Time is money
I think the common wisdom "Time is money" is wrong.
Knowlege is money. The loss of time is just a symptom of your lack of knowlege.
Many companies go out of their way to micromangage the flow of their employee's time. They can actually hurt themselves in doing so, because their policies often intefere with the formation of networks of knowlege.
Time goes away weather you manage it or not. Healthy companies have employees with significant amounts of idle time. Unhealthy companies have employees with no idle time. Each time murphy strikes, there is no extra capacity to spend on solving the problem, and as a result things fall further an further behind schedule.
Employees should be encouraged to use thier idle time to expand their knowlege network. Learning about their co-workers. Learning about the technologies of their industry. Learn about internet resources available to provide knowlege on demand.
There are a lot of healthy companies that are being driven to become unhealthy companies based on this common knowlege that "time is money".
Disclaimer for my boss: This thought pattern entered my head after a discussion with a friend who works somewhere else. It is not a commentary on the management of any company that I work for. Probably good advice the same. ;-)
