Parkinson’s Law: How to Stop this Productivity Barrier from Restricting You
Parkinson’s Law is defined as the process by which work will expand to fill the time allotted for its completion. It was first described by Cyril Northcote Parkinson in an article in the Economist in 1955. It is a business principle that can be applied to other areas of your life as well. Parkinson’s Law really harms your progress and ability to get things done in various areas.
In a practical sense, Parkinson’s Law addresses deadlines exclusively. Remember when you were in school and you had a report that needed to be completed by the end of the semester. You probably did some prep work in the beginning of the semester; looked up a few things. But you didn’t get really serious about it until the semester was nearing its end. Then you got busy. Compare that to the time when you had 2 weeks to complete a project. You were just told about the project 2 weeks before it was due. You immediately got to it.
In both situations, you did the same amount of work, even thought the semester project allowed you more time for completion. It can be argued that you actually put more effort into the semester long project even with the same amount of work, because the time you weren’t using to work on and address the project, you were actually worrying about what you weren’t doing or you were creating obstacles as to why you couldn’t work on the project at that moment. The work in the semester long project was just spread out through the semester instead of condensed like the 2 week project.
- History and background of Parkinson’s Law
- Why Parkinson’s Law is detrimental to your productivity
- Remedies for Parkinson’s Law
- Identify and address your deficits in the area of time management
- Set reasonable time expectations for task completion
- Focus on completing tasks in ways that optimize your strengths
- Plan for the routine tasks in order to complete them in less time
- Give yourself less time to complete small tasks like looking at social media, checking emails, meal planning
- Use a priority list
- Seek support as needed
- Resources
History and background of Parkinson’s Law
Parkinson’s Law deals directly with productivity in professions. I believe that it can relate to the home setting as well. In the home setting, a mother has to deal with various personalities, levels of motivation, numerous tasks and projects, routines, others expectations. Yes, the individuals in the home may be related to you, but the interaction you have with family members can resemble a business CEO with all the responsibilities, decision making, and interactions that occur on a daily basis.
One way that can release Parkinson’s Law’s hold on your productivity is to set reasonable time expectations to complete tasks. You don’t want to have too long of a timeline to complete something, but you also do not want to make it too short. Both of these can create frustrations. You have to learn your time schedule as well as how you work best.
Why Parkinson’s Law is detrimental to your productivity
Procrastination
Procrastination can pair with Parkinson’s Law making it doubly paralyzing. If you already have a tendency to put things off to the last minute, having a larger amount of time to complete a task does not make you more effective. It just allows you to have more time to push the important task to a later date.
There is a post on Find Your Flourish! where procrastination is discussed. Find it here. Ways to address procrastination is discussed.
Procrastination types
- Pressure procrastinator- You feel like you have to have your back up against the wall in order to perform optimally.
- Stretched too thin procrastinator- You feel like you have been doing so much already, trying to begin something else would be too much.
- Perfectionist procrastinator- You have to do everything exactly right and can’t start because you may not have everything in the proper place.
- Visionary procrastinator- You always have a new idea but seeing this vision through to the end is a challenge.
If you identify as a procrastinator, can you identify what type of procrastinator you are from this list?
Law of Triviality (Bike shedding)
The Law of Triviality develops Parkinson’s Law further. It was also proposed by C.N. Parkinson. Bike shedding is when someone takes into account all the small components of a decision (like constructing a bike shed- what color should it be) and overlooks the major components of the task (like the cost and where it should be placed). Bike shedding wastes valuable hours on something that is minimal when there are larger, more important decisions that should be addressed. It is when we get lost in the weeds. This is very easy to do when you are at home, because there are so many things that attempt to gain your attention. You have to figure out what is important and address that.
Task expansion
Another easy thing to do as a mom is to allow small tasks to take over your schedule. It is easy to get caught up in laundry or completing your child’s closet organization so you can get a task done and mark it complete. But routine tasks have a way of expanding. What should take 1 hour turns into 3 hours because you get swept away in the minor details and don’t move forward. Now, sometimes task expansion is good because you complete necessary details of what needs to be done. Sometimes you have not allowed yourself an adequate amount of time to complete something, so the task expands. You have to find a balance to prevent excessive task expansion as it can result in time being lost and important details to be overlooked.
Remedies for Parkinson’s Law
Identify and address your deficits in the area of time management
Identifying where you have issues to work on to improve yourself is one thing that successful individuals do well. Are you good at identifying where you need to make improvements? If you can do this in the area of time management, you will be able to gain more time to perform activities you enjoy more.
Set reasonable time expectations for task completion
This comes with maturity. You have to learn what goes into tasks and the time YOU usually need to complete them. Once you have that, you can move forward and perform time estimation for various tasks. This will allow you to become better at optimizing your time.
Focus on completing tasks in ways that optimize your strengths
You have to decide if you work better in the morning or later in the day. That is when you should schedule your more difficult tasks. Usually getting the most difficult task out of the way early works the best, because you don’t waste energy thinking about ‘that thing you have to do.’ Starting early (however you define that) also allows you to make adjustments as needed if something else comes up.
