Bike shedding (or the Law of Triviality)

Bike shedding, also known as the bike-shed or bicycle-shed effect, or the law of triviality or Parkinson’s Law, is a phenomenon where people in an organization fight over trivial issues and ignore what’s complicated and truly important.

The term "bike-shedding" comes from a story in C. Northcote Parkinson’s book Parkinson’s Law: Or the Pursuit of Progress (1986). In the story, a fictional committee discusses the construction of a nuclear power plant, but spends most of its time discussing trivial details such as which materials to use for the construction of a bike shed.