Part 1: Extracting the Essence

The cof­fee I make at home tastes far bet­ter than most of the cof­fees I drink in the city. Even those from top-notch roas­t­er­ies some­times don’t com­pare to mine.

This isn’t about arrogance—I’m not a supe­ri­or barista, nei­ther do I have high­er-qual­i­ty beans. And even though my espres­so machine is an excel­lent Ital­ian portafil­ter mod­el, it does­n’t quite match most pro­fes­sion­al machines. So, why does my cof­fee taste so much bet­ter? It comes down to one sim­ple rea­son: time.

I have the lux­u­ry to weigh my beans to the near­est tenth of a gram every time and grind them accord­ing to their spe­cif­ic type and roast. I can thor­ough­ly clean the portafil­ter, even­ly dis­trib­ute the cof­fee grounds, break up clumps with a spe­cial­ized tool, and care­ful­ly tamp down. I can close­ly observe the flow rate and stop the extrac­tion at the per­fect moment. Most baris­tas in roas­t­er­ies and cafes don’t have this luxury—they’re under con­stant time pres­sure, as cus­tomers don’t like wait­ing for their hot bev­er­ages. Con­se­quent­ly, they can’t work as metic­u­lous­ly as I do, and it shows in the taste.

Part 2: Blending Science and Craft

This anal­o­gy can teach us a cru­cial les­son about the world of work: time pres­sure often com­pro­mis­es qual­i­ty, cre­ativ­i­ty, and self-effi­ca­cy: when employ­ees are under con­stant pres­sure to meet tight dead­lines, the qual­i­ty of their work may suf­fer as a result.

Grinding to Perfection

In their study, «Effects of time-pres­sure on deci­sion-mak­ing under uncer­tain­ty: Changes in affec­tive state and infor­ma­tion pro­cess­ing strat­e­gy,» Maule, Hock­ey, and Bdzo­la (2000) exam­ined the impact of time pres­sure on deci­sion-mak­ing by ana­lyz­ing its effects on affec­tive states and infor­ma­tion pro­cess­ing strategies.

The researchers found that par­tic­i­pants who were required to make deci­sions under time pres­sure expe­ri­enced increased anx­i­ety and arousal. Time pres­sure led to a pri­or­i­ti­za­tion of pro­cess­ing gen­er­al infor­ma­tion about the prob­lem, sug­gest­ing that under time pres­sure, indi­vid­u­als are more like­ly to devel­op a broad under­stand­ing of the deci­sion prob­lem rather than delve into detailed infor­ma­tion about spe­cif­ic alter­na­tives and their out­comes. The study also revealed that time pres­sure can cause indi­vid­u­als to become more risk-averse when their strate­gies are not suc­cess­ful in reach­ing a deci­sion with­in the giv­en time frame.

This study sup­ports the notion that time pres­sure can impair the qual­i­ty of deci­sion-mak­ing. It demon­strates that under time pres­sure, indi­vid­u­als are more inclined to process less detailed infor­ma­tion and make more risk-averse deci­sions when their strate­gies fail to reach deci­sions with­in the allot­ted time. This find­ing high­lights the impor­tance of con­sid­er­ing the effects of time pres­sure on deci­sion-mak­ing and the poten­tial con­se­quences for work quality.

Tamping Down the Pressure

In his paper, «Deci­sion mak­ing under time pres­sure: A mod­el for infor­ma­tion sys­tems research,» Hwang (1994) focused on how time pres­sure influ­ences deci­sion-mak­ing and the role infor­ma­tion sys­tems can play in sup­port­ing deci­sions under time pres­sure. The study found that under time pres­sure, indi­vid­u­als tend to rely more on non-com­pen­sato­ry strate­gies, which are less thor­ough and less con­sci­en­tious deci­sion-mak­ing approach­es. This can lead to sub­op­ti­mal decision-making.

Fur­ther­more, time pres­sure can also cause indi­vid­u­als to feel increased stress and anx­i­ety, which can fur­ther impair their abil­i­ty to make sound deci­sions. By under­stand­ing the effects of time pres­sure on deci­sion-mak­ing and the poten­tial influ­ence of dif­fer­ent types of sup­port and infor­ma­tion pre­sen­ta­tion, we can rec­og­nize the impor­tance of pro­vid­ing employ­ees with ade­quate time and resources to make well-informed deci­sions, thus enhanc­ing the over­all qual­i­ty of their work.

