Higgenbotham wrote:
> I think there's an additional factor since The Peter Principle was
> written - jobs at all levels have become more complex. Over the
> past 30 years, it's become harder for a person at the 98th
> percentile to be effective in a technical job.
This is entirely counter-intuitive.
I don't know what you mean by a "technical job," but operating a
computer in the 1970s required much more sophistication than operating
a computer today, even a Linux server. Looking more broadly, doing
accounting for your business required a team of accountants creating
reams of tables and charts, while today a single accountant can do the
same job. He still has to understand accounting principles, but once
the core principles are understood, the job is far less complex
using accounting software.
Another example: The Xerox machine required a secretary to look after
it several times a day, since changing paper or toner or freeing jams
was fairly complex, much more complex than those same jobs are today.
Or if you wanted your computer to print something out, then you needed
to use the line printer, which was fed huge boxes of perforated
sheets, requiring a computer operator to service it, and it went
clunk, clunk, clunk as it printed out each line of text. Now, of
course, you just click "print."
Or how about printing out a graph in color? I remember ooohing and
ahhhing at a device in the 1980s. It was a large, flat surface, and
at the top were several bottles of colored ink with a pen. Each pen,
in turn, would come out and start drawing lines or circles of whatever
was required. It was extremely cool to watch, but it was very messy
and complicated, and today, or course, you just click "print."
So I could go on and on, but technical jobs were much more complex
then than they are now.