Go to the doctor in the morning and other proven timing hacks

Go to the doctor in the morning and other proven zeiteinteilung hacksGo to the doctor in the morning and other proven timing hacksOne of the worlds foremost thinkers on business and social science,Daniel Pinkis the author of several bestselling books on business, work, and behavior. He recently sat down with world-leading business thinkerWhitney Johnson, author ofBuild an A-Teamand host of theDisrupt Yurself Podcast, to discuss why when matters as much as what, how, where, and why.This conversation has been edited and condensed. To listen to Daniel and Whitneys full conversation on the Disrupt Yurself Podcast,click here.WhitneyYour new book,When The Scientific Secrets of Perfect Timing, is an absolute pleasure to read. Whats the big idea?DanielThe big idea is that we think the timing is an art. We make our timing decisions based on intuition and guesswork, but its actually very much of a science. There is this enormous body of research out there across many, many fields that allows u s to make systematically smarter, more evidenced-based decisions about when to do things. So, in this book, I try tocrack the code of good timing.WhitneyIn any given day, we have peaks and troughs. For most human beings, the peaks come in the morning, troughs in the afternoons. What are some of the implications of this?DanielWe generally move through the day in three stages a peak, a trough, and a recovery. For most of us, the peak is in the morning, the trough is in the early afternoon, and the recovery is in the late afternoon or early evening. For people who are strong night owls, its the reverse order, but the implications are significant. Time of day explains about 20% of the variance in our performance on cognitive tasks- on things that require our brain. So, this question of when is material to our performance and to our mood. It has huge implications.Lets take health. Based on this research, I would not let a loved one go to the hospital in the afternoon if that welches avoi dable. Anesthesia errors are four times more likely at 300 p.m. than at 900 a.m., for example. Looking at colonoscopies, doctors find half as many polyps in afternoon exams than in morning exams, even if its the saatkorn population. There is some great research showing that doctors, nurses, orderlies, hospital personnel are much less likely to wash their hands during the afternoon than in the morning. So, when we think about our experiences, as customers, as patients, as people doing jobs, we focus on the what, how, and who of our days, but the when of what were doing has a huge effect.The other big idea here is that we dont take these when questions seriously enough, and they have a material effect on our mood, on our well-being, on our performance, on what we learn, on healthcare delivery, on a whole range of things.WhitneyIn the book, you talk about the larger arc of our lives- the beginnings, the mid points, and the ends. You quote Cervantes and say, To be lucky at the beginning is everything. What do you mean by that? And specifically, what have been some of your good beginnings?DanielWhat the research shows is that beginnings matter more than we realize and have a greater impact over the long haul than we realize. You see this in a whole range of interactions. If you look at something like school start times for teenagers- the American Academy of Pediatricians says, Do not start school for teenagers before 830 in the morning, and yet the average school start time is 803 a.m. in the United States. Simply, the time of day of the school starts is increasing the dropout rate, increasing teenage depression, increasing obesity, and leading to more teen accidents.I found this really alarming. There is some research from Lisa Conn at Yale showing the following you take two people who graduate from the same college, have the same major, and have similar ability five years apart. One graduates in a recession, one graduates during a boom time. The person graduating in a boom time, will earn a little bit more money straight out of the gate. What is surprising is that the wage difference shows up 20 years later. Its unbelievable.WhitneyHow do you correct for that?DanielI set out three principles of beginnings start right, start again, start together. As much as possible, its important to start right. This is why you have more companies paying attention to what happens in the first week, in the first year of somebodys tenure on the job. Chip Heath and Dan Heath write a lot about taking these moments and making that beginning meaningful and useful to people so that they get off on a good trajectory.At an individual level, there are times when sometimes we need to start again. Theres some research from the University of Pennsylvania about whats called the fresh start effect, which shows that were more likely to make behavior changes on certain dates of the year rather than other dates of the year. Youre more likely to make a change on a Monday, ra ther than on a Wednesday. On the day after a Federal Holiday, rather than the day before a Federal Holiday. There are certain dates in the year that operate as temporal landmarks, and we can use them to make a fresh start.On a policy level, lets take the issue of the people graduating from college, through no fault of their own, at an inopportune time. Maybe we need to treat recessions akin to how we treat natural disasters. Theres an earthquake, youre going to get some help because through no fault of your own, the ground erupted underneath you and destroyed your property. Were going to help you out. Your neighbors are going to help you, the public authorities are going to help you. Maybe we need to do something like, if the unemployment rate hits a certain level for that year or for that certain period of time, peoples student loans are forgiven, or theyre reduced.Whitney Before we move on from beginnings, do you have a single tip that you would give to people to either get off to a good start or actually, more importantly, starting again?Daniel Pick the right date. Not all dates are created equal. If you have dates that are personally meaningful, that can be great. So, if you want to start a behavior change of some kind, lets sayWhitney For me, its to stop eating sugar.Daniel I would begin the new regime on a day that has some special meaning to you. Maybe the day after your birthday or the day after your anniversary, the day after one of your kids birthdays or something like that.WhitneyLets go to midpoints. What do we need to know about these? In particular, could you talk about the Uh-Oh effect?DanielSometimes