If there is one thing that can bring workers from all kinds of industries together, it’s the experience of surviving a compressed project timeline. It is inevitable at some point that you will get stuck between a rock and a hard place, having to get something across the finish line in less time than you would prefer. But there can be benefits to aggressive timelines that we want to (reluctantly) showcase.
It’s All Your Fault, Parkinson
“Work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion.”
British naval historian Cyril Northcote Parkinson wrote this in a satirical essay in The Economist back in 1955. While he’d intended it as a specific critique on government administration and bureaucratic efficiency, it rang true across the business world, leading to Parkinson writing a book, Parkinson’s Law: Or the Pursuit of Progress, two years later.
Essentially, Parkinson’s Law explains how a task tends to take up the entirety of the time allotted to it, even if it can be completed in less. The why behind this behavior is a little murkier, but it’s been attributed to our tendency to estimate how much time is available instead of how much time we actually need, procrastinate and delay starting, and perceived obligation to use all the time we’ve been given.
Now to be perfectly clear: Parkinson’s Law isn’t a tested, scientific principle, but it does line up really well with a lot of human nature. And it’s a good argument for why we don’t just need hard deadlines, but why more aggressive timelines—however much they might be disliked—can be beneficial.
Want to stay up to date with the news and resources from EdwardsSchoen?
Sign up for our monthly newsletter to stay in the know!
Reasons Why You Might Want to Get More Aggressive
Listen, no one wants to admit it out loud, but we’ve all probably been in the position where, up against an aggressive deadline, we’ve accomplished a lot more than we thought we could. We’ve risen to the occasion, pushed our output, and surprised even ourselves.
Research suggests that a tight timeline can:
- Increase focus and motivation, both for individuals and the overall team
- Encourage teamwork and relationship-building as people bond together toward a common goal
- Promote efficiency and productivity, reducing the amount of time that is wasted and potentially even finishing early
- Encourage creative problem-solving skills as less time requires people to come up with innovative, outside-the-box solutions
- Build confidence and capacity as everyone discovers just what they’re capable of
Now, this isn’t an endorsement to just start throwing compressed timelines at every project because it can blow up with serious negative consequences without the right foundation. And it should be used strategically so you don’t end up with teams of people suffering from burnout.
Before setting an aggressive deadline:
- Make sure you have the right team — The wrong skillsets, clashing personalities, no one willing to lead — any one of these personnel issues on a team can spell disaster for a project before it even starts. The team members on a project like this need to be able to work cohesively and with a positive attitude.
- Break down the project into clear tasks and goals — Looking at a whole project can be daunting, which is why it’s so important to divide it into smaller responsibilities. Each person involved can then focus on the specific tasks they need to handle instead of getting overwhelmed.
- Create a detailed strategic plan — Once you have the project broken down, each piece needs to be arranged along the compressed timeline as needed in order to hit the deadline. This means clearly understanding which parts will be happening concurrently, which rely on something else getting done, and what the ripple effects will be if checkpoints aren’t reached on time.
- Shorten or reduce meetings — Anyone working on a tight turnaround doesn’t want to waste time sitting in a meeting when they could be completing objectives. Those employees need to be able to clear their schedules as much as possible until the project is done.
- Maintain open and honest communication and continuous check-ins — Everyone needs to be encouraged and able to communicate without anxiety. Having someone tasked with consistently checking in with each team member, seeing how they’re doing and what they might need, enables an efficient, productive environment.
Like Nike Says: Just Do It
We have a long-standing, love-hate relationship with compressed timelines and tight turnarounds on projects. As frustrating it can be to get tasked with completing something in less time than you think you need, it has also driven us to accomplish more, innovate more, and drive ourselves further.
It’s a big reason why EdwardsSchoen stays nimble, so we can deliver the results our clients are looking for on the schedule they need. Because aggressive deadlines are going to happen; it’s up to us to make the most of them.