Plan for the routine tasks in order to complete them in less time
Schedule a certain time for those tasks that you have to accomplish on a regular basis each day.
Give yourself less time to complete small tasks like looking at social media, checking emails, meal planning
Use time blocking to segment tasks times with a specific start and end, so you can move onto more important tasks for your day.
Use a priority list
This is a key to my daily success. I use a priority list each day. Find out more about that here.
Seek support as needed
If you need help, please ask for it. Having someone assist you can help you accomplish more in less time, as long as it is the right person. Find that team of people who root for you and support you. That friend who is available to be a listening ear when you need one. And also participate in activities when needed.
Resources
Discover ways to use Parkinson’s Law to help you: https://www.lifehack.org/articles/featured/how-to-use-parkinsons-law-to-your-advantage.html
Information on how to conquer those difficult tasks- Eat the Frog https://todoist.com/productivity-methods/eat-the-frog#what-is-eat-the-frog
I am passionate about optimal work life balance and I can help women excel in both areas without compromising in either area because I have found systems of planning, organization, and personal development that help achieve goals. I created this blog to discuss topics on our journey of motherhood that we experience daily. Come on this journey with me and Find Your Flourish! Thank you for reading!
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This is really interesting- I can’t believe I’ve never heard of this before! If only I’d known about this sooner. Thank you for sharing!
Allison- Hopefully, now that you know about Parkinson’s Law you will be able to identify it in your own life and not let it stop you from what you need to do and what you desire to accomplish. |Shanna|
This was a really interesting read, I have never heard of Parkinson’s Law before. Thank you for sharing, I need to get hubby to read this as think it will be really useful for him.
Fee- Thank you for continuing to check out the blog posts. I am grateful that you will share it with your husband. Let me know what he thinks. I do think that everyone can use these laws to improve their productivity. |Shanna|
A priority list is a great help when trying to optimize your time.
Portia- I use a priority list everyday. It does really help me remain focused and accomplish tasks with increased productivity. |Shanna|
Never heard of Parkinson’s law until I read this. We all have experienced delaying deadlines one way or another. Good news is that we can do something to prevent it. Thanks for the tips.
Charina- I am glad you took time to read this post and learned something new. You are welcome for the tips. I hope you are able to use some of them to help you become more productive and allow yourself to flourish. |Shanna|
thanks for this post.. i recall reading about Parkinson’s law a while ago and recall thinking that yes, i need to work on planning my tasks with more thought 🙂
Vidya- I hope that you start using Parkinson’s Law to help you optimize your task completion. Now that you are aware of it again, don’t let it stop you! |Shanna|
I had never heard of Parkinson’s law before. It makes sense to make these changes to help improve efficiency.
Marysa- Thank you for your comment. Improving efficiency is what many people search for each day. Getting more done in order to get to what they really want to do. Grasping this concept can surely help with that. |Shanna|
I’m definitely stretched too thin with all that I need to do. I think it’s hard for people to have this type of realization.
Danielle- The first step in the process is identifying what the challenge is. Now that you know you are stretched too thin, what is the step that you are going to take to do something about it? That is the difficult thing because it forces us to make a personality shift. Thank you for reading. |Shanna|
Wow, I had never heard of Parkinson’s Law before but, yes, it is a fact! Great tips, especially when time is so precious these days.
Rachel- Parkinson’s Law was so eye opening to me. I really enjoyed investigating how it effects what I do on a daily basis. Hopefully, you were able to get something from this post that will help you with your own time management. |Shanna|
This post is really informative, and all the things that you’ve shared with us are useful. Thank you!
Gervin- You are welcome! Please use this information to help you with scheduling your tasks and task completion. |Shanna|
This is such an informative post. Thank you so much for this information.
Ashley- I am thankful that you found something to help you in this post. Hopefully you will be able to use something from it to help you accomplish tasks with greater efficiency. |Shanna|
I feel like depending on the project I can work really well into the wee hours of the night, or I can be incredibly productive in the morning after the kids are in school.
Monica- It is great that you can identify when you work the best. Then it is figuring out which task to tackle first in order to optimize the time that you have available to complete things. |Shanna|
This was a really interesting read! I especially liked how you broke down the different types of procrastinators. Also, it is a great idea to set reasonable time expectations to complete tasks! Thanks!
Emily | Good Mom Living
Emily- Thank you for taking the time to read this post. Time expectations are so key in order to not put too much pressure on yourself. I hope that you found something in this post to help you flourish! |Shanna|
This was very interesting to read. I find that I have fallen into these procrastination traps all the time. It makes sense to give yourself less time to complete a task. I always tend to wait until the last minute!
Dana- The key is determining how long a task will take you. Task analysis is what you have to do in order to make sure you are giving yourself the right amount of time. People usually fall into the category of giving themselves too much time but take care not to shorten it too much. |Shanna|
This is so helpful to know/think about when planning tasks!
Amanda- Definitely keep this in mind when you are planning. Hopefully, you will be able to use some of the tips on a regular basis. |Shanna|