I found most interesting is that it um unless you are what he called uh super incompetent quote unquote, then you won't get fired. No, you'll just continue along and basically what happens is is mediocrity takes hold. Doesn't mean you're awful and that you're gonna make decisions that will destroy the company, but your mediocre. And since there isn't a process of demotion in this country, or maybe there isn't in any country. Uh, and the corporate structure at least you, you can't be demoted without it looking like failed, defailed exactly. Yeah, Like they can't just say, you know what, this is quite right, you're you're better at your other job, so why don't we just put you back there? Um, And you'll even make more money doing so well that that's a real solution to the Pewter principle. Is number one, installing a mechanism where you if it if you're not working out, you get to go back to what you're doing, but without the stigma failure. The other the other, this is the one I subscribed to, is UM offering increased compensation without promotion. I subscribe to that as well. Think about it, I mean, like most people accept promotions and uh be based on the increase in salary, right right. I just really want to manage somebody. Usually I really want to go make more money. Yes, but those are probably people who are born managers. Yeah, but I would say the prestige and the title and the money is even above that. Yeah, the money's at the top, right, Yeah, I agree wholeheartedly. Um. So, if you could, if you could set up your business in such a way that you are paying people, you're giving them increased pay, vastly increased pay, like the kind that you would get if you got a promotion without promoting them, then you're going to avoid the Pewter principle altogether. The problem is that that you basically create a a class structure where there are just people out there who are you know, executives and that's what they do, and then you have people out there who are just developers. It's actually very socialistic in nature, it is, you know, uh Parkinson. Yeah. So there's another dude, an English historian. His name is C. Northcote, c Northcote Parkinson, great name, thank you, uh. And he wrote in the Economist magazine in nineteen fifty five his first law, which was work expands so as to fill time available for its completion. I think most people have heard this, and I think I might agree with the guy. Oh yeah, if you give somebody a week to do a project, they'll take a week. If you give them two days, they'll get it done in two days. Same project too, Yeah exactly. Yeah, so like Murphy's law. Yeah, it's an unnatural law. Exactly. Um. So yeah, what the white chuck just mentioned that is because um, one of the there's actually a contrary theory to um, the Peter principle. It was this lazare. Yeah, okay, that's the he wrote, I'm sorry, an article not a book, called the Peter principal a theory of decline, and he put the uh the onus uh for responsibility onto the employee rather than an incompetent manager who incompetently promote somebody who shouldn't be right. He said that what happens is you have your average employee who's looking for that promotion, probably because they want more money, right. Probably, so they're they're working, work and work and working like you know, eighty hour weeks and um, just putting in all this time, neglecting family, all that. Um. And once that, once that's noticed, after a certain amount of time, usually they will get a promotion. The thing is, it's not that's not sustainable. Behavior. Right, Well, that's when the trouble hits. You rest on your laurels once you finally hit that promotion. Yeah, and once you've gotten the salary. Because again, businesses don't have any kind of fail safe put into knock you back down. When you do do that, right, you either get fired or you just keep doing the same job. And most likely you're not gonna get fired, just gonna do a mediocre job. But Lazarre Lazier said that it was the employees basically creating a deception that made people who shouldn't be promoted promoted because they're being promoted based on their work ethic. That was actually an artificial work ethic. Right. That's kind of cool too. I like all this stuff. I thought you hated this article. Oh, I was just pulling your leg. You shouldn't toy with me. It's much it's much more interesting when we talk about it than when I read it. To be honest, I agree. I agree, Chuck. We've taken some kind of fluffy articles and done some things we should you know we should do. We should start a podcast. What a good you like talking about? I don't even know what a podcast is, dude. Uh, you know, the Peter principal also doesn't just apply to employees, right, it applies to innovation as well, right buddy, Yeah, it's it's the same exact principle. And this was an essay called the Peter Principle of Innovation by Nitton. I've never heard that word. Nitton Bore Bore one car. Yeah, what a great name. And um he basically said, the same thing applies to innovation young he or she um proposed as the a young company has room to innovate, producing new ideas, advancing old ideas, and the same thing happens. At some point, the innovation turns stagnant. Yeah, but then the reason why it turns stagnant is because eventually you hit a