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Professional Development
  • Posted by Jason Hensel at
    12:00AM 07/20/2012 • 1 Comments

    Volunteering Increases Your Sense of Having More Time

    Every time I come across a story about time, the song "Time Is On My Side" pops into my head. The sense of having control of your own time and not letting someone else dictate it is one of the reasons I like that song. Nevertheless, many people think they don't control time. If you're one of those people who suffer from time famine, there's something positive you can do to combat the negative sense of time. According to a new study, volunteering your limited time—giving it away— may actually increase your sense of unhurried leisure.

    Across four different experiments, researchers found that people’s subjective sense of having time, called "time affluence," can be increased. Compared with wasting time, spending time on oneself and even gaining a windfall of free time, spending time on others increased participants’ feelings of time affluence.

    Lead researcher and psychological scientist Cassie Mogilner of The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania believes this is because giving away time boosts one’s sense of personal competence and efficiency, and this in turn stretches out time in our minds. Ultimately, giving time makes people more willing to commit to future engagements despite their busy schedules.

    Furthermore, psychological scientists Melanie Rudd and Jennifer Aaker of Stanford University Graduate School of Business and Kathleen Vohs of the University of Minnesota Carlson School of Management devised a way to study the feeling of awe in the laboratory. Across three different experiments, they found that jaw-dropping moments made participants feel like they had more time available and made them more patient, less materialistic and more willing to volunteer time to help others.

    The researchers found that the effects that awe has on decision-making and well-being can be explained by awe's ability to actually change our subjective experience of time by slowing it down. Experiences of awe help to brings us into the present moment which, in turn, adjusts our perception of time, influences our decisions and makes life feel more satisfying than it would otherwise.

    This research conducted by Mogilner—and co-authors Zoe Chance of the Yale School of Management and Michael Norton of Harvard Business School—is forthcoming in Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science.

    BONUS: "Time Is On My Side" by The Rolling Stones

    (Story materials by the Association for Psychological Science.)



  • Posted by Marj Atkinson at
    12:00AM 05/19/2011 • 0 Comments

    10 Ways to Find More Time

    No, there is not a magic potion to add more hours to a day, but here are some good suggestions by blogger Dawn Foster on how to better manage the time you do have in your schedule. We may have seen a lot of these before, but they're good reminders. Unfortunately "decline meetings" is number one on her list. Not to say meetings are not important! But she has a point—maybe decline the ones you may not be an important contributor to. 

    I was pleased to find I employ a lot of these strategies already. Getting into work over an hour before the majority of my colleagues is one of the ways I have quiet moments at the beginning of every day to focus on things. What would you add to this list? 



  • Posted by Jason Hensel at
    12:00AM 05/16/2011 • 0 Comments

    Easy Timezone Management

    WorldTimeBuddy.com is a life savior for anyone booking meetings around the world. Its simple, one-page design makes it easy to see what time it is in another city. Just type in a destination to add it to the chart, and then pick a time that's good for everyone. Seriously, it doesn't get much simpler than this, and that's a good thing. 



  • Posted by Michael Pinchera at
    12:00AM 02/25/2011 • 2 Comments

    Case for Ignoring E-mails

    Is the demand of e-mail getting uncomfortable? Would you ever consider willfully ignoring some e-mail because of this growing demand? How about setting an auto-reply such as the following?

    Due to the volume of email I receive, I no longer personally review every message. If you are interested in learning more about why I have decided to set limits on my email time, you can read this [link to this blog post or one you draft yourself]. If you do not receive a further reply within 72 hours, please assume that I have had to focus on other professional or personal priorities at this time. Thank you in advance for your understanding.

    That's just what Alexandra Samuel has done (see her HBR post about the rationale).

    A stunning practice for sure...take a look at the comments!

    One takes on vacation out-of-office auto-replies: "Sorry, but I'm on vacation until xx/xx/xxxx. When I get back, I'll delete all the flood of email that arrived while I was gone, so if this note is important, please send it to me again after that date. Thanks..."

    To this, Samuel responded that the "I'm out of the office but will read your e-mail when I return" auto-reply is actually "the undoing of the psychological benefits of a vacation!"

    Of course, there's also the perception, if you don't respond to an e-mail, that the communication (or dare say, even the relationship) is not of interest or of little value to you. While that may be the case sometimes, Samuel makes note that with e-mail, senders are pushing demands of communication onto the recipient. Send an e-mail and you're demanding the receiver spend some of his or her valuable time dealing with it. The problem is, e-mails are so easy to send that people are increasingly throwing tasks and to-dos around to others with little thought of the consequences upon the communications overload of the recipient.

