When: The Scientific Secrets of Perfect Timing

by Daniel H. Pink

“Perhaps the main conclusion to be drawn from studies on the effects of time of day on performance,” says British psychologist Simon Folkard, “is that the best time to perform a particular task depends on the nature of that task.” The Linda problem is an analytic task. It’s tricky, to be sure. But it doesn’t require any special creativity or acumen. It has a single correct answer—and you can reach it via logic. Ample evidence has shown that adults perform best on this sort of thinking during the mornings. When we wake up, our body temperature slowly rises. That rising temperature gradually boosts our energy level and alertness—and that, in turn, enhances our executive functioning, our ability to concentrate, and our powers of deduction. For most of us, those sharp-minded analytic capacities peak in the late morning or around noon.17

This is why I now do all my writing in the morning – turning off email and not bringing my phone into the office. At the moment a human being sits down to write, the entire universe begins conspiring for ways to distract him or her. That’s why it’s crucial to write when my vigilance is a highest – which, for me, is before noon.