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Date: Wed, 6 Sep 2000 17:03:00 -0700 (PDT)
From: wsmith@wordsmith.org
To: linguaphile@wordsmith.org
Subject: A.Word.A.Day--Peter Principle
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Peter Principle (PEET-uhr PRIN-suh-pal) noun

   The theory that an employee within an organization will advance to his
   or her level of incompetence and remain there.

[After Laurence Johnston Peter (1919-1990).]

   "To me, Randell personified the Peter Principle, a popular management
   theory of the 1970s which held that you rise to your level of incompetence
   - in other words, you keep getting promoted till eventually you find
   yourself in a job that's beyond you."
   Karl Du Fresne, Sleeping better thanks to Blackadder, The Evening Post,
   May 31, 2000.

This week's theme: syndromes, paradoxes, laws, and principles.

.............................................................................
Experience is the comb life gives you after you lose your hair. -Judith
Stearn

Ralph Waldo Emerson once said, "Language is a city to the building of which
every human being brought a stone." Invite your friends and family to join
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Pronunciation:
http://wordsmith.org/words/peter_principle.wav
http://wordsmith.org/words/peter_principle.ram