Leaving tasks to the last minute is a common phenomenon – and we all do it. But the question is why?
Right before the holidays, stores burst at the seams, full of people who left their gift shopping to the last available day. Each person has had an entire year to get that shopping done, but the same thing happens year after year.
When given the luxury of time, we don’t always spend it in the best way, and that can be put down to something called Parkinson’s Law and the idea that “work expands to fill the time available for completion.”
Parkinson’s Law is an explanation for poor time management and why we frequently procrastinate, so let’s take a look at what it is and how to overcome it.
Parkinson’s Law came to be in 1955 when British naval historian Cyril Northcote Parkinson published a satirical essay in The Economist.
The tongue-in-cheek essay focused on Parkinson’s observations of the inefficiencies experienced in the British Civil Service. The article found a very important – and true – principle. It concluded that in large organizations, work continues to expand and bureaucracy increases, regardless of the productivity rate or the end goals.
The essay contains a famous example of an elderly woman who takes all day to send a postcard because that’s the amount of time she set aside for the task.
The reality is that sending a postcard is a simple job and shouldn’t take all day. However, since the woman had all day, she used the full amount of available time instead of just getting it done quickly.
While the essay was a satirical take on bureaucracy, it was certainly built on truth and we can, therefore, apply it to all areas of life.
Do you recognize any of these scenarios? If you do, you have already experienced Parkinson’s Law:
After Cyril Northcote Parkinson’s essay was published, he went on to explore his observations in more depth. This led to the publishing of two books "Parkinson's Law And Other Studies in Administration" and "Parkinson's Law: Or The Pursuit of Progress" in which he details the Law of Triviality.
Unlike the original Parkinson’s Law where tasks expand to fill the allotted time, the Law of Triviality is the observation that humans tend to focus on unimportant details while crucial matters are left by the wayside.
This observation is also known as “bikeshedding,” which refers to the example Parkinson gave in his books.
He writes about a fictional committee that gathers to discuss plans for a nuclear power plant. Rather than focusing on the important aspects of the plans, most of the time is spent determining where the staff bicycle shed should go and how it should be constructed.
He writes, “The committee devoted a disproportionate amount of time to relatively unimportant details.”
This law is commonly observed in business settings where colleagues gather to talk about a specific subject but then go off on several tangents. The end of the meeting arrives, and nothing truly valuable has been discussed.
Parkinson’s Law occurs for a variety of reasons, most of which have their roots in human psychology and behavior. The dynamics of the surrounding environment also lead to procrastination.
Here are the key reasons why we experience Parkinson’s Law:
The answer to overcoming Parkinson’s Law lies in effective time management and there are several strategies you can employ here.
Time-tracking tools come in many forms. From writing down your tasks and hours on a sheet of paper to using specialized apps or software such as My Hours.
Whichever tool you opt for, it will help you plan out the days leading up to the deadline of your project or task and create a clear roadmap to follow.
The crucial part is that you must be honest about how much time you think each task will take as this will allow your time tracking to be as accurate as possible. Plus, doing this forces you to think about the actual time needed to complete the task rather than the overall available time.
Break the project up into milestones and set aside time for each one. The idea here is to use these periods to fully focus on the task at hand.
If you are using an app or software, you will likely feel tempted to press pause on the time tracker and do something different or unrelated. If you are tracking time manually, it can be easy to ignore it altogether. When this happens, try to recognize that this is Parkinson’s Law trying to creep in and resist the urge.
Tip: Don’t forget to factor in time for your general day-to-day tasks such as checking emails or updating spreadsheets. Creating a set amount of time for these will allow you to focus on them for a concise period without it becoming excessive.
The data you gain from time tracking also serves as a valuable tool when planning future projects.
When similar tasks crop up, you can refer back to your previous time sheets to see how long it took you to complete them. Doing this makes your time predictions more accurate and allows you to set realistic deadlines.
