It has become a NATIONAL EPIDEMIC! African Time! Nigerian Time! This scourge has become so ingrained in our culture that when people plan events they build in the late arrival of African and Nigerian guests! This is because we are as a people world famous for being consistently late.
I am aware that not everyone has the atrocious habit, but let’s be frank more of us do that do not.
Outside the horrid reputation we have for arriving late for events, this ‘culture’ is costing us business, significance, success, advancement and much more.
Don’t you think that international businesses and business people think twice before engaging with us because they just cannot stand our penchant for African Time? Can you imagine how many of us have missed life changing opportunities because we turned up late for an event, an appointment or even a flight?
This is the 21st century and the world has become a Global Village, it is no longer business as usual. If we are to solidly take our place in the committee of nations we need to flip the script and relegate African Time to the history books. The change we seek will not start from elected officials; it will start from the man in your mirror.
The panacea for habitual lateness starts with a few simple changes in mindset.
PLAN AHEAD. All great minds start the day the previous day. None who achieved anything worthwhile ever lived their day off the cuff. The way to go is to plan your day before your day starts.
Before you turn in for the night, think ahead to the next day and write out your most important tasks and responsibilities for the day. Don’t just right them down; schedule them. Give them ownership of space and time in your calendar. Let that activity own you for that duration of your day.
I believe that the mindset that your activity owns you reduces the chances of you spending time on something else. It’s not so much about how much you can cram into your schedule; but what you can execute effectively and efficiently. Efficiency and effectiveness do not come by flying through a task by the seat of your pants. They come with intentional execution.
BUILD IN TIME FOR DELAYS: I am manic about scheduling and planning ahead. But I never really saw the benefit of building in time for delays in my planning. That is until almost lost a big client on account of my tardy arrival to our meeting. 
You see, I had a 2pm meeting and I surmised that it would take me about 15minutes to drive to the clients office. So I left my office by 1:40pm. Unfortunately, on this particular day the traffic gods decided to exhibit their supremacy over lesser mortals. And every route to my meeting was backed up with vehicles. To my chagrin I had to call the customer by 1:50pm to say I was stuck in traffic; eventually arriving for my meeting 15 minutes late.
I learnt a valuable lesson that day. I learnt that I had to form the habit of building in time for delays in my plans and not assume (remember what they say about ‘assume*’?). It doesn’t matter what type of plans – travel plans, meeting plans, cooking plans etc. Always build in time for delays.
*It is said that when you ‘assume’ you make an ass out of you and me. Get it? “ASS- U – ME”
It is much better to get there and wait than to run in behind schedule and destabilized.
BE FLEXIBLE. Murphy’s Law is real. The law says that “things will go wrong in any given situation, if you give them a chance,”
Sometimes people don’t plan to be late, it just sort of happens. You believe you and on an even keel, and BAM something happens that knocks you off your axis. The challenge is that we are so focused on the here and now that our situational awareness is off. That’s what knocks us off kilter.
When we make plans or commence a task, we need to like Dr Covey teaches begin with the end in mind. This way when things seem to be veering off script we would have already anticipated the deviation and know how to roll with the punches.
But you cannot do this if you do not plan head. Flexibility is the benefit of planning and effective preparation.
You can mitigate Murphy’s Law. The law is premised on you giving a leeway to wrong things happening. So, don’t. Plan ahead, know your exit routes, make alternate plans, and have back up actions. Don’t give Murphy’s Law a chance to make you come late.
My list is by no means an exhaustive one. I am certain you have other methods or tricks to help you ensure you are always on time. Sometimes all it takes is simple common sense.
Watch the following clip for four common sense tips to ensure you are never late again; and let me know what you think.
Lizspire (trainings, seminars and this blog) are geared towards building effective and efficient people. People who are successful and are actively building successful people.
In touching on African Time, I want to start calling attention to this often laughed off culture that is compromising our ability to be successful people engaged in actively building successful people.
The change starts with each individual and we owe it to ourselves first and our business environment to build a reputation for serious mindedness, focus and professionalism.
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Cover art from Leap Africa
