Win at Life
Bikeshedding is a common name for Parkinson’s Law of Triviality.
The theory states that people or groups spend disproportionately high amounts of time on trivial issues, avoiding important things that seem just too hard, too big or too scary.
The story goes like this:
A finance committee for a nuclear power plant was meeting to discuss two topics: signing a contract to approve a $400M reactor, and approval for $2k to build a bike shed for their staff.
The $400M proposal is too big and technical, and didn’t really get discussed.
The bike shed proposal, however, lining up more with the committee’s experience, took up the majorityof the meeting, with members debating what material the roof should be made of and what color the shed should be painted.
Avoiding Bike Shedding can be done by being aware of a group (or a person’s) tendency towards trivial details, and
shifting the focus to the bigger points and larger strategy.
shifting the focus to the bigger points and larger strategy.
- Action – Can you think of an area when you YOU Bike Shed?
Do you have a tendency to get caught up with lots of easy small jobs
(or ones other people have asked you to do!) rather than the ones that make the difference?