Earn up to $ 300 per year
American insurance group Aetna started an unusual and original initiative to increase working efficiency by increasing staff’s night sleep time. For staffs who want to participate to the program, the group provides up to ＄300 reward per year. Staff can earn ＄25 for every 20 nights in which they sleep at least seven hours, a limit of ＄300 for every 12 months. This project started in 2014 when 12,300 people joined it, recording an increase in 2015 with total of 17,300 within 49,500 employees the group counts. Each staff manually record how long they have slept every night and the system is based on trust, important factor for the success of the program creating stronger relations between employer and employee.
Aetna’s commitment to ensuring that its workers get enough sleep comes as a number of studies warn that not sleeping long enough can significantly affect ability to do our job. In USA, average worker loses 11,3 working days or ＄2,280 of productivity per year due to sleep deprivation, according to a 2011 report by the American Academy of Sleep Medicine. This adds up to an annual loss of ＄63.2 Billion for USA economy.
Last year, researchers at the University of California San Francisco warned that not getting enough sleep can make people ill. They found people sleeping less than six hours a night are ‘four times more likely to catch a cold when exposed to the viruses.
Global competitiveness, digital technology development and important increase of information and communication make everyday life rhythm much faster and it might be a ‘luxury’ finding 7 or 8 hours daily only for sleep. Many people believe price for success is connected with ‘burn’ attitude but many researches and studies proves the opposite. One of perfect example is Mrs. Arianna Huffington, founder and boss of news website Huffington Post, who after had been working 18 hours days for years, radically changed her life style and started to sleep 8 hours every night, transforming her life and greatly improving her ability to work. Ms. Huffington says ‘Different scientific data show more we take sleep, more we will improve aspects of the life. Mental capacity and clarity of thinking, joy of life, force not be destabilized by bad happenings.’ are some of aspects.
Why don’t you take a bit more of sleep?