    Certainly few PlusPoint readers will engage in such an extreme e-mail ignoring campaign (I'm guessing), but what do you think about the practice in general? Do you think it would help you?



  • Posted by Theresa Davis at
    12:00AM 01/04/2011 • 0 Comments

    Time is money

    Time is money. That phrase has been rattling around in my brain the past few weeks as we at MPI prepared to welcome in the New Year. My team and I are striving to work more efficiently and effectively with an eye on a number of business objectives.  And I keep hearing "Time is money" in the back of my mind.  And in all honesty I've shouted it down the hall to some tardy meeting guests (all in good humour of course).

    The thing is, that phrase is as true now as it was when Benjamin Franklin penned it more than 200 years ago. And if anyone knew the value of a critical moment in time, the man who was inventor, author, politician, satirist, diplomat, civic activist and statesman would. And come to think of it, he was kind of a meeting planner wasn’t he? You know what I’m referring to – those little meetings in Philadelphia back in the 1700s.

    OK, so at MPI we aren’t contributing to the Age of American Enlightenment, but we are working to develop initiatives like the WEC Hosted Buyer Program that contribute to the development of enlightening business solutions for our members.

    Any time management seminar can help you save time (and I should know, I’m kind of addicted to them), but I’ve learnEd that the right hosted buyer program leverages the time you do have to conduct business to its fullest, richest potential. It's about getting back to that efficiency and effectiveness I mentioned earlier.

    Meaghan, Bridget and the team here developing the WEC Hosted Buyer Program are creating a program that can do just that for you. By vetting qualified planners and matching them to exceptional suppliers, business gets done quickly and effectively. Pre-conference communication prepares you for one-on-one face time that cuts through the chit chat and gets right down to what matters—Business. Done.

    We’d love to hear from hosted buyer participants out there who have either done an MPI program or perhaps something like IMEX, and hear how you’ve leveraged your time in a hosted buyer program into either saving you time and money (or heck, making you money in some cases).

    How have you best prepared to take old Ben’s sentiment and turn it into better business?



  • Posted by Blair Potter at
    12:00AM 01/03/2011 • 0 Comments

    What Just Happened?

    Ever leave the office feeling like your mind is blank, or just numb? Don't.

    Author Peter Bregman of the Harvard Business Review says organizations should teach people how to learn--how to look at past behavior, figure out what worked and repeat it while admitting honestly what didn't and change it, helping to create life-long learners and learning organizations. 

    He says this reflection requires confidence, openness and letting go of defenses--but not much time, just a brief pause (perhaps five minutes) at the end of the day to consider what worked and what didn't.

    Bregman says that before you leave the office, spare a few minutes to look at your calendar and compare what actually happened--meetings attended, work completed, conversations had, even breaks taken--with your plan at the day's outset. Then ask yourself these sets of questions, which are invaluable for maintaining and growing relationships: 

    • How did the day go? What success did I experience? What challenges did I endure?
    • What did I learn today about myself? About others? What do I plan to do--differently or the same--tomorrow?
    • Who did I interact with? Anyone I need to update? Thank? Ask a question? Share feedback?


  • Posted by Jason Hensel at
    12:00AM 10/07/2010 • 4 Comments

    Take Back Your Time

    The meeting and event industry is primarily concerned with mid- to large-scale functions. Rarely do you see a CMP booking a meeting between two people in an office. But a lot of the time, when I mention that I cover the meetings industry, I'm met with disdain—"I hate meetings!" It's safe to say that when someone says she hates meetings, she means small meetings. 

    I kind of hate those, too. 

    Mike Monteiro at Mule Design knows why these types of meetings are hated—it's the way we're using our calendars. 

    "In my experience, most people don’t schedule their work," Monteiro wrote. "They schedule the interruptions that prevent their work from happening. In the case of a business like ours, what clients pay us to make and do happens in the cracks between meetings, or worse, after business hours.

    "I’ve yet to see a résumé—and I hope I never do— that lists 'attends meetings well' as a skill," he continued. "Yet attending meetings ends up being a key component of many jobs."

    Monteiro suggests scheduling your work on your calendar. 

    "People rarely schedule working time," he wrote. "And when they do it’s viewed as second-tier time. It’s interruptible. Meetings trump working time. Why? And why so often are the same people who assign deadlines the same ones reassigning all of your time? Crazymaking. They should be securing work time for you and protecting it fiercely."

    I agree with him that we should stop letting other people control our time and that we need a goal-oriented calendar. Read his blog entry for more on taking back your time.