THE POSITIVE EFFECTS OF PROCRASTINATION

"When you have to climb a mountain, do not think that waiting will get smaller"

To begin this analysis, I will begin by defining the term procrastination. It comes from the Latin procrastinare. It is the action or habit of postponing activities or situations that should be addressed, replacing them with other more irrelevant or pleasant situations.

From the definition, you can easily conclude the negative aspects of this practice in the development of activities that are part of a strategy whether it is work, business, academic or personal.

These have to do with the difficulty in implementation, delays incurred because of postponing activities, higher costs, loss of productivity; or simply the abandonment of a project because of these difficulties inherent in procrastination.

Normally, this behavior happens when the person does not like the work that he is going to develop, because he does not know how to solve the issue properly, because he lacks time, does not know if he really wants to do what was proposed; or just need a little more time to reflect.

To define the positive aspects of procrastination it is important to ask ourselves some questions, such as, for example, the person who is requesting a specific activity has as much urgency as the one who is demonstrating, or just wants to have everything under his control and will finish reviewing the result of the activity one or two weeks later, or simply the request obeyed a whim that ends up filed and later discarded.

I will mention some cases that allow us to understand when procrastination is justifiable and productive:

You have more important tasks that generate more value and for this reason you want to dedicate the best, most productive hours. In this case, it is justified to postpone less important tasks or that do not need so much of your energy and concentration, it is to prioritize according to the importance and urgency of each activity, which will help you to plan your work.

More time is needed to organize the ideas and understand what we want to do and what would be the best way to do it. This is rigor in the execution, is analyzing what is in front and not doing it because you have to comply, in this case it would generate more value with an additional analysis that would allow us not only to do it but to do it very well.

It needs more quantity of elements, data, needs, expectations, objectives, context; among others to make a better decision. It is not necessary to arrive at the excess of analysis, but if to have the greater number of elements that allow us to make the most correct decision, this would take more time, but it would generate more value.

I'm exhausted, I need a period of rest, relax allows me to see things more clearly. Organizations do not look for heroes, or professionals who are in front of their computers or in the workplace for prolonged periods of time, this could be very unproductive. The best thing is to take it easy, stop along the way, clear your mind and rest your body, surely after the rest exercise, your mind and your ideas will flow much better and again it will generate much more value for the organization.

When you are going to give up on a project, idea or venture, leaving it for tomorrow can be very convenient, it is possible that you are so close to achieving it, that one more day will make the difference between success and failure.

When I review the results of the 2017 Global Productivity report, prepared by the firm How Much based on the Expert Market study of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the Organization for Cooperation and Development (OECD), it is concluded that not by much work Higher productivity or a higher Gross Domestic Product (GDP) is achieved. In Colombia, we work more hours per week, but we are less productive than other countries.

In the end, putting so much pressure on the completion of tasks, harshly criticizing the people who know how to manage their life - work balance, what we get are very stressed organizations that end up being unproductive and that sacrifice quality and the generation of value for an excess of urgency that does not lead to positive results in the professional practice within the companies.

Postponing tasks is not always the most convenient, however, there are cases and there are few where procrastinating can be an important generator of value and lead a culture of innovation within organizations.

Oscar Javier Jiménez Yepes

MBA Javeriana University

Twitter: @ Inntegrity8

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Blog: http://actualidadnoticiasdeinteres.blogspot.com

Mail: jimenez.oscar@javeriana.edu.co