Keeping to time

Have you ever had to wait for someone who turned up late? Maybe you've got friends or colleagues that do this frequently? It can be very disruptive to both your personal life and, more importantly, to your professional life. It can get to the point that you have to start to tell them to arrive 10 or 15 minutes earlier than needed for a meeting or event just so you can get there on time. But then this means you have to be ready 10 or 15 minutes early on the off chance that they get to you on time. You can lose 15 minutes of working time, just to accommodate their disruptive habits!

Now imagine that these same people get given a keynote speaking slot at your company's conference. If they arrive late then there could be 100 - 150 people all losing 15 minutes. 150 people losing 15 minutes is equivalent to one man week's work. Wasted because they arrived late!

Now I know what you are going to say. You will say that when someone is speaking and has a slot at your company conference they never arrive 15 minutes late. And you would be correct. At least not unless there is a major problem on a transport network or something. But it is rare. Very unusual.

What is not rare or indeed unusual is that people over run by maybe 15 minutes when speaking. I was speaking a year or two ago at a University near Milton Keynes, Cranfield. The previous speaker over ran by a full 30 minutes! Yes you read it right. A one hour session went on for one and a half hours. Consequently my one hour session was cut down from one hour to 45 minutes. OK I could cope with it but it meant that the audience had to miss out on parts of my material.

My advice when speaking is to always prepare fully, which means timing your keynote or training sessions and allowing for audience interaction, such as questions, or reaction, such as laughter. That way you will be able to manage your time and not cause any problems for organisers.

Remember that if there are 150 in the audience and you run over by 15 minutes you will have cost that organisation a full man-week of lost time and the consequent cost involved.

Timing is essential. Don't be that person that people have to make allowances for. Be on time for everything and you will naturally ensure that your speeches, presentations and keynotes run smoothly to time as well.

I would be interested in your opinions on timekeeping and perhaps share this article for other people's views too.