Article critique
The article deals with one of the most compelling topics which most organizations tend to overlook. This topic is based on the lack of sleep and its possible hazards to an individual and the organization as a whole. The writer starts by suggesting that most organization take the issue of sleep lightly as it does not come under its purview. The introduction highlights past accidents to individuals and lists
down the losses incurred by firms due to lack of sleep. The article them describes its purpose by mentioning organizational factors responsible for sleep deprivation and its adverse effects on personnel and the firm as a whole. Lastly, the article provides certain mechanisms to manage sleepy employees, emphasizing on mitigation and prevention. The introduction is relevant, precise and the writer puts forward certain examples to emphasise his point.
The writer has taken up a very relevant topic which is not much discussed even though due to breakthrough in technology it has become possible to break all barriers. The literature review of this article has provided strong justifications by identifying how individual employees may be deprived of their sleep. Practical instances have been provided wherein the author has mentioned that employees provided with deadlines may be deprived of their sleep. Moreover the introduction of flexible timings by firms has further led to the time tables of employees to be erratic. There are people who may need to work for two consecutive shifts and hence are deprived of their sleep. Some others may have erratic timings, especially those employees who are outsourced. The writer mentions firms which have a 24 hour schedule and sometimes due to shortage of staff, an employee may be asked to do a double shift which means the person does not get any time to rest or take a nap.
The article also highlights some risks due to lack of sleep. This is illustrated in the next section of the narrative wherein preventive actions and mitigating the problem due to sleep deprivation is discussed in detail.
The audience was already given an idea about the narrative in the introduction. The article has an excellent introduction and a literature review by providing concrete steps to fight sleep deprivation and by highlighting the importance of sleep for organizational success. However, the conclusion has not been well researched. In fact, the conclusion is extremely brief and just summarises the narrative.
The writer could have shared a personal reflection of the overall article or may have put in some opinions. These would make the conclusion more interesting. Also steps for further research in this area may be provided and also the limitations of this research could have been highlight in this article. However, none of them has been done.
Overall the article has scored well due to its well conceived introduction and tightening of the literature review. In fact, concrete examples have made the audience to reflect on the problems posed due to lack of sleep. Also the writer has not mentioned any scholarly reference to justify his opinions. Moreover statistical data has not been mentioned in the article. All these details need to be included so that the opinion is well justified. By going through the article, it seems as if the writer has just expressed his opinions and viewpoints. The writer has mentioned in passing that there has been several academic research on the topic of sleep deprivation but has failed to mention the names of authors, scholars or researchers who has carried out study in this field.
For an article to be deemed important and intriguing it is necessary that it has all the above mentioned requisites. Just by summarizing the problem and mentioning some steps may not always help in giving weight to a particular subject area.
References
Barnes, C.M. (2011). I’ll sleep when I’m dead: Managing those too busy to sleep. Organizational dynamics, 40, 18 – 26.
