Executive Summary
When people are faced with a deadline far in the future, they are more likely to think the assignment is difficult. This leads them to procrastinate, spend more money on completing the assignment, and even risk abandoning it completely. These patterns are important for managers and others setting deadlines to recognize, in large part because the author’s research reveals that people’s tendency to procrastinate on long-term assignments and finish less-important but urgent assignments reflects a basic psychological preference. We behave as if pursuing…
