Time management: should every available slot be filled?
In a team handling client requests, leaving time unallocated can look like poor organisation. Yet the management question is precise: should all available capacity be assigned, or should a buffer be preserved and its usefulness subsequently measured?
What the literature establishes
Anuj Shah, Sendhil Mullainathan and Eldar Shafir (2012, Science) show, in experiments where participants have more or less limited resources, that scarcity changes the allocation of attention. It can strengthen focus on the immediate problem while encouraging neglect of other considerations. These findings illuminate the risks of managing under constraint, without demonstrating that a full calendar necessarily produces the same effects at work.
The cost of a seemingly available slot
Shane Frederick, Nathan Novemsky, Jing Wang, Ravi Dhar and Stephen Nowlis (2009, Journal of Consumer Research) show that, in purchasing decisions, people do not always spontaneously consider alternative uses of their money. Making those alternatives explicit can change their choices. Applied cautiously to scheduling, this mechanism encourages managers to identify what assigning a slot removes: particularly the ability to handle an unexpected request without displacing an existing commitment.
The premature conclusion
One might conclude that calendars should systematically be made less busy. Yet these studies establish neither an optimal proportion of unallocated time nor the superiority of a buffer across all activities. Unallocated capacity also has a cost: its value depends on the requests it actually absorbs and the work forgone to preserve it. (our executive and employee training programmes)
What the evidence cannot determine
The cited studies concern experimental scarcity and consumer decisions, not a trial of buffer time in professional teams. They offer plausible mechanisms, not direct evidence that this practice is effective. Moreover, a supposedly free slot is not a genuine buffer if it is already occupied by administrative tasks missing from the schedule.
A practical check in Lugano
As part of SHR's time management and prioritisation programme, a banking, fashion or trading team, or an Italian-speaking family SME in Lugano, could compare two weeks of normal operations with two weeks containing a daily thirty-minute unallocated slot: a trial protocol, not a scientific standard. A shared log in Italian would record each unexpected request, its deadline, whether it was handled in the buffer and any displacement of an already scheduled commitment. The main measure would be the proportion of unexpected requests completed by the requested deadline without postponing a planned commitment or extending working hours, while also retaining the total number of requests and their handling time. This comparison would not establish causality, but it would allow the buffer's usefulness to be discussed using verifiable records rather than calendar occupancy alone. To go further: explore the Time Management & Prioritisation training in Lugano, or browse our executive and employee training programmes in Switzerland.
In pictures: Time Management & Prioritisation in Lugano
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