The naughty siesta

A lot of people ― almost half of remote workers ― are taking a nap during the workday. And managers lead the pack

IF YOU’VE EVER secretly napped at work, here’s something that might absolve any lingering guilt: you’re definitely not alone. A survey of around 1,000 remote and hybrid workers by Amerisleep found that 48 per cent admitted to catching an average of an hour and twenty minutes of napping per week.

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“Napping has become a quiet norm for many remote workers, blending rest into the rhythm of the workday,” Amerisleep’s report said. “Even leaders are split, with some encouraging naps and others still seeing them as unprofessional.”

In its survey results, managers were marginally more likely to nap than their subordinates. Those in marketing and finance topped the list of nap-happy sectors, with 59 per cent of people in those fields saying they napped. Gen Z is the generation more likely to nap (which won’t be helping their image as the lazy generation much).

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One in five say they put fake calendar events up to make themselves look busy ― and one in ten said they’ve been caught. When the nappers were asked what they would give up in exchange for the right to nap, most said they would trade a day of PTO for napping rights.

Napping is probably more widespread than the report indicates — you have to factor in how many people might have fibbed a little when responding to a survey, and remote and hybrid work, obviously, moves it behind closed doors.

Slate’s Ask a Manager advice columnist Alison Green wrote recently that she’s seen all sorts of questions over the years related to napping at work. Mostly it’s stories of people finding creative ways to sneak away for a few minutes (and often getting caught in the process), but she said she’s received many stories of napping going awry in the remote work era, too. “One guy had his camera on and was working from his bedroom. His wife came into the bedroom and flopped on the bed for a nap,” reads one story. “A couple minutes later, he got up from his chair, crawled into bed and started napping with [her.]”

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When Amerisleep shared their survey results, they described this as time being “wasted.” But many scientists in the room would likely disagree and side with those bosses who turn a blind eye. A 2015 study in the journal Personality and Individual Differences supported napping as a productivity booster. Nappers were more able to tolerate frustrating tasks and were less likely to make impulsive decisions than non-nappers. And a 2006 study found that nurses granted 40 minutes to nap were better at inserting IVs, made fewer mistakes and “reported more vigour” than non-nappers.

“Obviously you don’t want people snoring through meetings,” wrote Green. “But there’s no point in having employees struggle through a workday exhausted if a short power nap means they’ll return to work with increased accuracy and productivity.” Kieran Delamont