subject: Being Punctual: What's The Big Deal About Having To Be On Time? [print this page] Being Punctual: What's The Big Deal About Having To Be On Time?
Being punctual is something that seems to have declined in our hectic modern lives. There's always an excuse for being late whether it's bad traffic, a meeting that over-ran, long queues at the checkout or simply laziness. There's even a term "fashionably late" that suggests that being punctual is somehow unfashionable.
So why is being punctual important?
First off, it's simple politeness. If you know you're going to be late for an unavoidable reason then there's always the phone to let the other party know, rather than have them wasting their time, tapping their finger on their watch, wondering where you've got to.
But if your intention all along was to be polite, that's a different kettle of fish.
If you practice being late too often, the person affected may give up on you. Maybe not literally but almost certainly in those situations where you would previously have expected them to be supportive.
The common courtesy of being punctual will almost always be rewarded.
If it's a job interview that you're late for then there's a good chance in today's economic climate that you won't be seen at all.
If it's a plane or train that you've got to catch then it's logical that being on time makes sense. If you're not punctual in that situation then you won't board. It's as simple as that. The airlines build in an expectation that a number of their passengers have got out of the habit of being punctual and ask that you arrive an hour or two before the impending take off. That becomes a problem when your habit of not being punctual kicks in and you plan to arrive later than the stated time, only to be held up on your journey and miss your flight.
Being punctual seems to be a skill that we're placing less and less importance on.
Unless, of course, it's us who are being held up.
Then the table turns and it's our time to get bugged.
So maybe the best way of being punctual is to imagine how you'd feel if it was you who was waiting for ten or fifteen minutes for someone else to arrive.
The other way that a lack of being punctual can backfire is when the people you're due to be meeting are so used to you being late that they plan around it. Then it's you who are kept waiting when their previous meeting deliberately runs late. That's when your habit of not being punctual starts to backfire on you.
