A number of years ago, I was working for a telecommunications company. At the time, we were a leading e-commerce organisation, and it was a pretty exciting, high-tech environment.
Each morning when I would arrive at the office, I would hit the ‘on’ switch of my computer and then go and make a cup of tea. Typically, I would return to my desk in time to see the booting-up sequence finishing. I'd then enter my password, and have time to check my voicemail and say hello to colleagues before accessing my email.
I reckon this all took around 10 minutes. Could you imagine waiting that long now for a computer to start up? The Mac I'm using to write this book takes less than a minute to be up and good to go, and sometimes I still find myself tapping my fingernails on the desk with impatience.
Our relationship with time has undergone a drastic change in recent years. With the growth of technology and the increasing pace of life, we have become more and more impatient and intolerant of delays. What used to be considered a reasonable wait time has now been reduced to a matter of minutes, if not seconds.
In the past, waiting in line for a meal at a restaurant or for a movie ticket was commonplace. We were content to spend half an hour or more in line, engaging in conversation or simply enjoying the atmosphere.
Today fast-food chains and online ticketing mean that waiting for even a few minutes can seem like an eternity. We have become accustomed to instant gratification, and anything less than that seems unacceptable.
I believe ChatGPT and AI are going to elevate our expectations of speed to a whole other level. Now, instead of taking an hour or two to craft a well-worded email, it can be done in minutes.
Even writing this book took a lot less time than my previous books, which could lead to impatience from my publisher and shorter deadlines in the future.
It still begs the question I asked at the beginning of this book: ‘What will you do with this time?’
Will you just fill it with more work, activities and things that mean — despite tasks that used to take hours, taking minutes — your days are even more full?
The post-pandemic era has already shown us that there are alternative models of work: working from home, working overseas and all the hybrid models in between. Now let's throw in reduced working weeks, like nine-day fortnights or four-day work weeks, and we truly have a tool that can help us get things done quicker, allowing us that extra day of leisure.
This is why we need to consider this a revolution of how we work. Don't miss the opportunity to take back time to spend more wisely. Don't let this be yet another tool that helps you fill your day with even more meetings.
Use it to help you make time for the people, things and activities that are most important to you.