Everyone who knows me reasonably well knows that I am, and have always been, a chronically late person. I remember one time when I was a student, and I quickly wanted to install some speakers, which I bought at a yard sale, onto my stereo before meeting my girlfriend. But there was no sound, and I got so obsessed with having to solve this problem, that I ended up letting my girlfriend wait for over two hours.

 

Now you might think I must be a horribly inconsiderate person. It would indeed seem that way. But the thing is that not only do I actually feel really bad for the people who have to wait for me, I myself am really upset about messing up appointments.

 

What’s more, my chronic lateness has really inconvenienced me in major ways. I have not missed a flight, yet (although almost), but every flight departure is very stressful for me because I always end up rushing, worrying, panicking, sweating, before I arrive at the gate. So I don’t look forward to flying for that reason alone.

 

I also missed many things I really wanted to attend, and I had to change many plans because I was late. And I always get upset about the slightest disruption in any commute because it means I will arrive late(r). There have been so many times where I missed the last bus or train from work, which meant that I had to either walk or take a taxi (or sometimes neither was possible or affordable). In fact, the time when I was probably best in middle distance running was when as a postdoc I had to take the train from London to a far away suburb every day and I literally sprinted for the last train almost every night.

 

Anyway, so I really don’t like being late. Hence, in this post I want to find out what makes me being late without really wanting to. And perhaps you face similar problems.Then this post may help you to understand why you might be chronically late. Or if you are one  of those amazing people who are always punctual, the post might help you to understand why some of your friends are always late (and hopefully how you can help them to be punctual, too!)

 

 

Honestly, I want to be on time, because I know that my lateness makes other people upset and creates a terrible atmosphere that takes away the joy of meeting them in the first place. But somehow it never works out.

 

Unlike probably most people, I personally usually don’t mind at all if others are late and make me wait. A few minutes late …, why is it such a problem? To the contrary, I in fact often prefer it, because I get to rest for a while and be able to mentally prepare for the meeting. So because I am not upset if someone else is late, it is difficult to understand why someone else would feel upset.

 

So what makes punctual people be so upset about late people? I felt I had to find out from them! And amazingly, when I asked four different people, they all said almost exactly the same things. Late people make them upset because their behaviour is selfish and inconsiderate. As punctual people, they try very hard to be on time, often putting important things aside for later, and they feel it is just not fair that the other person doesn’t do the same. They imply that the late person assumes that his/her time is more valuable, that the things they have to do are more important than those of the people who have to wait for them.

 

I can honestly say that I don’t think any of these! From my point of view, I want to be on time, but I just can’t.

 

But of course, I don’t want to come up with excuses. I know for a fact that the people who have to wait for me are being upset. And hence I SHOULD do something about it if I care at all. However, it is not as simple as saying: “If I was considerate, I would be on time.” But what I should do if I care is to try to find out why I am really late and try to improve, which I am trying to do here!

 

 

One frequently mentioned reason for why people are late is that they tend to underestimate the time it takes to do something. So to test this, I took the scientific approach. I tried to predict how long some task or daily routine  would take (like getting ready in the morning; checking out news, new music and personal emails in the morning; mark five video assignments; etc.) and then actually measured it over a few days. It turns that my estimates were pretty good, generally only slighter shorter than how long a task would actually take.

 

However, when trying to consciously monitor how I do tasks, I noticed two things. On some days, doing some routine or task took much longer. And that was usually because something unexpected happened. Like there was some very interesting news, or I had to do some background research on a video I was marking. In this situation, I was unable to put off reading the interesting news to a later time or just mark one video less on this day. I felt obsessed to complete the task instead of continuing later.

 

The other thing I noticed was that when things would go faster than expected, I would invariably do other things that I did not originally plan to do. So in the end, the routine or task took the same time, or even longer because I now also wanted to complete the additional task.

 

The best example was given by my dad, who described the difference between himself (a punctual person), and my mum (a chronically late person). If my dad wants to buy a new shirt, he goes to the shirt section in the department store, period. If my mum wants to buy a blouse, she checks out the blouses, but if she sees nothing nice, she checks out the pants, bags etc., because she has “extra time”, but predictably ends up being late at the agreed meeting time.

 

Hence, the actual reason number 1 for why I am late: I am obsessed to complete a task immediately and if the task goes faster than expected, I start to do new tasks that I did not plan to do initially.

 

So the lesson here is probably that I should not set myself tasks to complete, but set time periods to spend on an activity or routine (completing it if necessary at a later time). It is just not possible to always finish everything right away, because unexpected things do happen.

