This is Roundtable.
You're listening to Roundtable with myself He Young.
I'm joined by Steve Hatherly and Lee Yee in the studio.
Coming up, we all have that friend who thinks fashionably late means showing up an hour after the fun starts.
But what if you could outsmart their chronic lateness by giving them an earlier time?
Is it justifiable to lie about the start time to ensure that they arrive when everybody else does?
And the recent incident of a female job seeker wearing shorts to the interview has sparked a discussion about what it really means to dress professionally.
Should personal expression take precedence over conventional standards?
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Now, on Roundtable, let's switch it up for a different topic discussion.
Everybody has that friend.
The one who shows up 45 minutes late to dinner.
The one who lost track of time before the big birthday party.
The one who says they're on their way to the bar and hasn't left the house yet.
And who knows, maybe that person is you.
But here's a question for you.
Is it reasonable or acceptable to lie to a habitually late person giving them an incorrect expected arrival time with the goal of making them arrive on time for the real time?
So basically, are we talking about lying to a friend about the arrival time so they can get on get there on time?
Yeah. So to put it in a context, let's say the three of us are meeting for coffee and Huyang and I are always on time and Lee always late.
So Huyang and I we say, okay, we want to meet at 2pm.
Right. But hey, let's tell Lee it's 1 .30pm because we know she's going to be 30 minutes late.
The question is, is it okay to lie to her because we know she will be late?
That's the question at play here.
But before we dig in a little bit, let me ask you.
Are you an on time person or are you a habitually late person?
Well, I used to be a late person.
Oh, did you? Yeah. But now I think I'm kind of an on time person and I'm still trying to be an early person.
But yeah, but you know, being late, well, I sort of noticed my this problem a few years ago.
So I feel like I always miss deadlines and miss a lot of deadlines and I always like, you know, somehow panic before the deadlines because I don't already start early.
So that's why that's when I feel like, oh, it's really time to change.
So so now and also since the moment I realized it's a problem for me.
So I somehow deliberately will just force myself to be on time or to start early to do something.
Right. But by the sound of it, you're talking about your private life as well as, you know, work or studies, like serious stuff.
Are you? Yeah, maybe, because for me, I feel like I always procrastinate a little bit for my papers and, you know, academic homework or everything so that I feel like, well, it can be a serious problem because you just leave little time for you to accomplish a task, which can be quite challenging for me
sometimes for myself, of course.
And meantime, if it's becoming a habit when it want to become become really habitual or perpetual, lateness, it can be a problem.
It can really make other people unpleasant.
Right. Well, I suppose if it's for work or if you have a big essay or dissertation to turn in, then it's really important to be on time.
But if it's about going to a party or meeting up with friends.
OK, Leah, you said the old version of you would be a little bit would be late.
May I ask how late maybe like 10 minutes or I think no.
I think it's better to respect your friend's time as well.
But meantime, I can be quite tolerant to my friends who are late.
And I think that's somehow like the unspoken rule between me and my friends.
We know that now in this group, in this front circle, there is one person who is always late and we are like, OK.
So we know that she will be late.
So we'll just wait for her.
But we can be super tolerant.
So so I guess for private life, it's OK for you to be a little bit late.
But I think at workplace and when when it comes to professional things, you'd better be on time.
Right. I think so, too.
Otherwise, you garner this reputation of being unprofessional and also not being reliable.
And you don't want that for work.
The conversation is going towards a professional path.
But we're talking about private meetings hanging out with your friends here.
Well, Steve, what about you?
Are you the one who's late or waiting for some time?
Always on time. I can't stand being late.
If I'm 15 minutes late for a movie at the theater, I don't want to go in.
It drives me crazy.
And the reason I think I blame it on my job.
When you do I've done live radio for 20 years and when you're late by one second, then you're super late.
So that's eked its way into my private life.
And I really, really, really don't like being late.
Of course, I am sometimes, but I don't like it at all.
Well, here's the reason that we're talking about this.
Tick tock. A post went up with lots of comments to follow from the poster who talked about showing up 22 minutes early to a dinner reservation.
Now, the poster when she showed up 22 minutes early, she learned that her friends made the reservation for 30 minutes later than they told her.
They told her comment 130, as we told Lee to come to the coffee shop.
They told her 130. The dinner reservation was two, for example.
And the friend who posted was saying, is this OK that they lied to me or is this not OK?
One commenter understood just on a personal level.
The commenter said, I'm a habitually late to everything.
My friends know it's a major flaw with me, but they love me anyway.
I'm glad you have good friends, too.
Another person said, no, literally like it's just a sign of basic respect to your friends to be on time if you plan something together.
