With blogging, MyBook or FaceSpace social networks (my pet names for MySpace and Facebook), Twitter, FriendFeed, video comments with Seesmic, and all the myriad of other participative, internet-centric places to invest your time, where are you spending your Golden Hours? How many of them are there in a day when we’re always-on and always-connected, and how are you managing your communication interrupts when trying to get stuff done?
In emergency medicine, the Golden Hour is that 60 minute chunk of time after a heart attack, stroke or major trauma when medical procedures are of most benefit in limiting the scope of damage and for saving lives. In photography, it’s the first hour after dawn breaks and the last hour before dusk when the light is amazing and allows even an amateur hack like me to frequently snap stunning photos.
The Golden Hours in business — which varies depending on cultures, work ethics and geography — have historically been 9-11am and 2-4pm. Morning coffees or meetings, escaping for lunch at 11:15am, post-lunch tiredness over by 2pm and the day wind-down at roughly 4pm (along with the always welcomed caffeine boost), all have made those four hours in the day particularly compelling and productive in the past.
Today it’s different. Thinking about “Golden Hours” is like imagining that we left our computers, mobile phones and all the connecting-type applications on the ‘net behind when we left our workplace. In a day when it’s so easy to be connected, aren’t all hours in the day and evening in some way “golden”?
Steve’s Social Stuff