I hate being late. My palms sweat and my heart races, even when there isn’t a train to miss.

I was a bit late to an online informal networking session as part of the IAF England & Wales Annual Conference in October. And when I arrived, the facilitators who were already hanging out there were discussing... lateness. I was greeted with a good humoured ‘there’s always one!’.

And this sparked some thinking about lateness – who owns it, who’s responsible for responding to it, what does it mean?

Assumptions about ‘start times’

When I work with new clients to design events, I often ask what their organisation assumes about start times. If a meeting is scheduled to start at 11.00, what time should I expect people to arrive? The answers vary wildly.

What’s the problem when someone arrives ‘late’?

The facilitators who were discussing this were focused on the impact of missing the agreement of ground rules or the briefing of an exercise, as well as the impact on a group which has already begun to form. Does the facilitator need to repeat parts of the process to accommodate the late arrival? Would this irritate other group members, or be a poor use of time? Can someone else brief them? Should the late comer even be admitted? How might any of this be interpreted by the group, as an example of how seriously they should take time during the rest of the session?

If there’s a contradiction between the needs of the group and of the latecomer, where should the facilitator find the balance? How long after the official start time will you leave it, for latecomers to arrive? Will you interrupt the group’s conversation or pause the agenda to welcome and brief the new arrival?

In online meetings, where various roles may be split between a hosting and facilitator team, who takes this call? What if the team members disagree?

How do you respond to lateness?

Do you want to experiment with responding in another way? As a:

person who is late
facilitator
support facilitator or event team member
participant who is already there

Over the years I’ve grown in compassion for people who arrive late to meetings I’m running. I am also working on being more compassionate towards myself, when I am late.

Some practical tips

Make it clear in pre-event materials if there is an ‘arrival’ time and a ‘start’ time. Check and double check time zone information, especially at the time of year when the clocks change. Websites like Time and Date can help.
Agree as a team how you would like to respond to lateness, including someone having the role of briefing latecomers (if you decide to admit them).
If you suspect someone will be arriving late (they’ve let you know, or they’re on the list but haven’t arrived yet), signal to the group how intend to treat them: “I know one or two people are still to join us. Let’s welcome them and bring them up to speed when they get here.”
For online meetings, have the ‘brief’ or questions ready to paste into the chat again (often people can only see the chat which has been posted since they arrived). If a virtual whiteboard is being used, have them repeated there.

Making the Path by Walking

This post was first published in my newsletter, in October 2020. Scroll right down to subscribe.