It's not that hard.
Well, I suppose if you're friends, then you know each other quite well.
And if you know that, OK, I work in Lugu in the Babo Shen area in the city and my friend works in, let's say, Yidong in Beijing, which is like polar opposites in the city.
And if we make this appointment that you and I are going to cross the city, we're talking about like trying to do the math here, 40 kilometers to meet up with each other on a work day.
Yes, I will tolerate that you are you might be late or even half an hour late.
That's kind of my bottom line or threshold before.
But let's say if it's like really heavy traffic, then I've been there.
Maybe somebody is like an hour late and then you better be apologetic, though.
And then that's acceptable.
But if you're doing this all the time, well, I'm sorry, you're going to be called off my friend list.
OK, I'm glad that you mentioned very specific locations and very specific times because the question often comes up.
Why are people late all the time?
You have that friendly who's always late.
And you said you're off my friend list if you're always late.
Here's the question.
Do they do it on purpose?
What do you think? Yes or no?
No. No. OK. OK. Are they being disrespectful on purpose?
Yes or no? No. No. So then what's the problem?
Well, experts say there really is no clear answer as to why people are habitually late.
But there's one theory that really stood out to me in twenty seventeen.
They did a study where researchers asked 20 students who had newly moved to London to sketch a map of their college district.
So all the area around the college campus.
And then they asked them to estimate travel times to different destinations.
While the student space estimates expanded if they knew the very the area very well, meaning they could draw a bigger map, they were more accurate with their drawings, their gauge of travel time was off.
The more familiar they were with the geography.
So here's what this theory states.
If you know the area very well, if you know you work in Paboshan and you need to go to the other side of the city to Chowyang or something like that, you know in your mind the distance and you know the relative travel time in your brain.
The problem is because we're familiar with it, that's where we make the mistakes.
We underestimate the amount of time that it will take to get there.
That's one problem.
And then the second problem on top of that, we think back.
OK, the last time I got ready and I went from Paboshan to Chowyang, OK, I started to get ready at one p .m.
And it took me 30 minutes, right.
And then it took me 40 minutes to get there.
So I need a 30 plus 40.
OK, I need 70 minutes.
All of that is wrong in our brain because it took longer to prepare and it took longer to get there.
That's why people are always late, according to this theory.
I don't agree with this theory.
There are so many ways that this that people that people could fix this problem now.
We talked about navigation apps, digital map apps.
I if you still don't know this, then please write this down.
That is nowadays, if you travel like check your map before you leave like and you can even set the time to a proposed time to check the perceived time duration needed.
And there are just ways to help you to better regulate that time in your mind, although you might not always be accurate.
But and then give yourself a little bit more leeway if you think this is important enough.
If your friends actually care about this, then make that.
But but but but but but but that that accounts for the travel time.
That doesn't account for your own time getting ready at home.
There's no app for that.
And don't you know how to live your life if if you go on a date, for example, you know, you want to put on fancy makeup.
All right, girl, you've probably done this before half an hour or an hour and then you want to get dressed up nicely, maybe put on a little bit of jazz music to get yourself ready.
OK, one hour and then one hour plus one hour and a half to get there.
That's two and a half hours.
How difficult is it?
Well, I think using navigation app is one thing.
But but I hear I think this theory really emphasize that when you're you know, familiar with this.
Well, when you think that you are familiar with this place, you tend to pay less attention to the time allocation or to the preparation to the whole process.
And in the meantime, you also might might have the worst time perception because you feel like everything is under control.
But the reality is not you don't really calculate all the accidents, say road accidents and bad traffic and something you might just run into before you walk out of your apartment door.
Right. Right. OK. If you're going to a job interview, which is another topic that we will be discussing in five minutes time, wouldn't you do the forward planning?
Wouldn't you calculate, OK, what if there was a road accident?
If there was bad driving or what if my high heels, one of the heels broke?
And then what do I do?
I mean, if you care enough, you would take under account all these different variables.
So but all that being said, though, I as I've grown older and just judging by my argument, you probably think that I'm always on time.
Actually, I've looked at this differently recently.
That is maybe we're too hard on ourselves because work is hard already to be on time and everything.
And in your private life, if your friends love you, then I think there is a little bit of leeway.
We might not need to like do this like clockwork and be so, you know, place so much stress on ourselves.
And but that being said, more than 15 minutes or half an hour late, I think that's a bit much.
Yeah. Back to the question.
Is it OK to lie to your friends to make them on time?
Maybe, maybe not. Taya Cohen is a professor of organizational behavior and business ethics at Carnegie Mellon University.
