Procrastination in self directed leaders work - a qualitative study

Abstract

This research is performed to understand how procrastination affects the work of self-directed leaders. Procrastination is defined as the voluntary delay of an intended task, despite the potential adverse outcomes. The phenomenon touches everyone, which makes it interesting to find out how leaders experience and manage procrastination. Studies report that employees spend from 1.5 to 3 hours a day in non-work-related activities, which causes significant productivity loss. Delays dependent on individual contributions may affect others at work, and similarly, the individual itself. The theoretical hypothesis is based on self-regulation failure (Steel, 2007). Temporal Motivation Theory provides a framework for estimations on how and in which situations individuals experience the intended action (Steel and Weinhardt, 2018). Procrastination at work scale is used to analyze the type of behavior based on autonomy and supervisory measures (Metin et al. 2016). The data is collected by semi-structured interviews done for leaders in Helsinki, Finland. The results of the study are based on the analysis of the key themes. Chronic procrastination does not occur in the study group. Notwithstanding, the leaders experience occasional procrastination. Temporal Motivation Theory explains, for the most part, the reasoning in delaying behaviors in a job. Awareness of the phenomenon can help organizations to increase productivity and promote sustainable work.