Sleep Your Way To Success

According to Charles Czeisler, a specialist in sleep deprivation at Harvard Medical School, lack of sleep can be as bad for productivity as drinking too much alcohol.

"We now know that 24 hours without sleep, or a week of sleeping four or five hours a night, induces an impairment equivalent to having alcohol level in the blood," says Czeisler. "We would never say, 'This person is a great worker! He's drunk all the time!' ...yet we continue to celebrate people who sacrifice sleep for work."

And Corporate America does promote workaholism amongst its ranks - pushing exec's to work marathon-100-hour-workweeks, encouraging employees to take red-eyes and land with fast-feet running to the office, rather than catch needed shut-eye and re-energize.

Dr. Czeisler warns that burning candles at both ends actually does not justify the productivity ends. Indeed sleep deprivation creates the antithesis to high performance.

"With too little sleep," Dr Czeisler says, "people do things that no CEO in his or her right mind would allow."

For this reason, Dr. Czeisler suggests companies now start to incorporate new sleep policies which oppose employees working beyond a 16-consecutive-hour period, and prohibit working or driving immediately after late-night or overnight flights.

Dr. Czeisler comments how it's interesting that companies have rules to protect employees against smoking and sexual harassment -- yet companies promote self-destructive workaholism behavior.

I suggest you keep Dr. Czeisler 's report in mind the next time you have a choice between working too long versus getting some needed sleep.

In fact, I suggest you sleep on all this information.

Comments

[cylindar]

I like that idea.

[mumbaikar]

On a lighter note... Looks like Bill Gates knew about this secret from his young days.

http://guessworker.wordpress.com/2008/03/03/desktop/

[snorestopper]

There is no question that not getting enough proper sleep interferes with productivity. However this article focuses on "quantity" and not "quality". I find it fascinating that they completely ignored sleep-related breathing disorders as impacting productivity. These disorders are rampant in our adult population with one in five adults experiencing them at a level that impacts health.

The vast majority of people with these disorders are completely unaware that they have them. Occasionally a bed partner may say something but that is usually to complain about the noise that is interfering with their own sleep. Even those people who seek regular medical care are usually unaware of their problem, because few physicians regularly ask patients about the quality of their sleep. Those people who do get a diagnosis are routinely prescribed a therapy that as many as 50% refuse or fail within the first six months of treatment. Those people who remain undiagnosed and those who are diagnosed and untreated go on to live shortened lives of diminished quality with health care costs doubling those who are diagnosed and well managed.

This is a public health care dilemma of monumental proportions. What is desperately needed is more professional and public awareness about oral appliance therapy, a well validated and effective alternative therapy for those patients who refuse or fail CPAP (continuous positive air pressure).

Unfortunately, the medical profession routinely ignores their own practice parameters and makes no mention to patient about the availability of this life-saving treatment.

[exxonmobil4prez]

SIESTA at noon! YES!

[WorriedParent]

The most amusing part is the hypocrisy of the medical establishment. The Harvard sleep deprivation specialist has published a report.... but has he met an intern or resident recently? Medical students, interns and residents are ridiculed, berated, verbally bludgeoned if they dare speak about the lack of sleep. Within the last several years the 80-hour-week limit has been instituted for residents, however many residents in many programs across the country still find themselves working close to 100 hours per week. Worse yet, they are expected to be functional, to make sound medical decisions which affect the lives of patients throughout the duration of 36-hour shifts. What are the residency programs at Harvard doing about this report? How are their residents' schedules set up? I cannot take reports from Harvard "specialists" seriously until Harvard starts taking them seriously...

(Sorry, I am a little grumpy tonight...)

[cylindar]

This has been a problem for many years and is actually a scandal. I have always maintained that interns should not be on the floor for more than 60 hours per week. After that point they are a hazard to the patients, other staff, to themselves and to the reputations of the school/hospital.

[justShareandbeNice]

While I think the above article is sorta lame, the topic is sooooooo important!! I honestly think sleep and diet and stress should be high on the list of things to "reform". We are all just surviving, not thriving! And this goes for people of all incomes, although of course it is much worse living with the stresses that come with having little money plus all the stresses we all have.

Personally, I am chronically ill (undiagnosed, really -- but I have been sick everyday for 15 years -- lyme disease, fibromyalgi, chronic fatigue syndrome, heavy metal toxicity..... all of the above?) and yet I am raising my 5 year old. Everyday is a HUGE challenge. My husband is a teacher and works 20 hours per week for no pay. The level of excellence he provides his students is expected of him, who cares how many hours it takes!