home run and you say, okay, well this one thing we just did just made us a billion dollars, let's keep doing it over and over again, and everything else kind of falls to the wayside. So yeah, innovation becomes stagnant. What happens is the people who are still innovators go off found their own company and do the same thing, and it just keeps happening exponentially, this cycle of innovation and stagnation. Like I think Google will probably a good example. It's like they've completely mastered search on the Internet at this point, seemingly, and they've innovated their company structure in their company model to a point where people have left Google and started their own company. Sure, I I don't. I don't know that it's a lack of innovation, though they do a lot of I don't think they've hit stagnation yet. You don't think so? No, man, They're throwing so much money at new ideas, and um, They've got like the Google Reader, where they're trying to scan every book in existence and right on the web for free. There's the Google take Over the Planet project, where in they're all going to put microchips in our brain while we're sleeping. Star Yeah, the Death Star. Yeah. Um, so yeah, I think they're still innovative now, they are in different directions. I think I was probably just thinking of the base Google basement. But yeah, you're totally Chuck. We were talking about ways to fight the period principle, and there's actually one more way and that's actually, uh the up to the employee what to just have to go get them to uh to do good work. No, No, it's to have the smart and wherewith all to actually say, you know what, this guy is about to promote me into my level of incompetence and I'm not gonna do it. Think again, buddy, So you can just turn down and promotion. Yeah, but it's so unheard of in the state. It goes back to the money thing. Now, if it was the kind of thing where they would give someone raises with out the promotion, I think people might be more inclined to do that. Well, yeah, he has to go hand in hand with the companion piece, which is living without as much money as you could have did. I'd be all over that more money and less responsibility. I think that the Peter principal actually did speak to my debt because he loved drafting. He loved drawing h V A C aspects right, that was his thing, and actually towards the end of his career he got tired of h V A C. So he went over and learned refrigeration, which was apparently totally different. I would have thought that had fallen and fall into the same category, but I guess not um. But he after like thirty forty years, he got bored with h V A C. But he didn't try to move up. He just went to refrigeration. And he actually I don't know if he ever turned down a promotion or not, but he made it very well known that he was quite happy doing what he was doing. He did well for himself. Um, and he never became an executive. He he just didn't want to. So, I mean, it can be done. And I'm wondering just how much of an effect or impact the Peter principal reading the book had on. But yeah, this is called Peter's perry, which is basically turning down a promotion. If you don't have the guts to turn out promotion um, or if your spouse would murder you if if he or she found out that you turned down to promotion, UM, you can actually self sabotage. Yeah. Do you want to hear a couple of examples that Peter gives, Yeah, I'd love to. One is, um, basically wearing too much Perfumer cologne. Really nobody wants to be around you like that, you know, but it's not so it's not such an obvious uh social miss grace, disgrace. They're gonna say anything I love. Yeah, I know what you're gonna say. Go ahead, parking in the company president's reserve parking space. Yeah again, you're you're just showing like I don't really care. I'm not going to look out for you unnecessarily. My favorite one is to kind of subtly give the impression that you lead a morally questionable personal life. Yeah, which we do every week twice a week. Actually, I might have a bit of self sabotage and you think me too, So, Chuck, either one of us want to manage anyone. You know. I was avoiding that because you know, I I the Perry. I fell on one side. I did I go to the self sabotage side. I don't want to manage anybody either, Chuck. Now, I have a hard hard time managing myself and you. So there you got Peter principal. Peter principle. It's done. If you want to learn more about it, or if you basically want to read the article, Chuck it I just covered a hundred and ten percent. You can go to how stuff works dot com, our beloved website and type Peter principle into the handy search bar, which means, since I just said handy search bar, that it's time for listener mail. Listener mail, Josh, I'm gonna call this one frightening listener mail. Oh yeah, I don't know if you've read this one, because you usually email me and say did you read this one? And I didn't get that on this one, Okay. I I'm writing to share an experience I've had in this related to the Dejabu episode. And this is from Drowsy Doug and his Dreadful Dreams in Portland, Oregon, Grove Doug So Doug says, at times when I'm sleeping, my mind wakes in the middle of the night, but my body does not. My eyes open, and I can see the bedroom from a sideways angle, the dark shadows of