Executives: Parkinson's Third Law

A tongue-in-cheek British professor named Cyril Northcote Parkinson has won himself a reputation in recent years for evolving Parkinson's Laws, which have a disturbing way of showing the absurdity beneath the reality. Law One concerns bureaucracy: "Work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion." Law Two on the same subject: "Expenditures rise to meet income." Now Parkinson, 53, currently a business consultant in Amsterdam, has unburdened himself of a Third Law, this time on corporations, in a book out this week (In-Laivs and Outlaws; Houghton Mifflin; $4)....

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