C. Northcote Parkinson C. Northcote Parkinson Cyril Northcote Parkinson (30 July 1909 – 9 March 1993) was a British naval historian and author of some 60 books, the most famous of which was his best-seller "Parkinson's Law" (1957), in which Parkinson advanced Parkinson's law, stating that "work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion", an insight which led him to be regarded as an important scholar in public administration and management. The youngest son of William Edward Parkinson (1871–1927), an art master at North East County School and from 1913 principal of York School of Arts and Crafts, and
Principle of maximum work the works of Willard Gibbs and others to follow, the work principle was found to be a particular case of a more general statement: The principle of work was a precursor to the development of the thermodynamic concept of free energy. In thermodynamics, the Gibbs free energy or Helmholtz free energy is essentially the energy of a chemical reaction "free" or available to do external work. Historically, the "free energy" is a more advanced and accurate replacement for the thermochemistry term “affinity” used by chemists of olden days to describe the “force” that caused chemical reactions. The term dates back