A disturbing trend I’ve noticed in the 60+ meetings, conferences, and conventions I attend each year is the increasing frequency of how many of these events get thrown off schedule. When attendees are still clustered around the coffee stations 10 minutes after the meeting begins or they refuse to disconnect from their smart phones in sufficient time to get to their seats on time, it delays or interrupts the program, irritates those who are on time, and sets into motion a series of undesirable outcomes often delaying everything else scheduled throughout the day.
This ‘fashionably late’ mindset not only impacts off-site meetings and conventions, but has also become a disruptive force in the workplace. Not many years ago, it was considered rude and inconsiderate to walk in late to a meeting or appointment leaving the offender red-faced with embarrassment. Now it’s so commonplace that people are surprised when their meeting starts on time and late arrivers are perceived as VIP’s who must have more pressing issues to attend to than the business at hand.
However, when ‘the business at hand’ is deemed significant enough (i.e. kickoff at the Superbowl, an international flight, the curtain rising at a top-rated Broadway show, etc.), rarely is punctuality an issue.
Makes you wonder what would happen if event organizers started their meetings on time, but rather than beginning with boring housekeeping announcements, opened with something so compelling, attendees wouldn’t chance missing it.
PUNCTUALITY IN PRACTICE
Last week I presented to an audience of nearly 4,000 high school students in attendance at the Ohio FFA Convention in Columbus. The session was scheduled to start at 10am, and at 10am sharp, virtually every student/member was in their seat, pretty shocking considering that the closest hotel to the arena venue was 5 miles away.
“Why were the students on time?” you ask.
As a part of Ohio FFA’s organizational culture, each of the five general sessions held over the 2-day convention is preceded by an optional ‘pre-session’ that starts 30 minutes before the general session’s gavel goes down. Not wanting to miss a minute of the pre-session festivities, the student delegates flood in the hall the moment the doors open.
The pre-session that occurred before my keynote address featured a sensational musical performance, several entertaining student-produced videos, and then, right before the national anthem opening, they presented a ‘Bobbing for Spam’ competition.
You want the visual of this main stage activity?
Six student volunteer participants were divided into 2 teams and each individual was covered head-to-toe in plastic to shield themselves from the mess that was about to occur. On the stage floor in front of each team was a large clear tub filled with cold water. In relay style, one team member at a time was charged with dropping to their knees, placing their hands behind their backs, and racing to eat all the contents from a can of SPAM that a judge dropped into their tub. As soon as the judge declared that a participant had gobbled up all the submerged floating chunks of SPAM, it was the the next team member’s duty to repeat the process as the jud
ge dropped a fresh can of the meaty substance into the water. The audience roared with cheers, laughter, and applause.
No wonder the audience took their seats on time. How could anyone risk arriving late and missing out on this brand of controlled chaos?
The pre-session was hilarious, inexpensive, participatory, and incredibly effective as the gavel hit the podium at 10am.
ON POINT – If you’re frustrated with the lackadaisical manner in which your people are showing up for meetings…or for work, don’t think the only way to correct the situation is to scold, threaten, and/or punish the offenders.
Instead, get creative and reward those who are punctual.
From here on, begin all your meetings on time, but start with something that has such value to attendees (some kind of entertainment that concludes as the meeting begins, or an unexpected perk that only those arriving a few minutes ahead of schedule receive) that all last-minute doddlers and fashionably late arrivers end up kicking themselves for missing out on and are left asking others, “What just happened? Why is everyone laughing? What did I miss?”
When applied consistently, this small change can have an enormous positive impact on your entire culture.
What a great story Eric.
For a different demographic (high earning sales folks) this worked everytime at our meetings: The Twenty Dollar Rule – when in effect, any meeting participant who was late, by even a minute, was dinged $20. All those who stayed on time through the day were ellible to participate in a drawing for the pooled money or the money collected was donated to charity.
When The Rule was in effect meetings almost never ran behind due to stragglers.
This is an awesome technique, Rob. Really appreciate you sharing!
4 ideas…
1. Refuse admission to anyone who’s late, no exceptions
2. Walk of shame. Make late attendees gather at one door and parade them all in en masse at a designated time, say 15 minutes after the session begins.
3. Dim the lights like they do at the theater 5 and 10 minutes prior to the next session start time. You can also take it a step further and shut down the coffee bars, suspend wi-fi, etc. for 5 minutes before and after a session starts.
4. Designate special seating at the back (or maybe right up front) as the late seating session.
Conference administrators need to do their part and enforce a rigorous time table by insisting that every session start and end on time. Giving people an extra 5 or 10 minutes to get settled disrespects those who were there on time and reinforces the inconsiderate behavior of those who perpetually run late.
With respect to the latter, I’ve attended too many presentations, on and offline, which start late due to technical difficulties. No excuse for this particularly the last one I attended which was hosted by a ‘tech’ company. Yeah, really built their credibility. Finally, attended a board meeting and the chair of the meeting arrived exactly when the meeting was supposed to start, took 5 minutes to get settled and then opened the proceedings by thanking everybody for being there on time! Hmmm.
A no disruption hero: Alamo Drafthouse Cinema won’t seat anybody who’s late to a showing even if you’ve bought your tickets ahead of time. They also make it easy to deal with disruptive patrons. You simply notify one of the staff and they take care of the problem for you.
As anyone who follows Eric knows one of his admonishments to young workers is that if you arrive on time to your shift, you’re already late. Good advice for everyone.
Bingo, Tom! Great thoughts and suggestions. I agree that tardiness should not be politely accepted, but that steps should be taken to correct the situation and reward those who are on time.
Eric,
Thank you for what you do! I’m the one who introduced you at the Ohio FFA convention. You were wonderful! And I just wanted to let you know that this blog has just made hundreds of Ohio FFA members really happy! What a great connection to what we try to do! Thanks again!
Jeanie
Thank you for sharing truths. People will show up on time if they deem it important, AND if someone gives them a compelling enough reason. Bravo for bringing this clever solution to our attention.
You’re dead on with this comment, Colette. Thanks for sharing your truth.
Yes, it’s true that there is a lack of emphasis on being on time. It shows a marked lack of respect for the speaker/event. In my view if the event’s start time is 10:00 AM the doors should be closed at 10:02. I grew up in a time when actions had consequences (I am over 60). If you did no abide by the rules you missed out. People should not have to be bribed to do the right thing. Doing “the right thing” should be an automatic response. People are no longer afraid of “consequences” ’cause there are none.
I agree with your statement, “people should not have to be bribed to do the right thing,” Marvin. But I do believe that rewarding those who do the right thing is often more effective than to calling attention to, chastising, and punishing those who don’t.
I’m certainly not advocating the practice of looking the other way. Effective discipline often calls for punitive measures. But a great leader continually strives to know when to recognize and when to discipline, and they work hard to maintain the balance between the two.