What does "due Monday" mean?
Better be specific...
What does it mean if you tell someone in your department that a project is due Monday? Does that mean first thing Monday morning? Close of business (COB) Monday? End of day (EOD) Monday?
If I tell my students a paper is “due Wednesday” in this age of digital assignment submission, what do I mean? Before class on Wednesday or Wednesday by 11:59 p.m.? Conventional wisdom suggests the former, but it would be hard to argue with a kid who interpreted it the other way.
I see situations like this often in my consulting work as I’m reviewing documents for clients. A hypothetical example might relate to a regulatory compliance report, wherein a company is laying out its plans to meet state or federal requirements: “X will be completed by May.”
I flag it as problematic. Here’s why:
Interpretation 1: It will be completed by the end of the last day of April – the last moment in time that occurs before May, thus occurring “by May.” So, on the morning of May first, it should be ready to roll, with all the initial wrinkles worked out.
Interpretation 2: Completion will occur anytime up to and including the very last minutes of May – as long as it doesn’t spill over into June. So, it's not reasonable to expect it to be ready to roll on May 20th – we've got until the end of May 31st.
Of course, in some contexts, this might not matter. But in others, it could matter a great deal. What if the CEO understands interpretation 1, but the department manager understands interpretation 2? And, for an entire year leading up to May, neither the boss nor the manager even knows it?
In that case, it’s going to be a bad day in the office on May first. It would be hard to say who was wrong. Barring other contextual factors that would make it clear, they’d both have a valid case. Either way, nobody wins. Of course, we’d hope some simple communication in the interim would have flagged the problem and clarified the expectations, but sometimes projects just don’t get talked about vertically until they’re very close to deadline.
This confusion can be avoided by taking a little more time with precision of language. Just adding “by the end of” or “by the beginning of” clears it up. Even more precision is required if there are multiple timezones involved. I work with several clients with global operations, and I’ve seen timezone confusion trip teams up often enough.
Now, it’s important to remember something: Sometimes ambiguity is intentional because it affords flexibility. It’s a strategic decision. Sometimes. But I’d argue that more often than not, the potential liability will outweigh the benefit.
This occurs in everyday settings, too. If you say you’ll “do the grocery shopping by noon,” do you mean you’ll leave for the store at noon, or be home from the store by noon? It’s reasonable to assume you mean it will be complete before noon, but that’s not really what you’ve said, is it?
Simple takeaway: When it comes to timelines, be sure that ambiguous phrasing doesn’t set the stage for problems.