The Restless and Profitless: The High Cost of Missing Workplace Napping

More and more research is linking workplace napping to increased employee concentration and productivity. It is no coincidence that giant companies such as Google and Facebook now have sleep pods in their headquarters.  But how should HR professionals use this tool to support employee wellbeing, and what exactly can companies gain from introducing a workplace napping? Corvinus researchers and colleagues from Appalachian State University and the University of Dundee School of Business have investigated this topic.    

When Huffington Post co-founder Arianna Huffington fainted from exhaustion at work, she realised she needed to radically change her life. The businesswoman later wrote a book about the changing attitudes of society towards rest and the latest scientific research on sleep disorders. In the light of this, it is no wonder that the company’s New York headquarters now has several sleep rooms for employees and that management encourages explicitly employees to relax.    

According to a 2018 study, an average of 57% of employees fall asleep at work for shorter or longer periods, even though they are not allowed to. The concept of napping in the workplace has evolved significantly in recent years, with many companies around the world using it as a tool to promote mental wellbeing. Medical research on the subject has shown that, as with coffee and music in the office, naps at work can significantly reduce stress levels and improve concentration.    

“Even a quick 20-minute nap (a power nap) can significantly improve workers’ mood, memory, cognitive performance and creativity for the rest of the day. It also has a number of positive health effects, such as improving immune function and reducing the risk of heart attack,” explains Amitabh Anand, a Research fellow of CIAS, Corvinus University and a Full professor at Excelia Business School, France who, together with his co-authors, recently published in a study in the prestigious European Management Journal.    

How much sleep is efficient?    

Employees and HR managers often underestimate the benefits of napping at work, but the most innovative executives in large companies no longer dispute its validity. Google, Nike, Procter & Gamble and Facebook headquarters have for years provided employees with sleeping pods to relax in during the day, Uber has set aside an area at its headquarters for rest, and Sweden’s Forza has created Zen rooms to boost creativity.    

But opinions are more divided on how many minutes a day of siesta at work is best, with varying lengths of naps shown to have different effects on alertness and cognitive ability: “medical research points to the fact that it is not good to nap at work for more than 30 minutes, because the body then goes into a prolonged rest, and waking up from a deep sleep can result in prolonged fatigue,” says the researcher.    

The World Sleep Society also does not recommend that daytime naps exceed 45 minutes. Research on the subject has shown that even quick naps of 20 minutes or less (so-called power naps) can improve concentration and cognitive ability. However, nap length can have differential effects: researchers found that a short nap of 15 minutes improved alertness 30 minutes after waking, while a longer nap of 45 minutes improved attention only after 3 hours.     

Workplace napping is a reasonable decision    

Taking a nap at work not only benefits companies’ productivity, it also brings tangible benefits for workers: fewer errors and absences from work and more frequent promotions. According to a recent US report, workers who were allowed to nap at work were 18% more likely to report a promotion in the past year than their non-snorers counterparts. However, the authors of the study, summarising published research on the subject, also note that naptime at work is still more accessible to those in higher positions: a survey on the subject found that 55% of people who nap at work are in managerial positions, compared with 41% of non-snorers.    

The study also looks at industry differences, with 25% of workers in the technology sector saying their managers allow them to nap, and nearly 19% in the arts and entertainment sector, according to one 2018 study cited. However, it is banned for 62% of IT workers, 57-57% of public officials and 57% of finance and insurance professionals.    

The topic deserves further research, including how it impacts organisational performance, what other benefits it has, in what industry and context it is most effective, and how to address misuse. Organisations are investing considerable time and resources to increase their competitiveness, and to do so they want to improve employee performance and encourage innovative thinking. Science shows that short sleep in the workplace can do both, and if companies do not promote it, they are missing out on an easy and cheap strategic advantage. Therefore, the study recommends that business leaders make common sense decisions and take the initiative to embed the opportunity for a nap at work into their organisational culture.  

The authors of the publication were Amitabh Anand (Corvinus University of Budapest and Excelia Business School), Rita Tóth (Corvinus University of Budapest), Jessica L. Doll (Appalachian State University) and Sanjay Kumar Singh (University of Dundee School of Business).