Sleep, that is. According to a recent survey of 4,000 British workers published by the budget hotel group, Travelodge last week, money worries and the credit ‘crunch’ are driving a wave of sleep deprivation across the UK workforce. Baroness Thatcher may once famously have claimed to needing just four hours of sleep per night, despite the punishing workload of the office of Prime Minister, but eight hours is what the experts feel is good for our health.
Topping the sleep deprivation poll are estate agents; and while it may be difficult to summon up any degree of sympathy for this group (which only gets five hours and 50 minutes sleep a night), we should remember that the underlying cause – the house price slump – has the potential adversely to affect many more of us! Two groups of workers taking the brunt of the current fuel price hike – truck and taxi drivers – are the next on the list, averaging just six hours and 16 minutes a night; a bit worrying when you think of their road safety responsibilities.
The third position, not surprisingly, is held by the banking profession, which manages just six hours and 23 minutes of sleep per night. Builders and accountants complete the top five, with both getting on average some six hours and 24 minutes of shuteye each night. Engineers are also among the most sleep deprived of the nation, getting about six hours and 34 minutes – a little ahead of the IT profession, which manages six hours and 30 minutes.
I suppose sleep is a ‘commodity’ that is of essential interest to a big national hotel chain like Travelodge, which, let’s be fair, is there to offer a place to rest after a weary day on the motorways rather than a venue for sumptuous dining and entertainment. So, it may be no surprise to learn that the group actually has a director of sleep – one Leigh McCarron. He believes the results of his survey reflect the prevailing economic conditions, with money worries and job insecurity driving up stress levels, which, in turn, lead to significant sleep loss.
The reasons why 40% of workers regularly experience difficulty getting to sleep also came to light in the survey. Some of them are obvious but include work pressure worries, domestic budget worries, working long hours (leading to late meals and late retiring to bed), that alcoholic nightcap and catching up on a heavy daily workload at home in the evening.
The research also identifies more than a third of the sample claiming that it simply can’t switch off from work at any time. Moreover, 23% said their first thought of the day was about their job and 32% drift off to sleep thinking of work. Some 78% of respondents said they would love to get more sleep if they had the time and – sadly, in this author’s view – more than half of the sample surveyed said they actually take time off work and use their weekends catching up on the week’s lost sleep.
Mr McCarron warns that all this is a vicious circle. Losing valuable sleep, he says, will certainly impact on your wellbeing and productivity. He has a few tips to offer to help you get a good night’s rest. The first is to write down everything that is worrying you before you go to bed, in order to clear your mind; next, stick to a regular bedtime every night. Routine is good, he says, as it ensures your natural body clock follows a rhythm. Finally, avoid eating after 7.00pm. Your body needs a couple of hours to digest food and if you go to bed on a full stomach, your brain and body are too busy with the process of digestion and you will find it difficult to fall asleep. Our mothers and grandmothers would have advised as much, but it is good to hear it from the mouth of a 21st century business executive!
And what about those lucky souls who always seem to manage to get a good night’s rest? Well, we hacks are among fortunate few, apparently, with the survey placing ‘media and creative’ at the top the list of the nation’s least sleep deprived. Time for bed, said Zebedee!
Les Hunt
Editor