Bikeshedding: What Parkinson’s Law of Triviality Teaches Us About Where We Place Our Focus

Ever find yourself caught in the web of bikeshedding? 🚲

Bikeshedding, also known as Parkinson’s law of triviality, describes our tendency to devote a disproportionate amount of our time to menial and trivial matters while leaving important matters unattended.

It's that sneaky tendency to focus on trivial details while ignoring the bigger picture.

Who here has not lost sight of the bigger picture at some point in life...

With that ever-growing to-do list and an endless parade of tasks to distract us—we've all been there, right?

Instead of diving into the crucial tasks, you find yourself debating the color of the office walls or the font on the presentation slides.

For instance, John and his colleagues gathered for a team meeting to discuss an important office expansion project that would increase their marketing capacity.

The project involved complex technical aspects, but as the discussion unfolded, they found themselves spending an inordinate amount of time debating the color of the office bike shed that was planned to be built outside.

Initially, the team was focused on critical project details like website coding languages, architecture, and timelines. However, someone suggested painting the bike shed a bright red color. This seemingly trivial detail sparked a heated discussion among team members.

As the debate over the bike shed color continued, individuals who were less familiar with the technical aspects of the project started to actively participate, offering various opinions on the shade of red, whether it should be matte or glossy, and even suggesting alternative colors.

The more complex technical discussions took a back seat as the team became engrossed in the bikeshedding conversation — about the actual bike shed.

The team unconsciously gravitated towards discussing the easily understandable and non-technical aspect of the project—the color of the bike shed—instead of delving into the more complex and challenging technical decisions.

The allure of contributing to a topic everyone could understand, coupled with the desire to express individual opinions, led the team astray from the project's core objectives.

In this scenario, the subconscious pattern of bikeshedding took over, and the team grew dangerously close to missing a critical zoning board submission that stood to derail the entire timeline of the project, nearly costing the company's ability to leverage it's 10X annual sales growth.

The bikeshedding phenomenon diverted valuable time and energy away from the critical aspects of the project, illustrating how subconscious patterns can subtly influence decision-making in everyday interactions.

Has bikeshedding had a unique impact on one of your projects?

We would love to hear your insights for possible inclusion in one of our upcoming podcast episodes at The Light Inside.

Drop us a comment sharing your ‘horror stories’ or ’battle wounds’ - and the victories you have created as a result!

The good, the bad, the downright ugly…it all empowers our growth.

Let's break free from the bikeshed, and focus on what truly matters!

Want to discover the subconscious patterns that might be holding both you and your team back? Let’s chat…💪

#Bikeshedding #PrioritizeTheEssentials #FocusOnTheBigPicture