Meaning
When too many people take charge of one task, especially too many leaders or decision-makers, the result suffers. Applied to committees, teams, and projects where overlapping authority and conflicting input produce confusion rather than help. Conversational and mildly humorous; a natural aside in any discussion of teamwork. Regional use: General English.
Origin
One of the oldest English proverbs still current in essentially its original shape. The first known record is John Hooker's The Life and Times of Sir Peter Carew (1575), which cites it as an existing saying in the older form 'There is the proverb, the more cooks the worse potage', so the saying itself predates that record. Jane Austen already used the modern wording in her unfinished novel The Watsons, written around 1803-05 and published in 1871. The proverb is conventionally paired with its counter-proverb 'many hands make light work', and modern management writers still invoke it, for example Fred Brooks's argument in The Mythical Man-Month that adding people to a late project makes it later.
Research Sources
References used to check this entry’s meaning, history, or documented forms.
Variants
- The more cooks, the worse potage
- Too many cooks
- Too many cooks spoil the soup
Usage Examples
- Six executives rewrote the press release until it said nothing at all, a tidy demonstration that too many cooks spoil the broth.
- The council put every single member on the festival committee, and sure enough too many cooks spoiled the broth.
- Keep one owner per document; too many cooks spoil the broth, and the style guide is proof of it.