Eternal Beginner Syndrome

In the world of event planning, “Eternal Beginner Syndrome” refers to the tendency of some recurring events to defy efficiency curves because of their reversion to “from scratch” thinking and planning with each new instance.

The Olympic Games, which are held in a different city in a different country each time they’re held, seem especially prone to cost and preparation time overruns—even more than most other events of a similar scale—in part because each new host country and city essentially starts over when concocting their Games-holding plans, rather than basing their ambitions on an existing template.

“Economies of scale” refers to the tendency of things to get cheaper as we make more of them because we can, for instance, buy raw materials in bulk and manufacture more of them all at once, which cuts costs.

“Wright’s Law” gestures at what’s sometimes called the “Learning Curve Effect,” which basically says the more a task is performed, the less time it takes to perform that task in the future because the folks performing it learn how to do it better and more efficiently.

Both of these economic concepts apply to typical events like touring concerts or carnivals because the same performance held in Dallas and Tokyo, while distinct from each other in some ways, will still be similar enough that the songs, performers, and equipment will be largely interchangeable, even if they’re in different locations, climates, buildings, etc.

The Olympics, though, are so large and sprawling that they often require the construction of entirely new stadiums and other facilities, on top of the build-out of transportation and housing infrastructure, all of which are different from city to city and country to country.

Eternal Beginner Syndrome was coined by an economist who, as part of his research into megaproject management, found that every Olympic Games event since 1962 has come in over budget, costing an average of 172% the expected price tag, and that this inability to learn from previous events substantially contributes to that inflated cost.

Thankfully, most expensive endeavors allow for learning and growth over time, based on the accumulation of knowledge and know-how, and future Olympics could benefit from the same, though that would likely require a change in the nature of the Games and its associated fanfare, as cookie-cuttering any component of what’s currently an almost entirely ad hoc affair might scale-down its pomp and sense of grandeur, as well.