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Will I Be Late or Early if I Don’t Spring Forward?

Posted On: March 31, 2015

Recently, a good question was emailed to Authentic Journeys, “Will I early or late to work if I do not change springtime in my clock?” 

While the question’s wording should be changed to, “Will I be early or late to work if I do not move my clock forward for daylight savings time?”, I will attempt to answer this. 

 

The short answer is YES.

 

Let’s see why.

 

While many digital clocks and computers will automatically change the time, like in the below video demonstrating the spring forward, there are still many manual clocks and watches in circulation. For those clocks, a human must remember to change the time. If I were to forget to set the clock forward for spring forward, then I would be late to work on Monday. 

The reason: 
Normal time- 2am 
New time – 3am
Time to come to work is 9am
9 o’clock will come earlier than it usually does due to the time change, that’s why we lose one hour of sleep. So, for the person that doesn’t change the clock, and enters the office at 9am, it will actually be 10am for the rest of the people, and hence, entering the office at 9 without changing the clock will make that person l-a-t-e! 

I know that’s confusing. And, don’t think that all Americans find this easy to figure out or explain, either. In the video below, Americans are asked, “Will I be early or late to church on Sunday if I forget to change my clock for daylight saving time?” Most are perplexed and give the wrong answer! 

If I forget to change my clock in the spring will I be late or early? (Video on YouTube)

How does Spring Forward Impact me in India?
India does not observe any time changes domestically. However, if a person in India has a relative living in a country that does observe a time change (DST) or works on a virtual team, you may notice the time you would call your relatives or colleagues may change by one hour. 

 

Jennifer Kumar helps your teams run effective meetings with US colleagues be it during the spring time change, fall back in November, or any time of the year with programs such as Work Effectively with US Americans (from outside of the USA) or Managing Client Expectations. 

 

Feature photo credit: freepik