I see this occurring from time to time:
- „Let’s wait for 5 minutes, until everybody arrives”. An event where 90% of the people are present, but we wait for the remaining 10%.
- Or, if it is a conference with a clear deadline for paper submissions, why not wait until the last moment to announce the participants who successfully followed the rules?
- Or an event organizer announcing a conference a few days (sometimes a few hours, even) before the start.
Problems:
- If you say you start at 17, and you start at 17:05, you punish those who are on time. What’s the likely behavior of those people? They will arrive at 17:05 next time, because they will know 17:05 is the actual starting time.
- You don’t follow the rules you set for yourself for the conference.
- You satisfy those who make plans at the last moment, at the expense of those who plan long ahead.
A better solution?
- If you can’t keep a promise to start at 17, instead of 17:05, start at 17:05 right from the announcement. Or announce the event to start not at 18:00 or 19:00, but at 18:23. And keep your promise.
- Follow the deadline for the conference. And announce the list of successful paper submissions as early as possible, not one day prior to the event, and of course, not in the evening prior to the event, also.
- Announce the event long before the actual start. Follow up a few days prior to the event.
In my opinion, it helps people to have plans. Can’t plan two weeks again? Perhaps you are not busy enough with the important things.
