By When Do You Need This Done? Discovering Knowledge Workers' Time Management Practices

摘要

This research investigates knowledge workers' individual time management practices. At an academic institution in the United States, a set of in-depth semi-structured interviews was conducted to explore how individual knowledge workers manage their time demands and respond to the temporal norms and boundaries designed by their organizations. This research extends and applies taxonomies used for knowledge management to time management. Based on the qualitative analysis, a variety of approaches to managing time were identified. Personal time management practices mainly involve individual and organizational constraints that guide the perception of time and the allocation of resources around deadlines, distinguishing between work and family contexts. Moreover, the research shows that knowledge workers focus on conditional knowledge of time (i.e., understanding when the deadlines are), and pragmatic knowledge (i.e., finding out appropriate strategies for achieving time management goals). Study limitations and future research opportunities are also discussed.