How did you respond when the tantalizing urge to sleep last beset you on a midday afternoon at work? Did you fend off the sandman with a siege of coffee and work ethic willpower? Pace around your office to get the blood flowing? Sneak a clandestine snooze on your desk with the hope that your subversive activity would remain undiscovered? Closet nappers, as well as those at risk, can take heart from the latest scientific findings on the practice of time-out at work. Once an occasion for disciplinary action, napping has been rescued from the hall of shame by workplace research that conclusively demonstrates its beneficial impact on productivity.
Roger Broughton, a neurologist from the University of Ottawa, concludes from 20 years of sleep research that "humans are born to nap" at regular intervals in the pattern of circadian rhythms. Recommendations based on his findings suggest at least one 20-minute timed nap per day, scheduled about 12 hours from the midpoint of the previous night's sleep. Other sleep experts have supported his conclusions, with some scientists suggesting that two or three short naps during " ultradian breaks" in the energy cycle, may produce optimal results. Regardless of the nap count prescribed, the resulting improvements in alertness and productivity after napping are being recognized at the highest levels of corporate America, with several Fortune 500 companies now providing official employee nap rooms on site.
Pierce J. Howard, Ph.D., describes the workplace restorative nap in his book, The Owner's Manual to the Brain. Howard first distinguishes the "work nap" from actual sleep. The goal of napping, in his words, is to move from beta waves to alpha waves, which are associated not with sleep, but rather with a trancelike meditative state. He describes his own daily napping routine, which commences every afternoon around 3 p.m. in a quiet place, such as the office training room. "I turn off the lights, lie on the floor on my back, and allow my mind to be empty or busy with whatever it chooses. In about five to 10 minutes, images start dancing in my mind's eye that I can manipulate and play with, making them change and perform to my liking. This is the alpha state. No matter how drowsy I am when I lie down, my eyes pop open when I reach the alpha state, as if my body and mind were saying, 'Thank you, Pierce, I needed that!" Howard reports that he returns to his work station consistently refreshed after these brief naps have facilitated a restorative shift in his brain wave patterns.
Howard cautions against entering actual sleep, which consists of theta waves and delta waves, during the nap routine. "You're in trouble if you stay under long enough to officially reach deep sleep. You'll feel groggy when you wake up, like you had been hit by a truck. That's why I nap on the floor; it's nearly impossible for me to drift too deeply, and it ensures that I come out of the nap energized."
The critical potential of naps was demonstrated in NASA's Fatigue Countermeasures Program, which measured both fatigue and performance for pilots transversing multiple time zones with extensive flight times. Findings showed that pilots who were allowed a planned 40-minute rest period, including a nap, never lapsed in their performance measures despite some physiological indicators of fatigue during the last 90 minutes of the flight. In dramatic contrast, the group who worked continuously without a nap or rest-period showed measurable performance errors and twice as many "fatigue" episodes as the rested group during the crucial final hours of air time.
For companies that remain skeptical about the cost-effective benefits of napping, work-place research on "time-out" supports a 10- to 20-minute break for every two hours of intense productivity. This practice supports the need in brain learning processes for "chunking" (assimilating a limited number of information bites into manageable "chunks" before acquiring more) and "spacing" (learning effectively in small daily exposures to new information, rather than large exposures in a short period of time). Brain research demonstrates that the frequent breaks that support optimal brain functioning are especially critical to workers whose jobs require the use of higher mental functions. Without these short, regularly spaced breaks, the new neural connections essential to good analytical thinking and problem-solving cannot solidify.
Applications of nap research suggest that companies abandon "lazy employee" policies that prohibit employees from napping, as these are not consistent with findings on workplace productivity. Statistics also suggest that workers in safety-sensitive positions be mandated to take short naps for the purposes of effective risk management. Companies desiring to maximize performance and productivity in the workforce should revise company policy to sanction 15- to 30-minute mid-afternoon naps or meditation sessions for all employees.
With napping supported by two decades of scientific research, the informed workplace should move swiftly to follow the lead of First Napper Bill Clinton, who napped at least once daily for 5-30 minutes during his presidency. Nap mats must replace the coffee pot for optimal productivity.
Judith Humble is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker and Certified Employee Assistance Professional with 16 years of experience providing mental health services, training, and consultation to the business community. Judith can be reached at (859) 576-0002, or judith_humble@yahoo.com