Ask Lemmy

When I served in the military, my first supervisor taught me a valuable lesson: "15 minutes early, or you're late." I actually got in trouble with her if I was less than 15 minutes early to any meeting, appointment, or event.

Or even arriving to work. We worked in an IT field, so our office had a large row of server racks along one wall. Her desk sat facing the door, but next to the GPS server that kept accurate time for all our computers on the military base. It had a giant digital clock on the front of the server. Every day when I walked into work, she would look up at me, then turn and look at that clock. If I was even 10 seconds late (to the 15-minute rule), I got in trouble with her. I was never late to work though, because she ensured I was always there earlier than my official shift start time.

Being 15 minutes early to everything has changed my life. If I'm running behind, I have a quarter hour window to get myself back on track. If I arrive 15 minutes early, I have plenty of time to get myself set up and situated. Or just time to sit and clear out some other pending tasks while I wait for a thing to start (check phone notifications, clear out emails, etc.).

When it comes to virtual meetings, I like to join 15 minutes early, then mute myself and turn off my camera. Then I can sit at my computer and knock out some other tasks while I'm waiting for the meeting to start. That buffer gives me time to mentally switch into meeting mode while also giving me time to be productive beforehand. And no one is waiting for me to show up, so if the meeting is ever running late, it's never my fault.

If it’s a customer meeting I’ll join 30 seconds early. If it’s an all hands or has big wigs in it then I’ll join 10 seconds early. Smaller internal meetings I can be 10-300 seconds late.

If it is at work, then as exactly as my Outlook displays that Calendar message. Everybody does that, and within less than 30 seconds all are there.

If it is just among friends, then 3-5 minutes earlier, because the tech is somewhat different each time, and I do not want to make people wait for me.

I join exactly at start time, down to the second. Once everyone has been counted or noticed and the droning idiot starts presenting I bug right TF out. Nothing will happen that matters because its a freakin' meeting - if something important was going on it would be an email.

It depends.

I’m one of the few people still teaching on Zoom. Turns out it’s a good delivery method for some students at community colleges (like if you have young children at home, etc.)

If I’m teaching, I show up 15 minutes early.

If I’m just a participant, I show up pretty much right on time, then I quietly judge whoever is running the meeting because most calls are run poorly.

Maybe ten seconds before of after the start time. Depends if I was working on something or forgot about it. If the meeting starts at 8am, then whenever I get to the office a few minutes after 8am (don’t schedule meetings first thing if you want me to be there when they start). If it was on one of my wfh days, that’d be different.

One on one meetings, right on time or when the other person joins if they are a couple minutrs early.

Small team meetings, right on time unless I am hosting and need to set up screen sharing.

Large meetings hosted by others, whenever the host starts it but I work on other stuff if they are a few minutes early.

In all cases I start muted and camera off and only unmute and turn the camera on if necessary.

All my meetings are internal (i.e. not customer facing). I join 15-30 seconds after start time. That's enough for other people to join in and I don't have to do the awkward small talk with the host while waiting for others. If I'm hosting, I start the meeting 2 minutes early.