The argument is straight out lacking the much-needed supporting elements for pillaring the study in order to be considered a vital discovery for application in human living patterns for the growth of the concerned businesses. There can be several other factors resulting in the company of a particular group of executives with different sleeping patterns having a higher or lower profit margins. Similarly, the growth of a company cannot be calculated on the sleeping patterns of an employee.
First off, the authenticity of this study cannot be confirmed as it is nowhere mentioned in the article who or which organisation conducted this study. The duration of the study is also unknown. Considering how this study was carried out by an advertising firm and is printed in a business magazine, it is possible this study was never made and the information was just forged or made up for personal gain like advertising a product or maybe their own company.
Even if the study is genuine let’s look into how the study included 300 male and female candidates (advertising executives) for this experiment. It is not specified what the age group of the experiment subjects was. These executives could be of varying age groups, say 17 to 65. According, to a study carried out in 2017 by a group of students majoring in psychology at Harvard and led by three of the professors from the psychology department, different age groups require different amount of sleep. Infants should sleep as much they can, kids below 10 should sleep no more than 9 hours a day and the young working force of 18 to 45 should sleep only for 7-8 hours maximum. The number of hours one should sleep keeps decreasing with the increasing age.
In addition to that, it isn’t mentioned or stated what the physical or mental condition of those test subjects was. People tend to be lethargic or tedious at work places when they have emotional stress or are not in the best of their physical state. It’s possible that those 300 men and women were both physically and mentally fit when the study was in progress. There could’ve been some other reasons as to why the companies whose executives were involved in the study would have experiencing a growth in profit margins and growth rate. Maybe the products they manufactured or services they provided might recently have gained an unexpected positive attention from the public. Possibly the product/services had something unique or was much needed.
The fact that no solid statistical information has been included in the article about the study conducted and how much the limitation of 6 hours of sleep has helped the businesses. The prospect of businesses considering invading the private lives of their employees or future employees based on this article is quite difficult and can also prove risky.
In conclusion, companies should not keep a weighing factor of sleep hours over knowledge and brilliance of a future employee. Employers cannot invade the personal lives of an employee for their own interests. A person may sleep 4 hours or 8 hours, if the performance received in an interview from that person is above satisfactory or up to the mark and the person is likely to be hired then there’s no reason for the sleep factor to be considered.