And Professor Cohen says, consider whether any of the friends would be upset if they found out that the dinner party planner had communicated differently to each person the time that they were supposed to be there.
15 minutes late, acceptable or not depends on the people.
30 minutes, depending on the culture, you could say as well.
But it seems to be.
And I looked at other experts answers on this topic.
Is it OK to lie to your friends?
The consensus seems to say probably not a good idea to lie to your friends.
You can do other things.
Yeah, you can be aware that they're going to be a little bit late and you can try to make your own plans accordingly.
Yeah, I think compared like with telling a line to your friends, I think you just need a candid conversation, maybe which will also be more helpful.
I think you can just directly tell your friend that you are always late and that that somehow upsets us.
And please, can we somehow sort out a solution?
Maybe said a late, later starting time or something like that.
Experts say that's not the best idea.
Oh, really? Why? Because you're calling the person out on their behavior when they might feel attacked, when they're not.
We've already established, right?
We've agreed late. People aren't late all the time because they want to be or because I just don't care enough.
Well, OK. Back to your point about job interview versus meeting your friend for coffee.
Those are two different things that require two levels of what's the word I'm looking for care, I guess.
You're not going to care as much about being on time, meeting your friend for a coffee as you are about something that could potentially change your life and your career.
Right. Well, coffee is one thing.
But let's say if you're meeting up for a meal or, you know, you guys are going to go to, let's say, watch a movie or an exhibition together.
And we're all adults is not that easy to meet up.
To make time for each other.
And if you don't see that in that I'm making this great effort to meet up with you, I'm sorry.
You don't deserve my friendship.
Well, isn't that too demanding to your friends as well?
Seriously putting too much pressure on your friends and also yourself as well.
Because, you know, our solution to solve this problem about this gathering or meal, you know, how to handle, you know, one of our friends who is always late.
First of all, we try to have this competition, you know, try to figure out, OK, who's the earliest one this time and who is the latest one?
Well, of course, there won't be any reward or punishment measures.
But, you know, this competition, which is to make people feel like, oh, it's really important to be on time.
And meantime, we also, you know, nicely notice our friend who is always late, for example, our starting time for this gathering is six o 'clock, six p .m.
And then at five p .m., we were just saying something like in a group chat like, OK, it's five p .m.
So blah, blah, blah.
Who, who, who, you really need to, you know, start to get out of your apartment so that can make you an on time.
If you're meeting Huyang, you should leave last Tuesday.
Actually, I do realize there's a key difference here.
I found it because you're meeting up with a couple of people.
I'm meeting up with one person.
Big difference. Yeah.
So so I'm waiting here.
I've cleared my schedule so we could meet up.
It's not like we're going to a party and then, yeah, you can be two hours late.
You know what? Don't even show up and we'll all be gone.
Yeah. Don't really care that much.
I do agree with you on that.
If I'm meeting one person, it's way more important to me than they be on time.
If I'm going out for a group dinner, I don't care if they're 10 minutes or 20 minutes or 30 or 45 or 75 minutes late.
It makes no difference to me because there's a group.
I totally agree. If you're meeting one person and they're over an hour late.
Yeah, you just go home and you have a right to be angry then, I would say.
But see, in real life, I'm actually a bit of a softy.
I don't know if I can confront the person like LiYi suggested that way.
But you know what? You're just off my friend list.
You get ghosted. That could be even worse.
Well, the thing is, yeah, see, I think open communication is in theory the good way to go.
But sometimes in reality, we need some tactics.
If you're going to have that conversation with your friend, just do it sensitively and be aware that there might be some hurt feelings.
And if you feel that that's a possibility, maybe it's better to avoid the conversation altogether.
Yeah, you'll be the best judge to that.
Coming up next, professional image versus personal expression.
What do you stand on workplace dress codes?
Stay tuned. Looking for passion?
How about fiery debate?
Want to hear about current events in China from different perspectives?
Then tune in to Roundtable where East meets West and understanding is the goal.
It's the hour of Roundtable.
Myself, Hyang, I'm joined by Steve Hatherly and LiYi in the studio, as reported by the US People magazine.
Tyreshea Morrigan, a 28 -year -old from California, sparked a viral debate on TikTok after she was sent home from a job interview for wearing tailored black shorts, a white t -shirt and a white sweater.
Upon her arrival, the recruiter deemed her outfit inappropriate and offered her the option to change and reschedule the interview.
Morgan, feeling her attire was professional enough for the tech industry, chose not to return.
So what are the reactions from the internet?
Well, I think the video has really sparked a mixed reactions.
