too many cooks spoil the broth

Too many persons involved in managing an activity can ruin it, as in Without a conductor, every player had an idea for how the music should go-too many cooks spoil the broth . This expression alludes to each of many cooks adding something to a soup, which finally tastes awful. It was already considered a proverb in 1575 (by George Gascoigne in The Life of P. Care).