The Fine Art of Time passing at Work

“I generally come in at least fifteen minutes late, ah, I use the side door - that way my boss can’t see me, after that I just sorta space out for about an hour. Yeah, I just stare at my desk; but it looks like I’m working. I do that for probably another hour after lunch, too. I’d say in a given week I probably only do about fifteen minutes of real, actual, work. ”
- Peter Gibbons from the movie ‘Office Space’

The saga continues!

Here’s one article which might put my job in a spot. Candid confessions coming to light.

The Time Pass at work Series
An Introduction to Time Pass at Work and Why it is good
Definitive Guide for Geeks to Time Pass at Work
The Fine Art of Time passing at Work
How not to get caught Time Passing at Work

Unlike time passing techniques for geeks, I’m not sure if all the things that I’m going to list here will suit for all the people and the way the work. Nevertheless it’s fun to know what I’m doing to office.

Socialize
I have a lot of friends at my workplace. Now you can ‘hang out’ with, go for a coffee break, chat, go for a smoke (I don’t smoke) and in no time you’ll spend quality time with your peers. This helps a lot in more than one way. You improve your social networking skills (I’m an introvert turned to extrovert), get your favors returned and yes you time pass.

Built a Blog
80% of what I have written in this post was during the office hours. This is an ideal pastime for me. I keep writing my next to-be-published posts, but people think that I’m doing some project, research and serious things.

I always keep a piece of paper with me. My job might require me to travel. I always write things that sometimes become my future posts in this blog. Now you get writing in an environment that you normally don’t. You’re proactive in many ways

Of course you can earn money by blogging. There’s one cartoon on that. There are two ways to earn 6 figures a year. One is get lucky in a lottery or the other is by blogging. I’ll be more than happy if I earn 5 figures a year. My parents were astonished to know that in 2 months this year I earned more with this blog than what my full time job pays me.

Blogging is picture perfect! You time pass, you earn money, you improve yourself, you learn a lot and has a host of other benefits as well.

Go for a Walk
I don’t know how much people in my office know that I go for a walk in the evening (mostly after office hours, so that it’s not hot). Now this helps me keep my mind, body and soul in good condition. I feel fresh, creative and motivated. I make sure that this is the first job I do after my office hours.

It’s advisable to hit out for a walk if you’re stressed or having a bad day at work. I’ve have done this sometimes and it works like a charm. One other thing that you can do is move out of your office and go somewhere. I go to my apartment as it’s near to my office.

Fun at Meetings
Many people just hate meetings. Either they don’t like it or feel it’s waste of time. But yours truly, for most of the time end up looking forward to meetings! I’ve developed a habit of taking notes at meetings. Not only I take notes on what the speaker emphasis but also the character of the speaker, his behavior, the general mood of the people in the meeting room, etc..

This helps me in having fun, being without worry/tension, mastering the art of taking notes and noticing the slightest observation, body language, etc. The best part is the people at the meeting room thing I’m seriously jotting down things and sometimes I notice they also do the same!

More on taking effective notes and study-worth notes at Lifehacker. This is not exactly a time pass technique but just an example to show that you can truly enjoy some things which you might not like.

Get your other personal things done
Our people give us a car and petrol. We’ll have to make full use of them. Be it advance booking for a movie (I booked Spider-Man 3 in office hours), going for a date, going for home errands (like paying bills, grocery and things like that) or just simply relaxing in a beach shut off from all the tension and stress makes you unavailable at office and you know what others might think.

This technique like like getting 2 mangoes with a single stone. You ‘work’ as well as you make yourself unavailable for any other work as you’re busy with the current work.

Thats it. Look forward for the next article in this series: “How not to get caught time passing at work?”. Subscribe to stay tuned.

Please feel free to comment how you time pass in your work place. I’ll add your comments with a linkback (if you have a blog) in the final article of this series.

Archana once asked when we were chatting:
“Did you go to Dubai for working.. or for Blogging?”

I didn’t know how and what to answer. She caught me unaware.

Related Articles:

• Browse with more Privacy at Workplace
• How not to get caught Time Passing at Work
• An Introduction to Time Pass at Work and Why it is good
• Definitive Guide for Geeks to Time Pass at Work