6 ms·

Sleep Deficit: The Performance Killer

152 points by agilo 15y ago

portentint 15y ago
In corporations this is a classic prisoner's dilemma: If EVERYONE agreed that they'd be sane and work optimal 40-50 hour weeks, it'd be great. But someone always 'defects', going to 80+ hours in an effort to show off. The result is actually lower efficiency, but since most corporations do very little track efficiency and results (they track effort, instead), it doesn't get caught.
- CPlatypus 15y ago
  I wish I could upvote that at least twice - once for the game-theory bit, and once for the tracking-effort bit. Those are both excellent insights.
  - portentint 15y ago
    Thanks. I actually run a company - I have to constantly watch people and make the effort/results separation. Folks never understand when they get a negative review "for putting in 12-hour days." See, it's because you spend 4 hours/day running in circles.
- kokey 15y ago
  I think I must be doing my bit by making sure I don't ever go over my 40 hours, even if I work in teams where others or the manager works long hours.
peter_l_downs 15y ago
Doesn't just apply to adults: highschool students do not get anywhere near enough sleep [1]. Some schools have tried moving to a later opening, which has in some cases led to better academic performance from the students, but most schools still start god-awfully early. [1] My own experience, may not apply to everyone, everywhere.
- TWSS 15y ago
  Not just your experience: http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/teens-health/CC00019 http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/teens-health/CC00019 Your circadian rhythm changes in your teens, and too few schools are willing to work with this rather than against it. The results are sleep-deprived kids doing crap work in school and getting into car accidents like the one mentioned at the start of the HBR article.
  - gwern 15y ago
    I've collected some citations on the topic: http://www.gwern.net/education-is-not-about-learning#school-hours http://www.gwern.net/education-is-not-about-learning#school-... (Too bad that there doesn't seem to be any large authoritative collection of relevant material.)
    - peter_l_downs 15y ago
      This page, and your entire site in general, are very interesting. Thank you for taking the time to compile all of these links, I'll have to start sending them to my teachers :)
      - gwern 15y ago
        Well, it's not finished\; so if you are going to send'em to anyone, might I suggest you pick particularly relevant citations and just link those instead or something like that? \ You obviously have no way of knowing this but my convention on gwern.net is anything in lower-caps is draft/incomplete, and so I don't link it unless it's extremely relevant (as it was in this case).
- learc83 15y ago
  I've always thought it was ridiculous how early school starts. I had to get on the bus at 7:00 when I was in high school (before I started driving).
  - 15y ago
CodeSoft 15y ago
I am a programmer.I make a blogs for programming language http://allprogramminglanguageblogs.blogspot.com/ http://allprogramminglanguageblogs.blogspot.com/ this is my blogsite.
Tsagadai 15y ago
I know this is anecdotal but I feel it is worth sharing. I've had insomnia for several years. I've tried treating it with drugs, sticking to routines, exercise, meditation, diet, controlled lighting, and quite a few other methods. Eventually, I just stopped looking at it as a problem. I sleep about 5 to 6 hours a night now and I feel great. I just accepted I don't have the same sleep patterns as everyone else and moved on with my life. I've read about reaction times and how sleep affects cognition but I really don't believe it, for me. I've tested performance by going shooting and recording scores after various amounts of sleep and found that after more than 7 hours of sleep a night I get worse scores. Science is averages, you might be average or you might not. Test your own performance and find out what you need. If you only need a few hours sleep and your performance is not affected, do that. Many people with insomnia worry about it or try to fix what might not be broken. You might be an outlier and not the average.
- veb 15y ago
  I've suffered from depression, and random crap like insomania. For years, I'd rely on the doctor and follow the medications. These just made my life and sleep much worse. Then one day, I ate a cookie that had been cooked with marijuana. Suffice to say, I slept a lovely 8 hour sleep that night - and the greatest thing? I've only ever had to use marijuana a _few_ times in the last 3 or so years. So, it seems to work long-term... I've figured it's probably better for my health to stop switching weird medications every 3 months, and have a brownie every now and again. I'm a much healther and happier person by far.
