Work also shrinks to fit the time available: and we can prove it

British productivity is still in the doldrums. What if the simple reverse application of Parkinson's Law could solve it?

'It is a commonplace observation that work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion." So wrote C Northcote Parkinson in jest about postwar bureaucracy in 1955. But his musings resonated far and wide, and now, 60 years on, what became known as Parkinson's law is worth exploring in a country where productivity remains mired in the doldrums.

What if solving the productivity puzzle is simply a case of fitting the same work into a shorter time?

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