Time by Design

Time by Design Synopsis

How effective individuals, teams, and organizations routinely communicate slow to go fast, and how time as a feature of human experience can actually be designed. Speed in collective action, like teamwork or organizing, is never simply a time-based issue. While conventional theory relies on time-based interventions to achieve speed, this approach typically fails.

In Time by Design, Dawna Ballard shows how speed is actually a function of the relationship between time and communication, or chronemics. Ballard identifies two communication design logics-fast and slow-that reflect contrasting beliefs about how communication works to support urgent, time-sensitive work demands. Fast communication design logics are linear, short-term in orientation, and treat time in interaction as transactional.

Slow communication design logics are nonlinear, long-term in orientation, and treat time in interaction as transcendent. Given these distinct approaches, the book offers a practical toolkit that shows the reader how the two chronemic designs can be used in complementary fashion-and how effective teams, communities, and organizations routinely communicate slow to go fast.