  - hartror 15y ago
    Interesting has there been any research done into this application. I have friends who have a little bit and just fall asleep (am not sure the effect on myself as I can't smoke and no one has ever offered me a hash cookie/brownie).
    - chimeracoder 15y ago
      > Interesting has there been any research done into this application. You mean using marijuana to treat insomnia (or sleep disorders in general)? Quite a lot, actually - marijuana is one of the most studied drugs in existence, and its effects on sleep disorders have been documented thoroughly. It depends on the state, but some of the states with medical marijuana laws accept sleep disorders as a valid use.
matwood 15y ago
99% had a great video from Tony Schwartz just last week: http://the99percent.com/videos/7110/Tony-Schwartz-The-Myths-of-the-Overworked-Creative http://the99percent.com/videos/7110/Tony-Schwartz-The-Myths-... Basically, he believes that mental exercises is just like physical exercise. During rest periods is when your capacity to do the exercise expands, not during the exercise itself.
ggwicz 15y ago
The fact that sleep is not really valued in the "start up" community is a disgusting reflection of stupid people. SLEEP MORE. A great resource is a book called `Lights Out! Sleep, Sugar, and Survival` by T.S. Wiley. They book eventually gets into some controversial territory without much data to support the claims, but the first half or so is largely about sleep and invaluable. There's a ton of references for the sleep section. Tl;dr - get the book I mention and sleep. Human sleep cycles change with the seasons and you shouldn't be up too much outside the realm of daylight if possible.
Zakharov 15y ago
Sleep certainly is important but things like "Educational programs about sleep, health, and safety should be mandatory" and "Additionally, companies should provide annual screening for sleep disorders in order to identify those who might be at risk" sound like well-intentioned wastes of time.
EdisonW 15y ago
I have to say, this is one of the goals were wanted to achieve when I made SleepBot (Android). Sleep is such a big issue especially for us programmers. We often not aware of how much sleep we actually lose everyday and how much performance it kills.
jcromartie 15y ago
As I sit here at nearly 3 AM trying to finish something for Monday that we over-promised a client...
mkramlich 15y ago
summary: get enough good sleep
paganel 15y ago
> People in executive positions should set behavioral expectations and develop corporate sleep policies (...) It’s important to have a policy limiting scheduled work:ideally to no more than 12 hours a day, and exceptionally to no more than 16 consecutive hours. This sentence seems like having been taken straight out of Marx's "Das Kapital", volume 1. I know this is the Harvard Business Review, a bastion of capitalism if there ever was one, but I gathered that business owners had smarten up a little in the last 150 years. If they don't want to do it for the benefit of their employees, they should do it for the benefit of their family and business friends, because at some point or another some guy like Lenin or Trotsky could come again and ride the wave of discontent and the consequences would not be pretty.
- obtu 15y ago
  This article was written for an audience of pointy-haired bosses, and so the meh scientific insights are followed by groundbreaking! executive! decisions!
itmag 15y ago
Seth Roberts' sleep experiments: http://escholarship.org/uc/item/2xc2h866#page-1 http://escholarship.org/uc/item/2xc2h866#page-1
willyt 15y ago
Be ready for this when you have kids. Your performance will drop right off for the first 12-18 months or so for each child. They disrupt your sleep and make your day physically and mentally longer and more demanding. The number of crazy things I have done in the car through chronic sleep deprivation is scary. I love my kids to bits by the way :-)
- nosequel 15y ago
  This is completely true. I was focused completely on work when I was at work when I had no kids. My first kid brought that building completely down. I would sit at my desk staring at the screen not knowing that time was even passing. I finally had to force myself to sleep at lunch in my car in the parking lot so I could focus enough in the afternoon to not get fired. Luckily it passed and I started getting sleep after a while. It is amazing the stuff you think and do when highly sleep deprived.

