Procrastinators Anonymous is a fellowship of men and women who share their experience, strength and hope with each other that they may solve their common problem and help others to recover from chronic procrastination.

Are you "Anonymous" ?

My friends, relatives, even many of my co-workers and my boss know I'm a procrastinator. Many of my friends are procrastinators, some worse than me.

In fact, when I was applying for the job I have now, I had to explain to my boss the rather large gap in my resume. I told him the truth, that I procrastinated about getting a job. This is better than the more obvious possible explanation: "couldn't find a job", which implies that no one wants to hire me.

honesty is always the best long-term policy

Seing the other side of recruitment, I would say that it is always better to be honest.

The recruters aim roughly is 'not to hire people who ready to lie to their futur boss' ( though people who can lie to others are welcome). Had to do some recruitment training and cases of liars were used continuously to make it clear that people would make lies ( small, big ,...) to get a job. Also, more and more companies simply get a background check on candiadtes to really dig out the truth and some do actually pass the information to other companies as well!

I think one big reason, companies do hire young people more easily is that younger people have not yet developed bad habits or if they are liar, they are just starting on this path and can be found out quickly.
Some companies do look for liar profiles, others don't.
But no matter what, know that they'll know if they take the hiring seriously!

I could imagine your boss seing it as 'he has applied here because he is now really intrinsically motivated and ready to work'. May be you could ask him sometimes why he chose you ( if there were other candidates).

what to say to employers

>In fact, when I was applying for the job I have now, I had to explain to my boss the rather large gap in my resume. I told him the truth, that I procrastinated about getting a job. This is better than the more obvious possible explanation: "couldn't find a job", which implies that no one wants to hire me.

That was a dangerous answer. I'd certainly rather hire a person who tries hard even in the face of disappointment, than someone who withdraws into escapism and does nothing. You're lucky that the person who hired you interpreted this as "not worried" versus "chronic problem getting work done".

Pro, procrastination is

Pro, procrastination is certainly a negative trait. But one has to weigh the positives vs negatives when hiring someone. My present boss should probably have a reasonable expectation that, whatever my problems are, I should do at least as well at this job as I did at my last one.

I think procrastination is very common in creative fields. That's my theory. Artists, scientists, writers, students are all notorious procrastinators.

I forget why I wanted to start this thread. Poor impulse control. :)

procrastination on the job

doitnow, Do you procrastinate in doing your work?

resubmitting the reply - server bug?

Pro, yes, I procrastinate in just about everything. My work hours are flexible, my job requires creativity, and I'm fairly independent at work, checking in with the boss once a week to once a month. If I spend months emailing and surfing www, I may get away with it.