the dresser, of the tree outside the window, of my arms and legs curled up below me. Yet I cannot move. The frightening thing it's already frightening, to ask me. The frightening thing about this is that though my mind is aware of the reality of my situation, it vacillates in and out of the subconscious, creating visions. It seem all too real. So he goes on for a minute here, but I'm gonna skipped down one particular moment, which stands up my mind is this. I opened my eyes in the middle of the night. I was lying in my bed on my back, paralyzed, watching the image of someone standing at the foot of my bed in a pig suit. What yes, in a costume animal. I was waiting for that, because he actually put that in parentheticals. I know that I had my eyes open because I slowly came to consciousness the pig man fading into the darkness like a blurry image, and I hadn't closed my eyes the whole time. It was as if my mind just projected and imagine image onto what I was actually seeing. Once I even got up from my own bed, walked into the bathroom, and in the darkness, the reflection of my own face was stretched and contorted, and I was bleeding black liquid out of my mouth. But then I woke up and I was fine. So drowsy Doug says, Now, I'm sure you get lots of weirdos writing you, but I assure you I'm a pretty normal guy all except for this terrifying waking nightmare syndrome. I don't believe in possession or ghosts or anything like that, so I'm not supposing the supernatural yet. The occurrence of these dreams both fascinates and terrifies me. I've come to recognize the exact creeping feeling of it coming on. Yet by that point there's nothing I can do but try to talk myself in the waking. Is this common? Have you ever heard of this? And why can't they be about Hollywood hotties and not strangers and pig suits? So like, why can't I see Giselle at the Yeah? Some he actually does suffer from a recognized condition, and sadly I don't know what it is. Yeah, it sounds called but when you when your mind wakes before your body does, this is pretty bad conscious of of your surroundings. It is a recognized condition. Seeing first suitors, um is, I don't know what that is. And seeing yourself bleed like black ooze. Yeah, it sounds like there's a lot of self loathing. It's frightening. Such your arm chair psychotrop Yeah, I literally have my arm on a chair right now. Um. And then I asked him if you've seen the movie Donnie Darko, because I don't know if you saw that, but it was very reminiscent of that. So a guy in a rabbit suit and Frank the Rabbit, which is one of my favorite movies. That's a great movie, is so well done and so drowsy. Doug, dude, good luck. Wish we could help you. I wish we could help Doug too. If anybody out there has any clues to Doug's mystery, any suggestions on maybe what Doug do eg drink Balerian root key and hope for the best, that kind of thing, um, just email us at stuff podcast at how stuff works dot com for more on this and thousands of other topics. Is it how stuff works dot com. Want more how stuff works, check out our blogs on the how stuff works dot com home page. Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve camera. It's ready, are you

Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve Camray. It's ready. Are you welcome to stuff you should know? Front House Stuff Works dot Com. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. There's Chuck Bryant about fall Asleep and I'm Josh Clark. This is stuff you should know. How's it going? You just went on? He Hall, I totally did. Didn't I get the price tag? I'm a little hat. Did you watch that as a kid? No, I never did. That was more solid gold guy, Yeah, see that now Big Time and Muppets. Muppets Actually I think came on before after solid Gold, cal Burnet schell. Yeah. Yeah, My mom was a big tribe. Me too. I thought Tim Conway was the funniest human being. You're gonna bring up to Tim Conway. Chuck always talks about Tim Conway's assess it. It's always about Tim Conway. Tim Conway, This Tim Conway that you know what? Never happened to Tim Conway. He never got promoted to a job he wasn't qualified for. We've been doing this way too long, Chuck, way too long. Together. You can predict my every move. He can just point and he knows what I'm about to do. Sometimes I wonder if I actually do things because he's telling me to with his mind. Yeah, tell me that power, dude. Oh, I'd be in big trouble, he would. Yeah, so chuck, Um, let's talk about the Peter principle. Have you ever heard of this before? Well, I've read your article when it was initially published a while ago, But I mean, were you disappointed with it then too? I actually thought it was better than I do now. But I see, I grew up with this, Like my dad had this book and it was like it was like sixties kind of like intelligent ha ha ha kind of joke, you know, like hotail party humor. Yeah, and I grew up around that kind of thing, so I you know, intelligence. So uh, this was like the Peter principal to me is something that like I've known forever. So it's odd to meet people who don't who hadn't really heard of it before. Well, my parents were both educators and maybe, um, like I knew nothing about business in corporate life and that kind of thing. My dad was an engineer, a train engineer. Yeah, dude, dude, no, no, okay, Now