152 points by agilo 15y ago

In corporations this is a classic prisoner's dilemma: If EVERYONE agreed that they'd be sane and work optimal 40-50 hour weeks, it'd be great. But someone always 'defects', going to 80+ hours in an effort to show off. The result is actually lower efficiency, but since most corporations do very little track efficiency and results (they track effort, instead), it doesn't get caught.

CPlatypus 15y ago
I wish I could upvote that at least twice - once for the game-theory bit, and once for the tracking-effort bit. Those are both excellent insights.
- portentint 15y ago
  Thanks. I actually run a company - I have to constantly watch people and make the effort/results separation. Folks never understand when they get a negative review "for putting in 12-hour days." See, it's because you spend 4 hours/day running in circles.
kokey 15y ago
I think I must be doing my bit by making sure I don't ever go over my 40 hours, even if I work in teams where others or the manager works long hours.

peter_l_downs 15y ago

Doesn't just apply to adults: highschool students do not get anywhere near enough sleep [1]. Some schools have tried moving to a later opening, which has in some cases led to better academic performance from the students, but most schools still start god-awfully early. [1] My own experience, may not apply to everyone, everywhere.

TWSS 15y ago
Not just your experience: http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/teens-health/CC00019 http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/teens-health/CC00019 Your circadian rhythm changes in your teens, and too few schools are willing to work with this rather than against it. The results are sleep-deprived kids doing crap work in school and getting into car accidents like the one mentioned at the start of the HBR article.
- gwern 15y ago
  I've collected some citations on the topic: http://www.gwern.net/education-is-not-about-learning#school-hours http://www.gwern.net/education-is-not-about-learning#school-... (Too bad that there doesn't seem to be any large authoritative collection of relevant material.)
  - peter_l_downs 15y ago
    This page, and your entire site in general, are very interesting. Thank you for taking the time to compile all of these links, I'll have to start sending them to my teachers :)
    - gwern 15y ago
      Well, it's not finished\; so if you are going to send'em to anyone, might I suggest you pick particularly relevant citations and just link those instead or something like that? \ You obviously have no way of knowing this but my convention on gwern.net is anything in lower-caps is draft/incomplete, and so I don't link it unless it's extremely relevant (as it was in this case).
learc83 15y ago
I've always thought it was ridiculous how early school starts. I had to get on the bus at 7:00 when I was in high school (before I started driving).
- 15y ago

CodeSoft 15y ago

I am a programmer.I make a blogs for programming language http://allprogramminglanguageblogs.blogspot.com/ http://allprogramminglanguageblogs.blogspot.com/ this is my blogsite.

Tsagadai 15y ago

I know this is anecdotal but I feel it is worth sharing. I've had insomnia for several years. I've tried treating it with drugs, sticking to routines, exercise, meditation, diet, controlled lighting, and quite a few other methods. Eventually, I just stopped looking at it as a problem. I sleep about 5 to 6 hours a night now and I feel great. I just accepted I don't have the same sleep patterns as everyone else and moved on with my life. I've read about reaction times and how sleep affects cognition but I really don't believe it, for me. I've tested performance by going shooting and recording scores after various amounts of sleep and found that after more than 7 hours of sleep a night I get worse scores. Science is averages, you might be average or you might not. Test your own performance and find out what you need. If you only need a few hours sleep and your performance is not affected, do that. Many people with insomnia worry about it or try to fix what might not be broken. You might be an outlier and not the average.

