#259: Sherbie's Laws of Consulting, Augustine’s Law & the Ringelmann Effect
3 Ideas in 2 Minutes on Flawless Inefficiencies
I. Sherbie’s Laws of Consulting
In his book The Secrets of Consulting, Gerald Weinberg introduced Sherbie’s Laws of Consulting. They capture blunt (unsurprising) truths about how the wonderful profession of consulting works in practice.
In spite of what your client may tell you, there’s always a problem.
No matter how it looks at first, it’s always a people problem.
Never forget they’re paying you by the hour, not by the solution.
Weinberg wasn’t taking a jab at consultants, though. He was writing from experience as a consultant himself. Consulting problems were usually more about people and expectations than technical fixes. What you were really paid for as a PowerPoint philosopher was your time and guidance rather than a perfect solution.
II. Augustine’s Law
A bad idea executed to perfection is still a bad idea.
—Norman Augustine
Augustine’s Law suggests that being efficient, disciplined, hard-working and exhibiting flawless technical excellence are pointless if you pursue the wrong goal.
Remember the Segway? It was an engineering masterpiece with groundbreaking gyroscopic technology to balance itself perfectly. It looked like magic. But as a mass-consumer product, it failed spectacularly.
Its creators believed their electric scooter would replace cars and revolutionise city design. But it was way too expensive for regular commuters, too fast for sidewalks, too slow for the streets, and too heavy to carry up a flight of stairs.
Throw in a few high-profile accidents, and you get a flawlessly executed solution to a problem nobody had.
III. Ringelmann Effect
If there’s one word you can chase me with, it’s “groupwork”. I despised it in school, and I loathed it at uni. Only now do I have a catchy term for why I’ve been right the whole time. The Ringelmann Effect, as we probably all know, is named after a French agricultural engineer who discovered it in the early 20th century. (Check out the French source here.)
It’s the idea that the bigger a group gets, the less effort each person tends to put in. A motivated team of three will get more done than a team of ten. The larger the group, the more responsibility gets blurred. Plus, people spend more time coordinating instead of, I don’t know, doing the actual work. And if that wasn’t enough, it becomes harder to measure who has contributed what.
As a teacher, I still tended to dislike group work. Working in a team is a useful skill, but it only really works well when groups are small enough and everyone has a clearly defined role (that isn’t limited to: “You write it all down because you have the best handwriting.”). 🐘
Have a great week,
Chris
themindcollection.com