midpoints bring us down, sometimes they fire us up. Theres some great research from Connie Gersick at UCLA and Yale where she followed these teams around and recorded what these teams did. These are teams who are coming up with a new advertising campaign or rolling out a new product for a bank or you know, just the basic stuff that goes on in the w orkplace. She found something really peculiar. We have this notion that theres this fairly steady linear process by which teams do their work. What she found is that it didnt work that way at all. Teams begin by doing very, very little, mostly posturing and status-seeking. But there was a moment when they started really working in earnest, which came at the midpoint.So, you give a team 34 days to do something and they get started in earnest on day 17. You give a team 11 days to do something, they get started in earnest on day 6. That midpoint had this galvanizing effect- it had this Uh-Oh effect. People look at the calendar and they say, Whoa We we wasted half of our time. We better get going Its just eerie how often it happened. She created experiments where she would give teams an hour to do something. And they would really get started in earnest between the 29th and 31st minute. That is something really useful for bosses and project leaders to know how projects really unfold. The y can make these midpoints salient, and use it to get people to move.WhitneyNow, you talk in midpoints about a U-curve of happiness, a midlife slump, an American male slump at an estimated 52.9 years. By my calculations, you are right about at 52.9 years.DanielIndeed.WhitneyHow have you noticed that for you? What has that midlife slump looked like for you? And, excitingly, if publishingWhenis your slump, then what do we have ahead?DanielYou know, I actually have felt that slump on a couple of different dimensions. Ive been doing what Ive been doing now for 20 years, and in the course of writing this book, I was like, Hey, this is my last book. I cant do this anymore. I cant take it anymore. This is really hard. If you were to chart my overall well-being, it wouldnt surprise me at all if Im lower than at other points in my life. Its not a big dip for me though- the U is fairly flat.WhitneyBut its a slump nonethelessDanielI think it is. I wish I wouldve tested that. That analytical pa rt of me wishes I wouldve tested that, basically taken a mood reading twice every year for my whole life and see where I was today.People my age typically have parents who are getting older, and kids you need to assist in making their way into the world. Theres no question that there are certain disappointments that you have when you get to my age. The odds of my being on a 40 Under 40 list are pretty much nil. My odds of winning a Pulitzer Prize are almost nil. I think we have to reckon with those kinds of things. The good news though, Whitney, as you say, is that things begin to tick up a little bit.Whitney Do you have one or two suggestions for people to effectively combat that midlife slump?Daniel One of the meta takeaways of this book is just simply being aware of some of these phenomena. For instance, midpoints were basically invisible to me. Its something that I never even thought of. And now, Im like Oh, okay. This is a midpoint of a project. Now, I understand that midpoints have these kinds of effects, and so Im going to be aware of these things and make sure that they dont bring me down too much.Warren Buffett has this great technique that I think can combat a midlife slump. He asks, What are your 25 goals? What are the 25 things you want to achieve? Heres where it gets interesting You look at that list, and you cross out number six through 25 and focus only on those five. So, I have begun doing that exercise, and I find it very clarifying. In focusing and really being intentional about the things that matter most, that creates the most meaning. Thats who you really are.Whitney Whats a goal thats in your top five?Daniel I have alway wanted to make a movie. Not like Star Wars, but a documentary.WhitneySo, are you going to do it?DanielI think Im going to try to do it.WhitneyThat is fantastic. Im so excited for your documentary.DanielNow, I have to do it WhitneyWhitneyThats right. Isnt that wonderful? So its fascinating that you said that, because one o f the things that you wrote about endings is, The most powerful endings deliver poignancy because poignancy delivers significance. Adding a small component of sadness to an otherwise happy moment elevates that moment rather than diminishes it. When I read that, I thought, Oh, thats why I liked the filmLa La Landso much, because it had that modul of poignancy.DanielEndings have some really, really incredible effects on our perception, our behavior, and our mood. One of the things that endings seem to do in many cases is triggera search for meaning. And poignancy is, I think, a really under-studied emotion, but profoundly meaningful and profoundly human. You see this at graduations. I happen to love the ritual of graduations, the Pomp and Circumstance - I find them poignant. Its exciting because someone has achieved something, theyre moving onto a new stage of their life, but theyre also leaving something behind.That mix of happy and sad creates a sense of meaning. Life is about thes e passages. Life is about somebody you love making their way through life and entering a new chapter where you are a peripheral character.WhitneySo what are some tips or suggestions for our listeners to have better endings?DanielBe intentional- recognize that endings are a thing. All of this comes back to this idea that we need to be aware of the temporal aspects of our life and not just dismiss it as something thats not important or something that we cant have a role in shaping.Endings are a source of meaning. So, you should use endings as meaning makers. People prefer endings that elevate, they prefer rising sequences to declining sequences. This is one reason why if you have good news and bad news, you should always give the bad news first and end with the good news.This is true for more mundane things. Like the end of customer experiences are really, really important, and I dont think a lot of businesses are intentional enough about that. Endings disproportionately affect how we remember entire experiences. Most important of all, be aware that endings are going to be a huge part of how someone remembers an encounter with you, how someone remembers a transaction with your business, how someone remembers a talk that you gave. Endings stick with us for a very, very long time.This article was originally published on Heleo.com.