The Essence of Time

We all have read innumerable articles on time management; been advised, sermonised, lectured, admonished into thinking about managing time and how critical it is to plan by the minute if not seconds.

Our exposure to time management starts at the very moment we enter a play school as tiny tots and we live by a routine / time table through our journey to college - 20 long years i must say. Isn't it good enough to inculcate a habit which determines the following,

1. You can't be late even by a minute as that would get you a remark or may be a sit out in college?
2. A day is divided into multiple periods which expose you to different facets of a discipline and you could gain significant if not incremental all round knowledge in a single day.
3. You plan your week / day based on what you would be learning / doing in a particular time period and you are asked to align yourself to an expectation of what you can derive and what you can contribute.

Elementary stuff...right? we would vehemently agree that it is so well engrained in our mind and blood that we don't need to be told again. We will cringe and possibly feel insulted if we are told that we have not adhered to timelines.

Yet, on a person level, i have experienced (quite frequently) the following,

1. I found 80% parents coming late (by 15 to 45 minutes) to a parents-teacher meeting to decide if their kid could be tutotored to be the next mathematical genius.
2. I have people telling me that it is ok to be a couple of minutes (couple could even meet half an hour) to meetings and the client wouldn't mind as they have a personal equation
3. Meetings that have been set up a week or more in advance with an agenda have last minute preparations and postponements as there were other pressing engagements.
4. Young blood...at the beginning of their career....coming 20 minutes late for interviews quoting reasons which could be termed as irrational or unfathomable or plain bizzare.

Just a few examples to cite but takes me back to the basic premise i started with, where do we go wrong after having been through precision driven time table for two decades?

Hard to comprehend but it is what differentiates a leader from the rest. The most difficult task to accomplish and to maintain is to stick to a schedule. While we will quote a thousand external reasons for messing up schedules.....it has actually happened as a cascading effect of someone who started the mess....we end up aligning ourselves to fall in line with the mess rather than correcting it. The only small point we should understand is that being on time has a cascading effect too...it is just a matter of falling into a different trend...a trend seemingly militarian in approach but far reaching benefits....possible? My personal experience definitely makes me think it is.