Allen Bluedorn University of Missouri The Human Organization of Time, Part 1: Polychronicity Friday,

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Allen BluedornUniversity of MissouriThe Human
Organization of Time, Part 1 PolychronicityFrid
ay, Oct.29th, 1-230pm, E52-598
The OSG Seminar welcomes

• ABSTRACTThe perspective that time and times are
  social constructions generates a fundamental
  question What times do people construct? A
  fundamental answer is that they construct them to
  emphasize a greater or lesser degree of
  polychronicity. Poly-chronicity is the extent to
  which people prefer to do two or more things
  simultaneously (more on this at the seminar), and
  it was developed in the late 1950s as a way to
  describe both cultural and individual differences
  by anthropologist Edward Hall. However, aside
  from Hall few investigators studied
  polychronicity until the later 1980s. Since then
  an increasing amount of attention has been paid
  to this variable, both by me and by others.
  What has been learned from this increased
  attention will be the major focus of this
  seminar, in which we shall discuss
  polychronicity's conceptualization and
  measurement its manifestation as both a cultural
  and indi-vidual difference pattern and its
  relationship with other variables, including
  punctuality, planning, space, creativity, and
  organiza-tional attractiveness, commitment, and
  change. Results obtained by other researchers as
  well as from several of my own polychron-icity
  studies will inform the discussion. And as we
  discuss results from data I collected this summer
  from a sample of top executives from 193 randomly
  selected American companies, we will see that as
  important and fundamental as polychronicity is,
  there is more than one important temporal
  variable.
• For more on Prof. Bluedorn and a full schedule of
  OSG Seminars,
• visit http//web.mit.edu/sloan/osg-seminar/index.h
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