he's a mechanical engineer. For untrained. Yep. Okay, so, Chuck, that what we're talking about is based on a uh, let's see, I think it's a nineteen sixty nine book, nineteen sixty seven, nineteen sixty nine, we'll say, somewhere in there, and it's called the Peter Principal Why Things Always Go Wrong? And it definitely was based on an article written by a guy named Dr Lawrence J. Peter who was a an educator, and apparently it was an Esquire magazine initially in January nineteen sixty seven. Yes, there was a huge response to it, right uh. And basically what it was it was tongue in cheek. It's an unnatural law like Parkinson's law, which we'll get to, right sure, or Murphy's law, which we won't get to. We've already done that one, I think. Or was that pre Chuck. I think it was pre Chuck. Those days don't exist in my mind. Uh yeah. So anyway, Chuck, it's a it's a kind of tongue in cheek, but it actually does reveal, um, kind of this this rye observation that you know, all of us have seen at one time or another that eventually, if you promote somebody based on good work, you're going to promote them to a point where they're no longer they're so far out of their field they've become incompetent in their current job. That's pretty funny. There's one stertling example that comes to mind. Oh, I don't know, back in the heavy days of two thousand five, maybe late August early September two thousand five, a little thing called Hurricane Katrina struck New Orleans with a vengeance. And there's this, um I think it's a federal agency and it's charged with handling natural disasters or disasters of any kind that occur in the US. That would be the Federal Emergency Management Agency a FEMA. Uh And um, it just so happened that in late August of two thousand five, FEMA was headed by a guy named Michael Brown who you may know and love is Brownie. So Brownie was running the show when herr Kane Katrina hit and basically it took days for the FEDS to respond. I remember reading an article or several maybe where Bush was questioning whether it's even the federal government's role to help out in this kind of disaster. Right, Well, sure enough, FEMA finally gets around to helping. I think they got a few bottles of water down there and truck some people out. That kind of thing. Uh. And amid this complete cluster of a rescue humanitarian mission, mismanagement totally and in every form of the word. Yeah, the good people of FEMA, and we want to say we're probably working very hard, but it was missing. It was a top down day and and just ease off. I'm gonna, I'm gonna. I'm gonna bail Brownie out here in a second. Um. But amid this this bungled crisis rescue mission, Bush goes down to New Orleans and says, Brownie, you're doing a heck of a job, which he wasn't now and he even knew he wasn't. No, this is not judgment on our part, right, I think even while the the rescue operation or the crisis alleviation operations going on, Brownie famously said, can I quit now? Why made me feel bad for the guy? Yeah? No, I agree, he's in over his head. I feel bad for him. Two And he was in way over his head why because of the Peter principle, because he was promoted to a position he was not qualified to manage correct, he period he was formerly his job right before the head of FEMA. He was in charge of the Commission on Judges for the Arabian Horse Association. He's good at it too. Yeah, he excelled in that position, right. That was part of the reason why I think, you know, maybe a little bit of helping your buddy out I had to do with it. So, which which everybody does? I mean, I got this job because of a friend, So that did you? Really? I got this job by my own blood sweat and tears, pal, blood sweat and tears, Josh, great band agreed, So is earth wind and fire right, But earth wind and fire won't get you a job. Blood sweat and tears as well, agreed? So well, cool in the gang. Okay, so Chuck um, you're right there. There is a certain level of nepotism or I'm not sure what it's called when you get friends jobs. Is it still nepotism relatively familiar? Yeah? Yeah, I'm not sure that we'll figure it out. Um so yeah. So, but Brownie doesn't fit the classic definition of the Peter principle because he got his job in large part because he knew the president right, Is it usually someone who's promoted from within? Is that the distinction? Yes? Okay, yeah, So what happens is you, I use the example in this article of a web designer. Think of when a guy's in DEBV right, right, So you're just excelling at your work. You're you're you're working your tail off. Everything you do is just golden. You're born developer. Right. Well, if you do that long enough, and you get to know the people around you long enough, you'll probably get promoted to a position of of manager where you're still over the dev department, but you're now telling the dev department what to do. Conceivably, if you're of a certain ilk, you you would be able to kind of carry that out. Yeah, if if you're capable of doing that. But let's say that you are kind of good at that, and you excel at that, but you're still really you're doing you're walking behind other people and fixing their mistakes, that kind of thing. You're still doing developing. Let's say you excel in that managerial position and you get