There is nothing like a deadline to get shit done
How slow-moving government workers inspired ‘Parkinson’s Law’
Cyril Parkinson was a scholar with a sense of humour. In 1955, he wrote a satirical article in The Economist where he coined the term ‘Parkinson’s Law’. Disappointed by the way governments worked slowly and expensively, he compared them to an old lady taking all day to send a postcard. For example, taking 3 hours to write the perfect message, an hour to decide what to wear and wondering whether or not to bring an umbrella etc.
Basically, he observed that if you’re not busy and you’re given a task to do, you will take as long as possible to get the thing done.
If you’ve ever had a free Saturday with just one thing to do, you’ll know what I’m talking about.
Any task will inflate until all the available time is spent.
It doesn’t necessarily mean you’re not doing anything at all. It means that you might make the task bigger than it needs to be, take more breaks or create an infinite amount of decisions until you execute the task.
If you give a task a week, it’ll take a week. If you give it a day, somehow it gets done in a day.
What does that mean for you? Get busy so you get things done quicker!
3 ways to apply this to daily design decisions
- Add time-limits to flows to reduce drop-off rates.
- Break-up lengthy processes into smaller milestones for your users.
- If your user misses a deadline, give them a limited amount of time to redeem themselves. ‘You’re late on your bill! Pay in the next 48 hours to avoid a late payment fee.’
In short, there is nothing like a deadline to get things done.