veb 15y ago
I've suffered from depression, and random crap like insomania. For years, I'd rely on the doctor and follow the medications. These just made my life and sleep much worse. Then one day, I ate a cookie that had been cooked with marijuana. Suffice to say, I slept a lovely 8 hour sleep that night - and the greatest thing? I've only ever had to use marijuana a _few_ times in the last 3 or so years. So, it seems to work long-term... I've figured it's probably better for my health to stop switching weird medications every 3 months, and have a brownie every now and again. I'm a much healther and happier person by far.
- hartror 15y ago
  Interesting has there been any research done into this application. I have friends who have a little bit and just fall asleep (am not sure the effect on myself as I can't smoke and no one has ever offered me a hash cookie/brownie).
  - chimeracoder 15y ago
    > Interesting has there been any research done into this application. You mean using marijuana to treat insomnia (or sleep disorders in general)? Quite a lot, actually - marijuana is one of the most studied drugs in existence, and its effects on sleep disorders have been documented thoroughly. It depends on the state, but some of the states with medical marijuana laws accept sleep disorders as a valid use.

matwood 15y ago

99% had a great video from Tony Schwartz just last week: http://the99percent.com/videos/7110/Tony-Schwartz-The-Myths-of-the-Overworked-Creative http://the99percent.com/videos/7110/Tony-Schwartz-The-Myths-... Basically, he believes that mental exercises is just like physical exercise. During rest periods is when your capacity to do the exercise expands, not during the exercise itself.

ggwicz 15y ago

The fact that sleep is not really valued in the "start up" community is a disgusting reflection of stupid people. SLEEP MORE. A great resource is a book called `Lights Out! Sleep, Sugar, and Survival` by T.S. Wiley. They book eventually gets into some controversial territory without much data to support the claims, but the first half or so is largely about sleep and invaluable. There's a ton of references for the sleep section. Tl;dr - get the book I mention and sleep. Human sleep cycles change with the seasons and you shouldn't be up too much outside the realm of daylight if possible.

Zakharov 15y ago

Sleep certainly is important but things like "Educational programs about sleep, health, and safety should be mandatory" and "Additionally, companies should provide annual screening for sleep disorders in order to identify those who might be at risk" sound like well-intentioned wastes of time.

EdisonW 15y ago

I have to say, this is one of the goals were wanted to achieve when I made SleepBot (Android). Sleep is such a big issue especially for us programmers. We often not aware of how much sleep we actually lose everyday and how much performance it kills.

jcromartie 15y ago

As I sit here at nearly 3 AM trying to finish something for Monday that we over-promised a client...

mkramlich 15y ago

summary: get enough good sleep

paganel 15y ago

> People in executive positions should set behavioral expectations and develop corporate sleep policies (...) It’s important to have a policy limiting scheduled work:ideally to no more than 12 hours a day, and exceptionally to no more than 16 consecutive hours. This sentence seems like having been taken straight out of Marx's "Das Kapital", volume 1. I know this is the Harvard Business Review, a bastion of capitalism if there ever was one, but I gathered that business owners had smarten up a little in the last 150 years. If they don't want to do it for the benefit of their employees, they should do it for the benefit of their family and business friends, because at some point or another some guy like Lenin or Trotsky could come again and ride the wave of discontent and the consequences would not be pretty.

obtu 15y ago
This article was written for an audience of pointy-haired bosses, and so the meh scientific insights are followed by groundbreaking! executive! decisions!

itmag 15y ago

Seth Roberts' sleep experiments: http://escholarship.org/uc/item/2xc2h866#page-1 http://escholarship.org/uc/item/2xc2h866#page-1

willyt 15y ago

Be ready for this when you have kids. Your performance will drop right off for the first 12-18 months or so for each child. They disrupt your sleep and make your day physically and mentally longer and more demanding. The number of crazy things I have done in the car through chronic sleep deprivation is scary. I love my kids to bits by the way :-)

nosequel 15y ago
This is completely true. I was focused completely on work when I was at work when I had no kids. My first kid brought that building completely down. I would sit at my desk staring at the screen not knowing that time was even passing. I finally had to force myself to sleep at lunch in my car in the parking lot so I could focus enough in the afternoon to not get fired. Luckily it passed and I started getting sleep after a while. It is amazing the stuff you think and do when highly sleep deprived.