promoted eventually out of development, and maybe you're over development like you're the ct O R, but you're no longer developing. Oh, you're managing, You're working with budgets, you're hiring people, you're firing, completely different skill set. You're likely going to be incompetent unless you're a born manager and you're good with budgets, you know, um, dealing with CEOs and CEOs and stuff like that. Right, that actually happened, same exact scenario at my last job, a web developer, and he was great at that. They promoted him, and um, he was not a good manager of people. No, I think. I think it takes a certain kind of person. It's like sales, right, I can't sell anything. Come on, come on, I think dude. Uh no, I I can't. Like I'm no good at sales. Um, I also suck at serving. I was a terrible waiter. Yeah, I was a decent waiter. I sucked at it. That's good. Thanks, Um, so thanks? Why is that good? Well, because that means you don't have to be a waiter. That's true. Well, you were good at it, and you're not a waiter. Well true, I'm a writer. It's only one letter different. Agreed. Um. So let's say you you you do get promoted to CTO and you're doing hiring and firing. Now here's where the Peter principle, which has just occurred because you've been promoted to your level of incompetence, Here's where it becomes a vicious cycle. Right, right, do you want to take where? Because okay, uh, the the since you're hiring and firing people, you're probably also likely promoting people. So if you're an incompetent manager, then you are probably going to make terrible decisions on who to promote. So the problem with it is that eventually, in a hierarchy which all businesses are based on, or it's a top down, top down process for pyramid, most of the work is being done by the lower levels the base of the pyramid, and then you go further and further up, and the least amount of work is being done by the people at the top. Supposedly, I hear. Uh, So eventually the top of the hierarchy becomes populated exclusively by incompetent people in a worst case Peter principal scenario. But if this is what I found most interesting is that it um unless you are what he called uh super incompetent quote unquote, then you won't get fired. No, you'll just continue along and basically what happens is is mediocrity takes hold. Doesn't mean you're awful and that you're gonna make decisions that will destroy the company, but your mediocre. And since there isn't a process of demotion in this country, or maybe there isn't in any country. Uh, and the corporate structure at least you, you can't be demoted without it looking like failed, defailed exactly. Yeah, Like they can't just say, you know what, this is quite right, you're you're better at your other job, so why don't we just put you back there? Um, And you'll even make more money doing so well that that's a real solution to the Pewter principle. Is number one, installing a mechanism where you if it if you're not working out, you get to go back to what you're doing, but without the stigma failure. The other the other, this is the one I subscribed to, is UM offering increased compensation without promotion. I subscribe to that as well. Think about it, I mean, like most people accept promotions and uh be based on the increase in salary, right right. I just really want to manage somebody. Usually I really want to go make more money. Yes, but those are probably people who are born managers. Yeah, but I would say the prestige and the title and the money is even above that. Yeah, the money's at the top, right, Yeah, I agree wholeheartedly. Um. So, if you could, if you could set up your business in such a way that you are paying people, you're giving them increased pay, vastly increased pay, like the kind that you would get if you got a promotion without promoting them, then you're going to avoid the Pewter principle altogether. The problem is that that you basically create a a class structure where there are just people out there who are you know, executives and that's what they do, and then you have people out there who are just developers. It's actually very socialistic in nature, it is, you know, uh Parkinson. Yeah. So there's another dude, an English historian. His name is C. Northcote, c Northcote Parkinson, great name, thank you, uh. And he wrote in the Economist magazine in nineteen fifty five his first law, which was work expands so as to fill time available for its completion. I think most people have heard this, and I think I might agree with the guy. Oh yeah, if you give somebody a week to do a project, they'll take a week. If you give them two days, they'll get it done in two days. Same project too, Yeah exactly. Yeah, so like Murphy's law. Yeah, it's an unnatural law. Exactly. Um. So yeah, what the white chuck just mentioned that is because um, one of the there's actually a contrary theory to um, the Peter principle. It was this lazare. Yeah, okay, that's the he wrote, I'm sorry, an article not a book, called the Peter principal a theory of decline, and he put the uh the onus uh for responsibility onto the employee rather than an incompetent manager who incompetently promote somebody who shouldn't be right. He said that what happens is you have your average employee who's looking for that promotion, probably