Meritocracy and the Peter Principle … or why some employees rise in the hierarchy through promotion until they reach the levels of their respective incompetence

https://www.investopedia.com/terms/p/peter-principle.asp

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Principle

 

The Peter Principle is a special case of a ubiquitous observation: Anything that works will be used in progressively more challenging applications until it fails.

 

Applied to humans, the selection of a candidate for a position is based on their performance in their current role rather than on their abilities relevant to the intended role.

  • The Peter Principle is an observation that the tendency in most organizational hierarchies, such as that of a corporation, is for every employee to rise in the hierarchy through promotion until they reach a level of respective incompetence.

 

  • According to the Peter Principle, every position in a given hierarchy will eventually be filled by employees who are incompetent to fulfill the job duties of their respective positions.

 

  • A possible solution to the problem posed by the Peter Principle is for companies to provide adequate skill training for employees receiving a promotion, and to ensure the training is appropriate for the position to which they have been promoted.

 

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