And while some users, they try to defend this lady's outfit, saying that it was proper for warm weather and modern and more free workplace culture.
Well, I would say a lot of users are criticizing and some comments like, I'm not understanding why, what you are not understanding.
And also, who wears shorts to an interview for a job?
My favorite comment was, were you interviewing to be a camp counselor?
Kind of harsh, but also funny.
And there's also one that user who is also an HR says the fact that they allow you to change and have a redo says a lot.
It would have been an immediate no here.
So I would say this video also ignited a debate on workplace attire on TikTok and also on social media following this video.
Post. And according to this lady, actually, she doesn't really understand why she's speaking.
She's speaking. She's being given second chance and she considered as a indirect no from her like potential employer.
And she also refused the second chance.
But of course, she acknowledged that while she stood by her outfit, she would likely choose more conventional attire for future interviews to avoid similar situations.
This is blown up on TikTok as of us talking to you right now, six million views and people are really divided in terms of their opinions.
But a lot of people are saying that her clothing was inappropriate for a job interview.
And that's what we need to discuss here right now.
Now, I don't know if you've seen the picture of what she was wearing, but she was very wearing very nice fancy dress shorts.
These are not shorts that you would wear to the gym.
These were nice professional looking black shorts.
She had it on a white top and a white sweater on top of it.
In my opinion, I think she looked quite nice.
In my opinion, I think that attire, that clothing was perfectly fine for a job interview.
She was going for an interview in the tech industry.
To me, it doesn't really matter where she was going to interview.
I thought she looked professional.
I thought she looked clean and sharp.
I thought she looked good.
Yeah. And also for this lady, it's actually the last minute job interview because according to her conversation with people, she was doing this job haunting someday.
And then the recruiter emailed her around 10 a .m.
And then after a short phone call, they just decided to have an interview on the same day.
So that doesn't really leave a lot of time for her to prepare for the interview.
And meantime, this lady says she does wear a blazer, but that day is extremely hot.
So that's why she took off the blazer.
But she also thinks that she dressed in a quite decent way.
I hold the 180 degree opposite view on this.
I don't think this was appropriate.
Certainly, it will never be appropriate if you are interviewing for a Chinese company tech or more of those traditional sectors.
Either because look at how short the shorts are.
They're they're barely covering.
Oh, no, they're not.
You're making it sound like they're, you know, near her hip.
They're completely fine.
No, they're not all the way down to her knee, but they're not they're not like all going shorts.
Well, for Chinese standards, what are club going shorts?
I don't even know what that means.
Hot pants. Hot pants.
Thank you. This is probably maybe three centimeters, maybe four centimeters longer than hot pants.
And if you were wearing shorts to a Chinese workplace, they have to be it's recommended, I think maybe just above knee, then that's okay ish.
But also looking in China, I think the dress codes can be very varied in different companies because we don't necessarily have such a suit and tie culture unless you work, let's say, for a law firm or maybe for some of those more traditional industries or maybe like the public organs as such.
Then I guess even for warm weather for men, you're recommended to wear at least a polar polo shirt or a short sleeve shirt and maybe long trousers.
Maybe some places allow shorts, but definitely not hot pants more.
They weren't hot pants.
And she's only less than five centimeters longer.
She's going to work at the tech in a tech job or to get a tech job.
Aren't you more interested in what she knows about the position?
Aren't you more interested in who she is as a person as opposed to what she could put together on short notice, pun intended, to get to get to the interview?
Hire the person, not the shorts.
Yeah, I sort of agree.
I also talked to one of my friends who is also an HR and she somehow said that the so -called interview attire or the dress code is more like a way for both companies and also potential employees to do a two -way meetup.
So, for example, this, I mean, my friend, she works in the finance industry.
So she said that anybody who is interested in working in financing our company would just naturally follow the unspoken dress code.
If you are not really following the dress code, then maybe you are not really so interested in working in this industry.
I think that makes sense.
If it's a more free working place and more free industry, so perhaps we would just naturally follow the dress code instead of having this very strict regulation, I guess.
I agree with you that it depends on the industry, but also if you really want the job, when you kind of do some research and also if this is not your first interview, then don't you kind of know what's expected to dress as the safest option to go to an interview?
Fair point if you really want the job.
What if this person showed up in hot pants and they were 10 minutes late to the interview?
Would they have any chance to get the job?
Well, if Hye Young is at the HR seat, then you know what my answer is going to be.
Unless they bring mooncakes.
Then maybe you get a second chance, maybe.
And that brings us to the end of today's show.
Thank you, Steve and Lee Yee for joining the discussion.
I'm Hye Young. We'll see you next time.
