Whilst there may not be a perfect correlation between punctuality and efficiency, I'd suggest that it seems likely punctuality in business is more likely to be efficient than not.

For example if you have 10 people attending a meeting and all must wait till they are present before starting (a very common occurrance) having all 10 people turn up promptly is more efficient than having 1-9 people waiting for the remainder of the attendees to arrive.

It's honestly blowing my mind that this point even needs to be argued. Of course being on time correlates with efficiency.

Have they ever looked up a store's hours before going there? Or gone to see a movie? Or met with someone else to do... anything? Or utilized public transit?

Of course it can be argued that, in a cosmic sense, maybe society is more "efficient" toward people relaxing and enjoying life if that train doesn't leave for another 45 minutes because the conductor felt like sleeping in this morning. But at that point, it's not a meaningful discussion.

Honestly it's difficult to imagine having the opposing view with any experience at all managing anything. Or even considering what it might be like to do so.

Indeed, it is a bit surprising to me that timeliness appears to be a debatable point in business.

Feel welcome to disagree--I just think you might feel differently with broader life experience or a more open mind.

I think with broader life experience and a more open mind you would think the exact opposite to what you are espousing.

Maybe you're right. What life experience(s) would help lead me to seeing it the other way?

Well, as you yourself admitted, your position is the default one, that few would disagree with.

That automatically implies that it doesn't take much experience or a very open mind. It would be the opposite position, the hard to accept one, that would require broader life experience and a more open mind.

Maybe you're right. What life experiences would you suggest that might help me better understand your perspective?

Even more efficient is: starting the meeting anyway; publishing minutes so people can choose to attend or not; inviting fewer attendees; not having meetings about things which can be resolved by the teams talking directly to each other in their day-to-day work.

Yeah, it's a mistake to think that a meeting is always the most efficient way of doing things. Every meeting held costs the company thousands of dollars as people are not able to do other things during it, and so many companies just don't even think twice about adding anyone and everyone and don't think of how much it's costing them in productivity lost to other things because they just always assume that meetings are the best way to get things done.

I think it would be better if meetings were seen as the expensive beasts they are and only the bare minimum of people that can attend it, should attend it, and it should be considered (especially with routine meetings) whether or not the meetings even need to be held in the first place.

Oh absolutely, I'm not suggesting that meetings are always well run or indeed necessary, but where they are held, time management is important to get people in and out as fast as possible, which improves efficiency.

>Whilst there may not be a perfect correlation between punctuality and efficiency, I'd suggest that it seems likely punctuality in business is more likely to be efficient than not.

Efficient towards what, and what for? Those are good questions seldom asked.

Efficiency in terms of not wasting people's time. The ability in business for people to complete tasks in-line with when they were expected allows for better scheduling.

I'm not suggesting that everything in business benefits from being regimented but that meeting expectations allows for others to plan their time effectively.

Time where people are waiting for others to do work which should have been completed can often be wasted.

>Efficiency in terms of not wasting people's time.

Then you must first consider the need to have the business or meeting in the first place.

In fact, people's time is only "wasted" because it has been made precious -- i.e. because it was stolen and/or sold. That's way more wasted time (they'll never get again) there, than in "wasting time" by not being punctual.

Societies studied by ethnologists had little care for punctuality. In fact the same was true for rural societies in Europe and the US as well (the US South was considered "lazy" and without a "sense of time" as well), and even urban life before the tyranny of the modern "always on" demands. For the upper classes, being fashionably late was a virtue.

Sure as I mentioned elsewhere I'm not arguing that meetings are an unalloyed good, what I am arguing is that where they are held, it is better that people are punctual, rather that non-punctual, and that there is improved efficiency relatively where participants are punctual.

Punctuality is a foundation of respect for other people's time.

Demand of punctuality is a demand on other people's time.

Punctuality is a virtue of slaves -- to other people and to the clock in general.

I understand your point, but you're wrong. Working with other people towards a common goal does not equal becoming a slave to them. It does mean however, that if you don't respect their time then your actions serve against that goal.

I think we are so deeply ingrained in thinking this way in some societies that we completely miss the forest for the trees. We forget what the overall goal is and instead focus mindlessly on efficiently doing little things that seem in that moment to be the goal at a drag on accomplishing the overall goal. We are not ants, we are thinking creatures who, given time and a relaxed attitude can come up with solutions that easily negate the need for the mindless ant-like efficiency that is more suited to ignorant creatures than thinking ones.

Do people often "work with other people towards a common goal" though, or only give the impression of doing so, by going through the motions, and being trapped into one of the default modes of making a living in modern society?

There is effectively zero cost to punctuality. If you have to spend 60 minutes in a meeting to get through the agenda items regardless of when it starts then there's no benefit to being late. Just show up on time.