Laurence J. Peter Quotes

You can always tell a real friend; when you've made a fool of yourself, he doesn't feel you've done a permanent job.

Many a man, under the old and the new systems, has made the upward step from candidate to legislator, only to achieve his level of incompetence.

The man who is always waving the flag usually waives what it stands for.

IT SHOULD BE clear by now that when an employee reaches his level of incompetence, he can no longer do any useful work. Incompetent, Yes! Idle, No! This in no way suggests that the ultimate promotion suddenly changes the former worker into an idler. Not at all! In most cases he still wants to work; he still makes a great show of activity; he sometimes thinks he is working. Yet actually little that is useful is accomplished

the ability to charm, to amuse, to inflame a crowd of ten thousand voters with voice and gesture did not necessarily carry with it the ability to think sensibly, to debate soberly and to vote wisely on the nation’s business.

Don't believe in miracles - depend on them.

If man is going to rescue himself from a future intolerable existence, he must first see where his unmindful escalation is leading him. He must examine his objectives and see that true progress is achieved through moving forward to a better way of life, rather than upward to total life incompetence

Given enough time — and assuming the existence of enough ranks in the hierarchy — each employee rises to, and remains at, his level of incompetence.

You don't need to take a persons advice to make him feel good, just ask him for it.

In most hierarchies, super-competence is more objectionable than incompetence.

Man’s First Mistake: The Wheel

Never stand when you can sit; never walk when you can ride; never Push when you can Pull.

My problem is I say what I'm thinking before I think what I'm saying.

Education is a method whereby one acquires a higher grade of prejudices.

Some problems are so complex that you have to be highly intelligent and well informed just to be undecided about them.