You likely have a good idea of what you need to achieve in the coming days or even weeks.
Write down what you need to do and organize these to-dos according to their priority. For this, you can use the Eisenhower Matrix – an effective way to visualize which tasks must be completed first, and which ones can wait.
In a nutshell, you organize your tasks into four categories:
Employing this technique reduces the likelihood of missing deadlines and allows you to focus on the right things at the right time.
It can’t be emphasized enough how important it is to break larger projects or tasks down into manageable pieces. Feeling overwhelmed is a key trigger for procrastination and quickly sets Parkinson’s Law in motion.
Let’s say you work in an office with a large filing room. This has gotten out of hand with loose piles and boxes of unfiled paperwork everywhere. The moment you walk through the door, you are instantly overwhelmed, and your first instinct is to close the door and ignore it.
Looking at the room in its entirety makes the job feel monumental. However, if you break it down by section, it starts to feel more achievable. For example, tackling the job one box or pile of paper at a time.
Doing this lets you set a clear path for any project and work through it efficiently without succumbing to overwhelm or the procrastination that inevitably follows.
Deadlines are somewhat of an art form. Often, they are either too tight or too generous.
An overly generous deadline is where we often experience the phenomenon of “leaving it to the last minute.” Moreover, an unrealistically tight deadline will create too much stress.
Here are some tips:
If you struggle to manage your time efficiently or stick to the deadlines you’ve set yourself, you may find it beneficial to employ a time management technique.
Besides helping you stay focused on the task at hand, a time management technique will also ensure you’re taking regular pauses and not getting fatigued or burnt out.
Some popular techniques include:
If you prefer something a little more structured, you might like to try the following:
The Pomodoro Technique is a popular method of time management. It consists of short 25-minute bursts of work (called a “Pomodoro”) followed by a five-minute break. After four Pomodoros, you can take an extended break.
This method is great for preventing procrastination and multitasking. The 25-minute windows promote a sense of urgency and increase motivation to get the task done.
Another good but simple method to employ is something known as “timeboxing.”
All you do is open your calendar and create a block of time (like scheduling a meeting) that you will dedicate to a certain task.
This method is entirely flexible. You can fill your entire day with timeboxes, or you can dedicate parts of the day and leave the rest open. You can schedule a day at a time, or do it for the coming weeks.
The “Timeless Demonstrations of Parkinson's First Law” was a set of studies completed in 1999. Participants were given four sets of photos of men and women and asked to rank them according to the level of education they believed each person had.
Participants were given sets one and two to judge. However, before they were given the third set of photos, they were informed that the fourth set had been canceled.
This resulted in the participants dallying over the third set and taking longer to judge them when compared with how long it took them to judge the first two sets.
The study was replicated two more times with different participants, and the same phenomenon occurred. Each study saw the participants prolonging the time it took them to judge the third set of photos.
Another study, “A Replication and Extension of the Excess Time Effect,” conducted in 1967, showed that too much time allotted for tasks will result in them taking longer to complete.
Participants were given a five-minute task to complete. However, the amount of time each participant had to complete it differed. Some were given five minutes; others were given 15 minutes.
The participants who were given the excess time spent significantly longer working on the task than those who were given only five minutes.
Additionally, the participants were also presented with a second task that was either identical to the initial task or completely different. The participants who initially had excess time for the first task and were given the identical second task took much longer to complete it
Parkinson’s Law will always be hovering in the background waiting to pounce. And it’s likely that even if you know what it is, you’ll still succumb to it once in a while.
However, by taking steps to manage your time efficiently, setting reasonable deadlines, and breaking things down, you’ll become much more effective at keeping it at bay.
If you do find that Parkinson’s Law has crept into your projects, take a step back and try to understand why. Look at where you were spending your time and what factors influenced it.
Then, once you learn why you procrastinate or fill your time unnecessarily, develop a time management strategy to avoid it happening for future projects.
