Laurence J. Peter

Dr. Laurence J. Peter (September 16, 1919 - January 12, 1990) was an educator and "hierarchiologist," best known to the general public for the formulation of the Peter Principle.

He was born in Vancouver, British Columbia, and began his career as a teacher in 1941. He received the degree of Doctor of Education from Washington State University in 1963.

In 1964, Peter moved to California, where he became an Associate Professor of Education, Director of the Evelyn Frieden Centre for Prescriptive Teaching, and Coordinator of Programs for Emotionally Disturbed Children at the University of Southern California.

He became widely famous in 1968, on the publication of the The Peter Principle, in which he states: "In a hierarchy every employee tends to rise to his level of incompetence."

From 1985 to his death in 1990, Dr. Peter attended and was involved in management of the Kinetic Sculpture Race in Humboldt County, California. He proposed an award for the race, titled "The Golden Dinosaur Award" which has been handed out every year since to the first sculptural machine to utterly break down immediately after the start.

Works

*"The Peter Pyramid or will we ever get the point?" (1986)
*"Why things go wrong"
*"Peter's Almanac"
*"Peter's People"
*"Peter's Quotations"
*"The Peter Plan"
*"Individual Instruction"
*"Classroom Instruction"
*"Therapeutic Instruction"
*"Teacher Education"
*"The Peter Prescription"
*"The Peter Principle" (with Raymond Hull) (1968)
*"The Laughter Prescription" (1982)
*"Prescriptive Teaching"