Quotes by C. Northcote Parkinson

“Work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion.”

“The chief product of an automated society is a widespread and deepening sense of boredom.”

“Delay is the deadliest form of denial.”

“The man who is denied the opportunity of taking decisions of importance begins to regard as important the decisions he is allowed to take.”

“Make the people sovereign and the poor will use the machinery of government to dispossess the rich.”

“Expenditure rises to meet income.”

“Perfection of planned layout is achieved only by institutions on the point of collapse.”

“Expansion means complexity and complexity decay.”

“Where life is colorful and varied, religion can be austere or unimportant. Where life is appallingly monotonous, religion must be emotional, dramatic and intense. Without the curry, boiled rice can be very dull.”

“The smaller the function, the greater the management.”

“A fellow doesnt last long on what he has done. He has to keep on delivering.”

“I would rather he able to appreciate things I can not have than to have things I am not able to appreciate”

“Human happiness and human satisfaction must ultimately come from within oneself. It is wrong to expect some final satisfaction to come from money or from a computer.”

“We are taught you must blame your father, your sisters, your brothers, the school, the teachers - you can blame anyone but never blame yourself. Its never your fault. But its always your fault, because if you wanted to change, youre the one who has got to change. Its as simple as that, isnt it?”

“Do not think of your faults, still less of others faults; look for what is good and strong, and try to imitate it. Your faults will drop off, like dead leaves, when their time comes.”

“The Law of Triviality... briefly stated, it means that the time spent on any item of the agenda will be in inverse proportion to the sum involved.”

“A committee is organic rather than mechanical in its nature: it is not a structure but a plant. It takes root and grows, it flowers, wilts, and dies, scattering the seed from which other committees will bloom in their turn.”

“The man whose life is devoted to paperwork has lost the initiative. He is dealing with things that are brought to his notice, having ceased to notice anything for himself.”

“When any organizational entity expands beyond 21 members, the real power will be in some smaller body.”

“Men enter local politics solely as a result of being unhappily married.”