Oh, back to sleep. It is a cornerstone of physical and mental health. But not only do we not sleep enough, we also go to bed too late which means we miss out on a certain deep sleep you can only get the first part of the evening (before midnight). Add enormous stress, lack of time for play and family and hobbies and travel, and then our horrible diet. Wow.

We will not be a strong (or sane) country until we address these issues BIGTIME!

[43P04T34]

You're absolutely right. Sleep is absolutely essential.

[the addick]

This is something new? I thought sleeping your way to success was a tried and trusted method. (The trick is, not getting pregnant, or passing on communicable diseases).

[Fernando]

LOL! Not THAT type of sleeping!

I'm voting this for funniest comment of the year. : )

[Attilatheblond]

seems to work for george the bush. He sleeps plenty. To bad the rest of us are so stressed out we get all sorts of conditions that make it impossible to sleep well, even if we don't have jobs to go to anymore.

[rpr]

Too little sleep is also unhealthy and leads to weight gain. That's been known for many years.

[impatient]

I generally try to sleep 7 hours a night, but am much happier if I can get 8. Most of the time, I can't. So I make a point of closing my office door at 4 and sleeping for a half hour under my desk using a pillow and blanket I keep on hand for just that reason. Most people are so into getting their own stuff done at that hour, i can close my door pretty successfully without interruption,

Then I can work another 5 hours or so, and feel totally good.

It's not that I want to work 12 hours or more a day, it's that I really have to. When(if) I get tenure, I expect things will lighten up at least a little.

I rarely drink before going to sleep---I used to have a glass of wine. But now I find, as I am getting older, it causes me to wake up at about 4 AM with rebound anxiety, so it's jsut not worth it.

I do have a bok of NY TIMES crosswords by my bedside. I find that working on those for about ten minutes before bedtime in bed, makes me drowsy and I fall gently asleep.

My problem is annoying birds who wake me up way earlier than I have to. How do you get the birds to knock it off?

[BannedInBoston]

Now beginneth the sleep auto-suggestion. As I turn on my side, calm my mind, and slow my breathing, I will fall into a deep, sound, enjoyable sleep -- deep sleep, sound sleep, further and further to sleep all the time, until I enter the wonderful realm of dreaming, which is a world in its own way as real as the world of waking where I will live a full and complete life, sleeping through all sound, all light, and all noise, until I awake refreshed about _____(fill in time) in the morning (when the alarm rings -- optional) having dreamt lucidly the while and remembered my lucid dreams without waking. Thus endeth the sleep auto-suggestion.

[falgiano]

Jim Lehrer of PBS has a couch in his office and takes a mid day nap daily. Makes perfect sense to me. Seriously!

[BannedInBoston]

I can't get excited when medical/psychiatric types come out in support of common sense. To me, it isn't even news, just some researcher's PR. I average about 7 hours a night Monday through Friday, and then make up the time on weekends with back-to-back 9-10 hour sessions. Works for me.

[rabiddog6708]

Sleep....it doesn't have to be a dream.....remember that add? I make sure I get at least 8 hours a sleep and do not drink. I don't know if this leads to success, but it does lead to better health.

[BannedInBoston]

Not drinking is pretty huge. You can get the same health benefits as you can from a couple of glasses of wine a night with supplements or even, for that matter, grape juice. I hope you don't smoke either. That negative combo is a real health winner!

[jalyn]

Did it occur to this specialist that insomnia is on the increase, hence the many tv ads for prescription sleep medication. People are stressed out, have chronic illness that keeps them up at night with pain. Workaholism is a personal choice for a few. But for most people, they are pressured by their company's expectation to volunteer overtime and be on call 24/7, or lose their job.

[rini]

Never mind work at a desk, the need for sleep before driving, or for pilots, truckers and medical people.

Residency is ridiculous. We were encouraged to ignore our need for sleep even as we had to perform at a high level in order to save lives.

Idiotic..

[BannedInBoston]

Hey, you were young....

[mandycat]

This article appears to think that working long hours is some sort of lifestyle choice. Yeah, well so is eating and most of us American serfs have to do one in order to finance the other. Being at our employer's beck and call 24 by 7 by 52 is a condition of employment, not a way to get ahead. Companies want round the clock coverage without staffing for it. So we wind up festooned with pagers, cell phones and Blackberries.

Corporate American doesn't "promote workaholism." It demands it and factors it into its project plans. Those who object frequently find they have lots of time to catch up on their sleep after their work hours cut back to zero.

[loki]

Your right they demand workaholism. They even reprimand , humiliate, and fire you if you dont comply. They do all this during their 4 hour 10am to 2 pm days, 4 days a week, while they are catered on hand and feet by their yes people. Then the rest of us slave away for 1/100 what they make as they sleep 10 hours each day.

[ohmetoo]

Depending on the company it just might be 1/400th of what they make!