Naps: a tool for workplace productivity

The October issue of the Harvard Business Review contains an insightful piece by Robert Stickgold, "The Simplest Way to Reboot Your Brain." The big idea: Naps during the work day make employees more productive. The science shows that sleep helps people, post-nap, integrate unassociated information for creative problem solving and that a nap boosts memory. In short, the employee becomes sharper with  information handling, and a nap, according to Stickgold, also helps with separating important information from extraneous detail. How long a nap is required? He says a micro-nap as short as six minutes (not including falling asleep) helps. Google has a pro-napping policy, he notes, and provides its employees with pods, blocking out light and noise so they can take a snooze.