If you have ever been in a meeting and people start getting tetchy, there’s a chance someone will have said, “I think we should sleep on it before making a decision”. When everyone in the room is tired, because the meeting has gone on too long, tempers will inevitably get frayed. Indeed, the heated row between Elon Musk and Donald Trump could be attributed to fatigue and a lack of sleep.
Donald Trump has said that he has little sleep, getting about three or four hours a night. Elon Musk has been public about his poor sleeping habits. Indeed, he has said that he even sleeps on the floor of his Tesla office. He once admitted that his poor sleep routine “hurt his brain”. Is it any wonder that two men, who are open about their lack of sleep, get a little argumentative with one another?
Margaret Thatcher, though, reportedly only had four hours of sleep a night. What we did not discover until the National Archives released the details was that she was sleeping in the Prime Ministerial Daimler to catch up on her missed slumbers.
Some people like to boast that they survive on little sleep. The trouble is, they are not effective. Worse still, they become difficult to work with due to a combination of irritability and unpredictability. On top of this, they can nod off at inappropriate times. Plus, a new study from Belgium shows that when we are sleep deprived, we become more narcissistic and increasingly psychopathic. So, perhaps it is not a good idea to have too little sleep if you are in a leadership position, where you are more likely to have such “dark triad” tendencies in the first place. Lack of sleep appears to bring out those darker sides of personality. So, if sleeplessness amplifies dark-triad traits in already aggressive leaders, what does that mean for everyday managers?
A recent study showed that around 14% of the UK population have so little sleep that it is dangerous. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention showed that almost 40% of the USA population is sleep deprived. Despite continuous education about the need for sleep, the proportion of people not getting enough sleep appears to remain stubborn. The only time in recent history when slightly more people got better sleep was during the COVID pandemic.
A few years ago, the research organisation Rand Europe showed that the lack of proper sleep was costing the UK economy £40bn a year. The researchers pointed out that if people in the UK just got one hour more sleep a night, that would boost the economy by £24bn. That’s about the same as the Government spends on caring for the elderly in a year. That’s before we take into account the economic benefits of improved health in those who sleep more each night. Perhaps there should be a tax on staying awake too long?
Many people I speak with in business and education tell me that life is increasingly tough at work. Petulant bosses appear commonplace these days. Similarly, the level of office conflict is also high. Lack of sleep may be a contributing factor.
We live in a world of “always on” technology, encouraging us to also be “always on”. But we’re not built like that. Our bodies are designed for sleep to recover from the activities of the day and for our brains to do the filing, as it were. Sleep is essential.
Regular bedtimes, without any technology accompanying us, are what we need. But how do we do that when our alarms are now on our phones and our only way of being in touch with family is with a mobile, having ditched the landline? Also, how can you go to bed at the same time each night when you are encouraged by streaming services to watch “just one more episode” of that thrilling series?
There is an answer, but British businesses may find it far too radical. The answer is to be more like Maggie Thatcher and sleep in the daytime. Siesta, built into the working day, will restore sleep, thereby boosting business, improving the economy, making people healthier and reducing tetchiness and conflict. Goodness me, it’s so beneficial, why has nobody thought of this before? Oh, hang on, what did you say about working in Madrid…? If you can’t relocate your business to Spain and can’t undergo a complete culture change, you could start small by designating one time slot each week where everyone can take a nap. If you monitor what happens, you should be able to demonstrate that it makes a difference. Then you really could sleep your way to a better business.
