Dedicated to those who are disrespectful of other people's time

I may be anal about punctuality, but I’m taught this by my mentor:

"Always give priority to those who gives you priority.”

What it essentially means is if someone do not respect your time, then don’t give them as much attention as you would to another who is respectful.

And I take that as common sense too, because if the other party do not take your time seriously, do you think you should be forgiving, wait for them, and let them push your schedules around?

Over the years, I’ve worked closely with the startup communities here in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, partly because of my work at KICKSTART.MY. And I have to say, I’ve never felt more disrespectful of my time than with those in this community.

Here are 4 separate incidents that truly left a bad taste.

#1. Casual meet up

Meet up was agreed to happen at 2pm, at a Starbucks. Meeting was initiated by the other party too. I went a little early to my meeting and had some work done as I wait. 2pm came, then 2.30pm. I dropped a text, and went back to work. Before I knew it, it was already 5pm. The guy didn’t text me back until 11plus at night. Excuse? Phone died. We never had that meet up. Best part, it had a very casual apology too. #casual

#2. Casual meet up too

This is with a local government agency located far out from the city. We were chatting a bit about collaborations, and though it was very rarely, I happened to be around her workplace, which is a good 40 minutes drive away (on a very good day). We agreed to meet at 7pm at a restaurant near by. As usual, I was there to work early. No show until 9.30pm, with messages in between. Funny thing was, despite being just 5 minutes drive away, her constant reply was that she’s leaving, or on-the-way, or see you soon. We never met that night too. Best part, no apologies.

Apparently I found out some time later one of my community partners had the same issue with a couple of staffs from the same agency. Luckily for her, they were only 25 minutes late. Spirited as she is, she met them for 5 minutes, and left because the meeting was supposedly for 30 minutes only. #burned

#3. Skype Call(s)

This meeting was initiated by me, as I was interested in her startup. As she was in the marketing-tech space, and I was in marketing in general, I was keen to know more about her solution, so we arranged for a Skype call at 2pm. At 3.30pm, she dropped me a message (yes, after 90 minutes of silence), saying her meeting ran late, and couldn’t make the Skype call. She was apologetic, and wanted to contact me again after the meeting to arrange another Skype call. She never did.

#4. Free consultation

So I do psychometric assessments from time to time for my client, and a new JV partner I was testing out asked if I could do a free one for her. Normally my charges are at RM500 per assessment, but since she was kind enough to give me a speaking slot (at a paid event), I decided to extend her a complimentary assessment.

Assessment was done, but she asked me to meet her at a part of city that I do not frequent, nor did I enjoyed going because it has bad traffic flow. So we agreed to meet another time when she was around my area.

My thought? The assessment was already free, and for me to drive over to debrief her for free, that’s a lot of non-paid work.

Come morning of the debriefing session (we were supposed to meet at 2pm), from past experiences, I decided to drop her a text to confirm the meeting. She said she was busy and asked for a reschedule later in the evening, which clashes with my personal time. I told her we will meet another time, but I couldn’t help but think, if I hadn’t confirmed with her earlier in the morning, would she informed me on her own?

These are just four major ones I remembered well, mainly because I thought it was unprofessional, disrespectful and distasteful even. Of course, with KL city traffic, I am generally fine with others who are a few minutes, or even up to 20 minutes late, regardless of who asked for the meeting. Clients get special treatment, of course, since they are paying customers. It’s those free ones, especially those initiated by the other party, that I’m more particular with.

Well, I guess they just don’t value time as much as I do. That’s comforting to know. Or try to avoid 2pm meetings, since it's like a common denominator here...

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