When: The Scientific Secrets of Perfect Timing

by Daniel H. Pink

Each group first went through a phase of prolonged inertia. The teammates got to know one another, but they didn’t accomplish much. They talked about ideas but didn’t move forward. The clock ticked. The days passed. Then came a sudden transition. “In a concentrated burst of changes, groups dropped old patterns, reengaged with outside supervisors, adopted new perspectives on their work, and made dramatic progress,” Gersick found. After the initial inert phase, they entered a new heads-down, locked-in phase that executed the plan and hurtled toward the deadline. But even more interesting than the burst itself was when it arrived. No matter how much time the various teams were allotted, “each group experienced its transition at the same point in its calendar—precisely halfway between its first meeting and its official deadline.”