We are all aware that many of us are sleep-deprived and when we wake up in the morning not feeling rested, it becomes more challenging to put in a productive day.  Most of us also wake up in the morning and rested or not, we do not have any plans to have any sort of a ‘rest’ with our eyes closed until bedtime!

Although that routine has been considered the norm, times are changing – literally!  I’m confident a part of our tired society has to do with technology allowing us to work anytime and anywhere. We once thought that we would be able to work less because we could accomplish more in less time with technology.  However, as we all know we just started to work more and more hours. This includes working after the office closes (including our virtual ones), but are we looking after ourselves in the process?

Our downtime has been replaced by working, so our working hours should involve some downtime as well.  A quick nap of 20-minutes or less has been making a world of difference for some.   “We’re still stuck in this perception of sleep as a luxury,”  instead of seeing it as “a positive health behaviour with beneficial outcomes for productivity”.

Some offices have even created nap rooms to support this. In Japan, companies are installing sound-proof pods to encourage workers, who put in long hours, to get some rest.

As this subject continues to increase in practice and popularity, hopefully we will see this more often and there will be less stigma and scrutiny about it.  Ultimately a nap is a ‘win-win’ for the employer and the worker: Rest Equals Productivity.

There of course needs to be guidelines around the practice, but once Health & Safety topics and other rules of napping are in place, we can rest assure that rest can happen!

~ Kerri

Sources: “Should Workers be Allowed to Nap at Work?” (https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-50396297)

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