Always late for something? Blame your time personality

Early in their relationship, before they married, Anne Kelsh was working from home and enjoying making dinner for her partner – what she called “the fun of the domestic role.”

He told her he’d like to eat when he got home at 6pm. That was a bit on the early side for Kelsh, but she was willing to accommodate – until she eventually realised that “when he said 6 o’clock, he meant 6 on the dot.”

For her, the time was more like a suggestion. “Eight o’clock is the time the curtain goes up at a show, and you must be there for 8 o’clock,” she said. “But dinner – it’s dinner. It’s dinner in our own house. I could not understand that sense of rigidity.”

Punctuality became a constant source of friction. Kelsh, who had struggled all her life with getting things done on time, used to say, “I married you, I didn’t join the army.”

Meanwhile, her husband was frequently bothered by her inability to arrive promptly to appointments and gatherings, a habit he considered rude.

Arguments about punctuality are common, but experts say they are often really about something else entirely: The different ways we relate to time. Social scientists have worked for the better part of a century to understand our varying approaches to the clock. In the 1950s, the anthropologist Edward T Hall coined the terms “monochronic” and “polychronic” to describe different cultural attitudes to time management.

In northern Europe and the United States, which Dr Hall labelled “monochronic” societies, he wrote that people tended to emphasise deadlines and work sequentially, completing one task before moving to the next. In Latin America, Africa and the Middle East, he found what he called “polychronic” societies, where he observed that people were more comfortable shifting gears in the middle of a task and less rigid about sticking to a schedule.

Dr Hall’s insights have inspired generations of organisational theorists and management experts. And while he originally made observations about societies, he and others have observed that people’s individual time-use styles also vary considerably.

Studies suggest that people are most creative, motivated and productive when they can work in their preferred style, whether that’s dipping in and out of multiple tasks or focusing laser-like on a single one. Becoming aware of your own relationship to time can make your life easier and can help you negotiate conflicts with the people around you.

ONE THING AT A TIME OR EVERYTHING ALL AT ONCE?

A good way to gauge your values around time use is to notice how you respond to interruptions. If you’re prepping a presentation when a colleague calls to discuss something else, do you pick up and say you’re busy? Or do you make time for what might turn out to be a 20-minute conversation?

If your response to this scenario is that you’d send the call directly to voice mail, you’re likely “monochronic,” said Dawna Ballard, a chronemics expert at the University of Texas at Austin. People who manage their time as a series of tasks to tick off the to-do list tend to live by the clock and are primed, at least during work hours, to prioritise obligations over relationships.

For someone like this, “an interruption, almost by definition, is irritating,” said Allen C Bluedorn, a professor emeritus of management at the University of Missouri and author of The Human Organization Of Time.

“Polychronic” people, by contrast, tend to give primacy to experiences and relationships that don’t always fit neatly into prearranged schedules. The other day, a cousin of Kelsh was visiting from out of town. Although she had an assignment to do for work, she decided to put it off for a day so they could go on a hike together. Not every deadline is truly urgent, she said, so “when interruptions come up and I feel like they’re valuable enough, it makes me reprioritise.”

Furthering these social interactions rather than shutting them down can throw off a person’s schedule – an inconvenience that some are willing to tolerate. “If you tend to be late because you are trying to fit multiple people’s needs into your day, you are polychronic,” said Dr Ballard, author of the forthcoming book Time By Design: How Communicating Slow Allows Us To Go Fast.

EACH TIME STYLE HAS BENEFITS AND DRAWBACKS

Mara Waller, a senior research scholar at Colorado State University’s College of Business, revels in her monochronicity. Focusing intently “gives us the opportunity to take deep dives into our tasks, really be thoughtful,” she said.

That time style also allows people to see a single project through to completion: “For certain tasks, it’s so efficient, because you’re blocking out everything else,” Dr Ballard said. A downside, though, is that you can get so “locked into the plan” that you lose out on serendipity and fail to notice opportunities when they arise, Dr Bluedorn said.

Dr Waller, who studies the work of high-pressure teams, holds deep appreciation for people who are capable of handling many things at once. Years ago for a research project, she sat with air traffic controllers at what is now George Bush Intercontinental Airport on busy weekend nights, watching them manage critical data and bark commands without losing their cool. “If you see someone who’s really polychronic in a multitasking situation, and they have a good grip on it, sometimes it kind of looks like a ballet,” she said.

People who easily shift between tasks are also at an advantage when it comes to handling life’s messiness. “One of the benefits is that you have a realistic view of life, and so you won’t be distressed when things don’t fit into your time,” Dr Ballard said.

You’re also less likely to get burned out by perseverating on a single task, Dr Bluedorn said. A 2023 study of people balancing college with nearly full-time work revealed that those who naturally took on multiple tasks at a time were better able to balance competing obligations without becoming emotionally exhausted.

But on the flip side, these flexible folks can be easily distracted and may engage in what Dr Bluedorn calls “unproductive dithering” and have trouble finishing what they start.

HOW TO MAKE YOUR TIME STYLE WORK FOR YOU

Time-use styles are a preference, not a trait, Dr Waller said, meaning that people can adopt a different approach – it just won’t feel as comfortable. Shifting when it serves you, though, will make you more effective, Dr Ballard said.

“Is your goal here relationship building? Then go polychronic,” she said. “If your goal is to complete a task, then we need to be monochronic for a window of time and shut out all distractions.”

For those who organise their lives on a strict timetable, Dr Ballard suggests building in buffer periods of up to an hour between engagements, so “if things start to extend, you’re not stressed out.” Meanwhile, people who deviate from their schedules could try the inverse – writing down appointments half an hour earlier than they actually are.

And for compulsively punctual people who are easily frustrated by others’ delays, Dr Ballard suggests carrying work or a book; you can stay productive in moments when someone keeps you waiting. If you don’t feel your time has been wasted, you may be less annoyed.

The key is to remove judgment, Dr Ballard said. “For both personalities, what will help is to recognise that everyone doesn’t see time the way they do.”

By Emily Laber-Warren © The New York Times Company

The article originally appeared in The New York Times.