Every time I have an annual job performance review, I tell a lie.
The question comes: Where do you see yourself in five years? Pat answer: Well, some kind of step-laddering up in the company and you know, maybe managing other people.
Bosses dutifully write that down.
Inside, I'm both laughing and screaming. Laughing that I keep saying that year after year, and screaming that OH MY GOSH THEY MIGHT ACTUALLY DO IT.
Because it's the Peter Principle, folks.
For those unfamiliar with the Peter Principle, it is thus:
The Peter principle is a concept in management developed by Laurence J. Peter, which observes that people in a hierarchy tend to rise to "a level of respective incompetence": employees are promoted based on their success in previous jobs until they reach a level at which they are no longer competent, as skills in one job do not necessarily translate to another. (Quoted from Wikipedia.)
I have managed people. I am not good at it. When I do it, I enter the level of respective incompetence.
So I am very pleased to remain as a technical writer, rather than an organizer and leader of men. Or women. Because, yuck.
I see this in my Scouting career. I loved being Scoutmaster. When we started a girl troop in 2019 because our daughter wanted to earn her Eagle, I got roped into being the committee chair. That put me right into the realm of incompetence.
And there I sit. And sit. And sit.
I want out.
But I don't think anyone else wants the job. I know I don't. I want out. I WANT OUT. But I'm stuck there. Being highly incompetent.
Krusty indeed wants out.
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