The Story We Tell Ourselves
When I know I have a project coming up (like writing a blog post), I typically start preparing early. At a minimum, I’ll jot down some thoughts about the topic and start a mind map. I’ll do some research and plug that into my mind map.
Then I back off and let it incubate. When I come back to it, my subconscious mind has been working on it, and I have new insights and organizational ideas. I’ve learned that starting early is the key to my doing my best work.
However, I’ve had friends who know about a project weeks before it’s due but do almost nothing to start preparing.
They wait until it’s close to the deadline, then stress out, racing to finish it.
When I’ve asked why they didn’t start earlier, they’ve told me, “I do my best work under pressure.”
Do people really do their best work under pressure?
Or do they just work fast, but the quality of their work suffers because it’s done in a rush?
What the Research Actually Shows
Research tells a different story from the one we often tell ourselves.
The reality is that we don’t do our best work when we’re under pressure and rushed.
1. Procrastinators Overestimate Their Performance
Research shows that procrastinators actually perform worse.
They just think they did well.
In an article in Psychology Today, Joseph Ferrari, Ph.D writes, “Procrastinators do not do well under time pressure, yet they think they do.”
2. Speed Comes at the Cost of Quality
After reviewing the scientific evidence, Elizabeth R. Tenney & Don Moore, concluded in their paper, Time Pressure, Performance, and Productivity,
“Time pressure increases speed at the expense of quality.”
They determined that time pressure generally impairs performance because it places constraints on the capacity for thought and action. These factors limit exploration and increase reliance on well-learned or heuristic strategies.
Thus, time pressure increases speed at the expense of quality.
3. No Time for Incubation
Pressure may motivate people to focus and finish, but that doesn’t necessarily equal the best work.
My best work comes when I let concepts incubate over time and let my mind work on them even when I’m not consciously working on them.
I had some basic ideas for a blog post and did some research, but I struggled to figure out how best to organize the material. I finally gave up and went to bed. In the morning, I realized my brain had been working on the problem and presented me with the organizational structure I was looking for.
However, waiting until the last minute leaves no time for incubation.
4. Artificial Stress Isn’t Sustainable
Another drawback of waiting until the last minute is that it creates significant artificial stress.
We all have stress in our lives, and some of it is actually good for us, but it’s not sustainable to repeatedly put ourselves under extreme stress by waiting until the last minute to complete a project.
As By Kevin Eikenberry wrote in his article about productivity myths,
“Always forcing pressure (or waiting for it) isn’t sustainable. But it is an invitation for burnout and errors in the work or your judgement.”
5. The Deadline High Is a Trap
Anne-Laure Le Cunff, writing in Ness Labs: The Trap of the Deadline High points out that the “deadline high” is actually a trap:
“It rewards the brain for procrastinating, making you more likely to rely on panic again next time. Over time, this wires your brain to depend on urgency instead of intention.”
Although people think they are more productive under time pressure, Le Cunff suggests this is not actually increased performance, but rather “rushed performance.”
The Alternative: Let Your Brain Work Even When You’re Not
There’s another option to working under pressure: starting early enough to allow time for incubation, which will likely improve the quality of your work.
Incubation happens in your mind when you’re not actively working on a project. It is “unconscious processing” that goes on in your mind automatically.
Well-known writer and writing coach Anne Janzer highlights the importance of incubation in the creative process. In her book, The Writer’s Process: Getting Your Brain in Gear, she includes incubation as an essential part of the creative process.
“One secret of productivity is learning how to use not-writing time to advance the work. Remember that incubation is a critical precursor to creative insight.”
How to Build Incubation Into Your Process
• Start your project early! As soon as I finish a blog post, I select the topic for the next one (usually from my list of blog post ideas and notes) and put together a mind map to chart out my thoughts and organization.
This is typically about four full days before the next post is due. Starting early gives me plenty of incubation time as I return to work on the post each day.
If you wait to start a creative project right before it is due, you won’t have time for incubation, and the quality of your work will likely suffer.
• Plan backward and plan time for incubation. Anne Janzer suggests, “Once you have the ending date, work backward through the seven steps to set up interim deadlines. Leave adequate time for incubation and rest between key phases.”
If you know a project is coming due, set reminders or calendar entries to guide you through the steps you need to take in the days or weeks before the due date.
• Prepare the soil with research. Your subconscious isn’t going to have anything to process if you don’t first give it some raw material to work on.
Research your topic and then move on to something entirely different. While you’re not consciously working on the material, your mind will continue to process it.
During incubation, your mind will do some heavy lifting for you. When you return to the project, you’ll likely find that you already have some ideas for organizing your topic and have some insights about how your research materials fit together.
Give Your Ideas Room to Breathe
The next time you have a project with a deadline weeks away, try an experiment.
Start early—even if it’s just some initial research or a rough outline.
Then step away and let your mind work on it in the background.
You might be surprised at what surfaces when you return.
The deadline rush will always be there if you want it. But I suspect you’ll find, as I have, that your best work doesn’t come from pressure. It comes from giving your ideas time to develop.
AI Note: I wrote this blog post myself, using my own words and thoughts for the initial draft. I used AI only to suggest headlines, section headings, images, and text improvements.
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