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Some recently published books focus on time-based competition, including *Fast
Cycle Time* by Christopher Meyer and *Real Time* by Regis McKenna. These books
discuss the importance of continually decreasing organizational cycle times.
According to McKenna, “Faster is no longer enough. The search for the
instantaneous and simultaneous has become the 1990s equivalent of the quest
for the Holy Grail.” (p. 1)

Meyer points out that “The measurement systems of most corporations are better
equipped to serve the needs of Wall Street . . . than they are those who run
the business. . . . Imagine what it would be like driving a car if the
speedometer indicated how fast you were going ninety days ago.” (p. 49) Cycle
time offers management and employees alike a more fundamental, ‘bottom-line’
means for continuous improvement no matter what the business process being
measured: Is anything more continuously available than time?

Although these books highlight the importance of challenging time limits, they
don’t challenge the confusing Western identification of objective, physical
time and psychological time: in other words, they do not distinguish outer
speed from inner speed. For example, McKenna defines *real time* as “our
sense of ultracompressed time,” which has a strong component of psychological
time, and yet he devotes almost all of his book to a discussion of shortening
clock time cycles.

Perhaps the worst consequence of this confusion is that no significant
opportunity is seen for decreasing our *personal processing times.* We’re
fascinated, even obsessed, with ways to do things faster, but we focus on
technology and external speed, almost never on ways to improve internal
speeds. These days we talk about “managing knowledge,” but we do it solely
from outside, not seeing the possibility of changing the speed with which an
individual processes information. Imagine when driving that you could be
aware of your environs five times per second rather than once. Wouldn’t you
be much more relaxed and in control?

As Stephan Rechtschaffen points out in *Timeshifting*, unless we learn to
shift our inner speeds, we will probably get more stressed out as time
continues to accelerate. And if we truly wish to shorten external process
cycles, we need to take into account the fact that all such opportunity is
limited by our ability to perceive it: Any process--work or otherwise--is
known only through our experience, which in turn is always limited by our
individual and personal processing time.

I've written an article which is based on twenty-one years of research on
*time*, and which (1) distinguishes clock time from psychological or personal
time (how frequently you know what’s around you when you’re driving, e.g.),
(2) brings a larger, more comprehensive system into view by balancing the
emphasis on technology and objective time with an exploration of how we can
change our *experience* of time, and (3) opens up new levels of performance
and well-being. Clarifying these matters is important because our obsession
with external speed obscures what can be learned about psychological time, and
because learning is “the only truly inexhaustible source of competitive
advantage.” (Meyer, p. 23)

If you want to look at the article I wrote, go to
http://members.aol.com/rslts, and then under "Hot New Resources," click on
"Beat the Clock by Changing Your Personal Time."

Best wishes,
Steve Randall, Ph.D. - Results in No Time - email: stevrandal@aol.com
Time Management Supersite: http://members.aol.com/rslts
Site includes complete time management courses and resource directory
land: 1124 Ballena Boulevard, Suite 5, Alameda CA 94501
phone & fax: 510-749-9931 tollfree 800-845-8484