That's Fit

It's 9:30 in the morning. If you wake up at 7:00 every day, you've now been churning and burning for a solid two and a half hours. Shower: check. Shave: check. Get dressed: check. Eat breakfast: check. Drive to work: check. Log on: check. Begin task number one of 1,000: check. Respond to 25 emails: check. Leave first meeting of the day: check. And that just about brings you to where you are now at 9:30. If you're already feeling like you need a nap, it's clearly for good reason.

What are the chances that your boss will let you curl up under your desk for twenty minutes to catch some Z's? Well, if you happen to work for any of the growing number of companies in the U.S. that are allowing employees to take power naps, your chances are actually quite good.

Newsweek reports that 37 percent of Americans nap during the day, citing a survey by the National Sleep Foundation. What's more, about a third of people surveyed stated that their employer permitted naps, and that more than a quarter said they would sleep at work if they were allowed to. While this may seem counterproductive to improving employee output, it actually offers both employees and employers long-term benefits.
A growing body of evidence suggests that napping during the day improves memory, creativity and alertness. Moreover, if an employee is not healthy enough to work (or work to their full capacity), an employer may have to absorb the costs associated with their absence. Therefore, the fact that regular daytime napping can reduce coronary mortality (by 37 percent, according to a joint study from Harvard School of Public Health and the University of Athens Medical School) makes affording employees a "nap time" a means of ensuring many more years of able-bodied service.

Experts suggest taking 20-minute power naps during the day, a duration they claim is the perfect amount to boost alertness and motor performance. Napping longer than that will put you into a slow-wave sleep, leaving you feeling groggy when you wake up.

With the Who, the What, the When, and the How covered, what remains is Where: where can you take a daytime nap on a workday? Until offices offer kindergarten-style napping pads, your best bet is to jump in your car and drive to a quiet place near your office, says the Newsweek article. Or, if you happen to live in New York City, you can visit Yelo (yelonyc.com), where for $15 you can rent a private sleep pod for 20 minutes for a daytime snooze.