because they want more money, right. Probably, so they're they're working, work and work and working like you know, eighty hour weeks and um, just putting in all this time, neglecting family, all that. Um. And once that, once that's noticed, after a certain amount of time, usually they will get a promotion. The thing is, it's not that's not sustainable. Behavior. Right, Well, that's when the trouble hits. You rest on your laurels once you finally hit that promotion. Yeah, and once you've gotten the salary. Because again, businesses don't have any kind of fail safe put into knock you back down. When you do do that, right, you either get fired or you just keep doing the same job. And most likely you're not gonna get fired, just gonna do a mediocre job. But Lazarre Lazier said that it was the employees basically creating a deception that made people who shouldn't be promoted promoted because they're being promoted based on their work ethic. That was actually an artificial work ethic. Right. That's kind of cool too. I like all this stuff. I thought you hated this article. Oh, I was just pulling your leg. You shouldn't toy with me. It's much it's much more interesting when we talk about it than when I read it. To be honest, I agree. I agree, Chuck. We've taken some kind of fluffy articles and done some things we should you know we should do. We should start a podcast. What a good you like talking about? I don't even know what a podcast is, dude. Uh, you know, the Peter principal also doesn't just apply to employees, right, it applies to innovation as well, right buddy, Yeah, it's it's the same exact principle. And this was an essay called the Peter Principle of Innovation by Nitton. I've never heard that word. Nitton Bore Bore one car. Yeah, what a great name. And um he basically said, the same thing applies to innovation young he or she um proposed as the a young company has room to innovate, producing new ideas, advancing old ideas, and the same thing happens. At some point, the innovation turns stagnant. Yeah, but then the reason why it turns stagnant is because eventually you hit a home run and you say, okay, well this one thing we just did just made us a billion dollars, let's keep doing it over and over again, and everything else kind of falls to the wayside. So yeah, innovation becomes stagnant. What happens is the people who are still innovators go off found their own company and do the same thing, and it just keeps happening exponentially, this cycle of innovation and stagnation. Like I think Google will probably a good example. It's like they've completely mastered search on the Internet at this point, seemingly, and they've innovated their company structure in their company model to a point where people have left Google and started their own company. Sure, I I don't. I don't know that it's a lack of innovation, though they do a lot of I don't think they've hit stagnation yet. You don't think so? No, man, They're throwing so much money at new ideas, and um, They've got like the Google Reader, where they're trying to scan every book in existence and right on the web for free. There's the Google take Over the Planet project, where in they're all going to put microchips in our brain while we're sleeping. Star Yeah, the Death Star. Yeah. Um, so yeah, I think they're still innovative now, they are in different directions. I think I was probably just thinking of the base Google basement. But yeah, you're totally Chuck. We were talking about ways to fight the period principle, and there's actually one more way and that's actually, uh the up to the employee what to just have to go get them to uh to do good work. No, No, it's to have the smart and wherewith all to actually say, you know what, this guy is about to promote me into my level of incompetence and I'm not gonna do it. Think again, buddy, So you can just turn down and promotion. Yeah, but it's so unheard of in the state. It goes back to the money thing. Now, if it was the kind of thing where they would give someone raises with out the promotion, I think people might be more inclined to do that. Well, yeah, he has to go hand in hand with the companion piece, which is living without as much money as you could have did. I'd be all over that more money and less responsibility. I think that the Peter principal actually did speak to my debt because he loved drafting. He loved drawing h V A C aspects right, that was his thing, and actually towards the end of his career he got tired of h V A C. So he went over and learned refrigeration, which was apparently totally different. I would have thought that had fallen and fall into the same category, but I guess not um. But he after like thirty forty years, he got bored with h V A C. But he didn't try to move up. He just went to refrigeration. And he actually I don't know if he ever turned down a promotion or not, but he made it very well known that he was quite happy doing what he was doing. He did well for himself. Um, and he never became an executive. He he just didn't want to. So, I mean, it can be done. And I'm wondering just how much of an effect or impact the Peter principal reading the book had on. But yeah, this is called Peter's perry, which is basically turning down a promotion. If you don't have the guts to turn out promotion