Brewing Creativity

And in their research, «The Curvi­lin­ear Rela­tion Between Expe­ri­enced Cre­ative Time Pres­sure and Cre­ativ­i­ty: Mod­er­at­ing Effects of Open­ness to Expe­ri­ence and Sup­port for Cre­ativ­i­ty,» Baer and Old­ham (2006) found that there is a curvi­lin­ear rela­tion­ship between time pres­sure and cre­ativ­i­ty. Low to mod­er­ate lev­els of time pres­sure can enhance cre­ativ­i­ty, but high lev­els of time pres­sure can inhib­it it. The study also dis­cov­ered that indi­vid­ual dif­fer­ences, such as open­ness to expe­ri­ence and the sup­port pro­vid­ed for cre­ativ­i­ty, can mod­er­ate the impact of time pres­sure on cre­ative performance.

«Thus, if man­age­ment is inter­est­ed in boost­ing cre­ativ­i­ty, super­vi­sors might first iden­ti­fy the objec­tive con­di­tions that pro­duce the expe­ri­ence of cre­ative time pres­sure and alter those con­di­tions so employ­ees expe­ri­ence inter­me­di­ate pres­sure with respect to cre­ative pur­suits. Next, man­age­ment should con­sid­er assign­ing employ­ees who are open to expe­ri­ence to these con­di­tions, and encour­ag­ing super­vi­sors and cowork­ers to sup­port the cre­ative efforts of such employees.»

Part 3: Mastering the Balance

Adjusting the Grind

To mit­i­gate the neg­a­tive effects of time pres­sure, com­pa­nies can adopt strate­gies such as:

• Encour­ag­ing real­is­tic time man­age­ment and prioritization
• Imple­ment­ing flex­i­ble dead­lines when possible
• Pro­mot­ing a healthy work-life bal­ance for employees
• Pro­vid­ing train­ing and sup­port for effec­tive time management
• Imple­ment­ing infor­ma­tion sys­tems and tech­no­log­i­cal tools to sup­port deci­sion-mak­ing under time pres­sure by pre­sent­ing rel­e­vant infor­ma­tion clear­ly and accessibly

Finding the Sweet Spot

«The increase in anx­i­ety reflects an increased aware­ness of the need to work hard­er that occurs when the amount of time to make the deci­sion is less than would nor­mal­ly be taken.»

It’s impor­tant to empha­size that, much like how my cof­fee turns cold if I take too much time, a cer­tain lev­el of pres­sure is essen­tial in the work­place. Thus, find­ing the right bal­ance between time pres­sure and flex­i­bil­i­ty is cru­cial for max­i­miz­ing employ­ee pro­duc­tiv­i­ty and well-being. Baer and Old­ham show that some degree of time pres­sure can be ben­e­fi­cial, as it can increase focus, moti­va­tion, and a sense of urgency. How­ev­er, too much time pres­sure can lead to stress, burnout, and com­pro­mised work qual­i­ty. Com­pa­nies should aim to set dead­lines that are chal­leng­ing but attain­able, pro­vid­ing their employ­ees with a healthy lev­el of time pres­sure that moti­vates them to per­form at their best with­out over­whelm­ing them.

In con­clu­sion, just as the qual­i­ty of my cof­fee ben­e­fits from the care I put into mak­ing it, the qual­i­ty of work in the pro­fes­sion­al world can sim­i­lar­ly improve when employ­ees have suf­fi­cient time to com­plete their tasks. By rec­og­niz­ing the impor­tance of time and its impact on work qual­i­ty, cre­ativ­i­ty, and self-effi­ca­cy, we can cre­ate health­i­er, more pro­duc­tive work environments.

So, the next time you sip a deli­cious cup of cof­fee made with patience and pre­ci­sion, appre­ci­ate it—and remem­ber that the same prin­ci­ples apply to the work­place: give peo­ple the time they need, and you’ll taste the dif­fer­ence in the qual­i­ty of their work.