How to deal with a procrastinating (student) collaborator? I am just beginning a research project with a fellow student. She is always 10-20 minutes late to scheduled meetings and has a very hard time making any sort of deadline. She freely admits that she is a procrastinator, and acknowledges that chronically being late is a problem which she has never effectively dealt with.

We are going to be working together for several months, perhaps longer, and I know that her chronic lateness will eventually become irritating. (I am always at least 10 minutes early, and consistently complete tasks before the deadline.) I enjoy working with her in a more casual setting, but I am concerned that her procrastination may become an issue in an academic collaboration. How should I approach her about this? Are there any ways to work around it? The collaboration was her initiative, so I am hesitant to confront if there are more diplomatic options.

How should I deal with her procrastination and lateness?
There are a couple of options that you could consider:


You may have to put your foot down (in a nice way), and gently remind her that it was her idea to collaborate and that such collaboration is difficult unless you both adhere to the deadlines set.  If it still persists, tell her that the procrastination, particularly with the tasks are making the collaboration untenable.
If this is not a critical aspect of your work, take a more relaxed attitude yourself to it - in terms of punctuality and task-completion.  The rationale for this is that if she does not place the collaboration as a high priority, then why should you?  This second one you would need to be careful about, the approach would be to put your other work before it.