 

How do you NOT do things that you did not plan on doing in the first place. Well, the key is not to HAVE things that you have not planned on doing. Whenever you think you want to do something, plan it. In other words, assign a day and time when you plan to do it. And if you don’t get to do it at this time, plan a new time. Which means I really need to improve my planning habits.

 

 

Yes, some time ago I read this revelatory post.

 

What this post explains is that “people are chronically late for one very simple reason: they don’t want to be early.” That is exactly true! I never thought of it. I want to arrive just when necessary. I feel that being early is a waste of my time. Therefore I plan to leave so that under normal circumstances I would just arrive on time.

 

The problem is of course that most of the time circumstances are not normal. I might forget something, meet someone on the way, or there are other unexpected delays, and then I end up being late. And while trying not to waste my time, I end up wasting the other person’s time, which understandably makes them upset.

 

What can be done about this? One thing I will try is to plan to do some task that I want to get done when I get early to the meeting place. That way I would still make efficient use of my time if I do arrive early.

 

But what if the other person also arrives early. In fact, when people come to see me, I have this phobia that they might come early and I would not be able to finish what I had planned to do before the meeting. But thinking about this, I think it would be perfectly reasonable to point out that the other person is early and I would still need to finish what I was planning to do before the agreed meeting time. Then they probably won’t come early next time.

 

 

I was also told, as a further proof that late people are inconsiderate, is that that they can be punctual when they have to. For instance, do I turn up late for my lectures? Or would I turn up late if I had an appointment with the president of the University. Definitely not. Which brings me to the question,

 

Why is it that chronically late people can be on time sometimes? What is different about these appointments or tasks to which chronically late people turn up on time. Is it because the consequences of missing these appointments or messing up these tasks are more severe? The fact that I am also running late when I have to take a flight or turn up late for classes for which I paid a lot of money suggests otherwise.

 

So why then am I on time for these important meetings or tasks? I strongly believe that the reason I am able to get to some appointments on time is that my reputation is at stake. If the president of the University thinks I am a late person and show no respect towards him, that would be super embarrassing. If I am late for a class in which over 200 students are waiting for me, it would send a terrible message about me.

 

But what late people do not realise is that their reputation suffers every time they are late, because people notice and draw their own conclusions about the late person’s character.

 

So as a punctual person, the best way you can help late people is by making them see the consequences of their lateness, or even by making the consequences more severe (?) You could try telling your friend: “Do you know that everyone talks about you being late all the time?” “Did you know that people perceive you as arrogant because you think it is ok to always be late?” “Next time you are late I won’t be waiting for you anymore.” or “Sorry, I don’t want to meet with you anymore because you are always late.”

 

Tomorrow night I am flying off to Germany, and I am already dreading my pre-departure stress. What actually makes it so difficult for me to leave for the airport on time? I would usually set myself a time to start packing and getting ready, estimating how long it would take to get ready, travel to the airport and arrive well on time. The first problem is that usually I don’t start at the set time because …, well because I am usually late for everything, for the reasons discussed above. 

 

The second problem is that while packing or getting ready, I often cannot find things or discover things that I wanted to do before the departure but forgot, like cleaning my computer, my shoes, printing out something, etc. And given my compulsive perfectionist nature, I feel obliged to do them.

 

The answer to solving these problems is obvious. Make a list of the things you need to do before getting ready and plan when you actually do them. And secondly, make a list of things you want to take along. Coming up with these lists will make you realise about the things you also wanted to do before the departure, which otherwise you only would have discovered at the last moment.

 

So here then are some actionable steps that I will try to take:

 

1.Plan EVERYTHING. When you think of something you want or have to do, do not do it right away, but plan a day (and time) when you will do it. You don’t want to have things that you remember at the last moment when you HAVE to do them right away.

 

2.If you plan an activity or task, don’t plan how much you want to get done, but how much time you want to spend on the task.

 

3.If you are worried about wasting your time by getting to appointments early, plan to arrive ahead of time and to do some activity at the agreed meeting point.

 

4.If another person arrives early and you have not finished what you wanted to do before the meeting, point out to them in a friendly manner that they are early and you would still need to finish your task before you are ready.

 

5.Before an important appointment, make a list of the things you need to do beforehand and a list of the things you need to take. Plan to get ready ahead of time, so that there is still time for an activity that is non-essential.

 

6.Realise the severe consequences that always being late has for your reputation. As a punctual person having to wait for a late person, convey to him/her how others perceive them and demonstrate how you will not tolerate it.