um, or if your spouse would murder you if if he or she found out that you turned down to promotion, UM, you can actually self sabotage. Yeah. Do you want to hear a couple of examples that Peter gives, Yeah, I'd love to. One is, um, basically wearing too much Perfumer cologne. Really nobody wants to be around you like that, you know, but it's not so it's not such an obvious uh social miss grace, disgrace. They're gonna say anything I love. Yeah, I know what you're gonna say. Go ahead, parking in the company president's reserve parking space. Yeah again, you're you're just showing like I don't really care. I'm not going to look out for you unnecessarily. My favorite one is to kind of subtly give the impression that you lead a morally questionable personal life. Yeah, which we do every week twice a week. Actually, I might have a bit of self sabotage and you think me too, So, Chuck, either one of us want to manage anyone. You know. I was avoiding that because you know, I I the Perry. I fell on one side. I did I go to the self sabotage side. I don't want to manage anybody either, Chuck. Now, I have a hard hard time managing myself and you. So there you got Peter principal. Peter principle. It's done. If you want to learn more about it, or if you basically want to read the article, Chuck it I just covered a hundred and ten percent. You can go to how stuff works dot com, our beloved website and type Peter principle into the handy search bar, which means, since I just said handy search bar, that it's time for listener mail. Listener mail, Josh, I'm gonna call this one frightening listener mail. Oh yeah, I don't know if you've read this one, because you usually email me and say did you read this one? And I didn't get that on this one, Okay. I I'm writing to share an experience I've had in this related to the Dejabu episode. And this is from Drowsy Doug and his Dreadful Dreams in Portland, Oregon, Grove Doug So Doug says, at times when I'm sleeping, my mind wakes in the middle of the night, but my body does not. My eyes open, and I can see the bedroom from a sideways angle, the dark shadows of the dresser, of the tree outside the window, of my arms and legs curled up below me. Yet I cannot move. The frightening thing it's already frightening, to ask me. The frightening thing about this is that though my mind is aware of the reality of my situation, it vacillates in and out of the subconscious, creating visions. It seem all too real. So he goes on for a minute here, but I'm gonna skipped down one particular moment, which stands up my mind is this. I opened my eyes in the middle of the night. I was lying in my bed on my back, paralyzed, watching the image of someone standing at the foot of my bed in a pig suit. What yes, in a costume animal. I was waiting for that, because he actually put that in parentheticals. I know that I had my eyes open because I slowly came to consciousness the pig man fading into the darkness like a blurry image, and I hadn't closed my eyes the whole time. It was as if my mind just projected and imagine image onto what I was actually seeing. Once I even got up from my own bed, walked into the bathroom, and in the darkness, the reflection of my own face was stretched and contorted, and I was bleeding black liquid out of my mouth. But then I woke up and I was fine. So drowsy Doug says, Now, I'm sure you get lots of weirdos writing you, but I assure you I'm a pretty normal guy all except for this terrifying waking nightmare syndrome. I don't believe in possession or ghosts or anything like that, so I'm not supposing the supernatural yet. The occurrence of these dreams both fascinates and terrifies me. I've come to recognize the exact creeping feeling of it coming on. Yet by that point there's nothing I can do but try to talk myself in the waking. Is this common? Have you ever heard of this? And why can't they be about Hollywood hotties and not strangers and pig suits? So like, why can't I see Giselle at the Yeah? Some he actually does suffer from a recognized condition, and sadly I don't know what it is. Yeah, it sounds called but when you when your mind wakes before your body does, this is pretty bad conscious of of your surroundings. It is a recognized condition. Seeing first suitors, um is, I don't know what that is. And seeing yourself bleed like black ooze. Yeah, it sounds like there's a lot of self loathing. It's frightening. Such your arm chair psychotrop Yeah, I literally have my arm on a chair right now. Um. And then I asked him if you've seen the movie Donnie Darko, because I don't know if you saw that, but it was very reminiscent of that. So a guy in a rabbit suit and Frank the Rabbit, which is one of my favorite movies. That's a great movie, is so well done and so drowsy. Doug, dude, good luck. Wish we could help you. I wish we could help Doug too. If anybody out there has any clues to Doug's mystery, any suggestions on maybe what Doug do eg drink Balerian root key and hope for the best, that kind of thing, um, just email us at stuff podcast at how stuff works dot com for more on this and thousands of other topics. Is it how stuff works dot com. Want more how stuff works, check out our blogs on the how stuff works dot com home page. Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve camera. It's ready, are you