Can workaholism be as bad for productivity as alcoholism?

According to Charles Czeisler, a specialist in sleep deprivation at Harvard Medical School, workaholism might just be.

Dr. Czeisler recently reported that lack of sleep can be as bad for productivity as drinking too much alcohol.

According to Dr. Czeisler : "We now know that 24 hours without sleep, or a week of sleeping four or five hours a night, induces an impairment equivalent to having alcohol level in the blood. We would never say, 'This person is a great worker! He's drunk all the time!' …yet we continue to celebrate people who sacrifice sleep for work."

And Corporate America does promote workaholism amongst its ranks - pushing exec's to work marathon-100-hour-workweeks, encouraging employees to take red-eyes and land with fast-feet running to the office, rather than catch needed shut-eye and re-energize.

Dr. Czeisler warns that burning candles at both ends actually does not justify the productivity ends. Indeed sleep deprivation creates the antithesis to high performance.

“With too little sleep,” Dr Czeisler says, “people do things that no CEO in his or her right mind would allow.”

For this reason, Dr. Czeisler suggests companies now start to incorporate new sleep policies which oppose employees working beyond a 16-consecutive-hour period, and prohibit working or driving immediately after late-night or overnight flights.

Dr. Czeisler comments how it’s interesting that companies have rules to protect employees against smoking and sexual harassment -- yet companies promote self-destructve workaholism behavior.

I suggest you keep Dr. Czeisler ‘s report in mind the next time you have a choice between working too long versus getting needed rest.

In fact, I suggest you sleep on all this.