The importance of a good nights sleep has been something I’ve badgered on about incessantly over the past few years, whether it’s for our ability to learn, or our productivity when we get to work.

Despite the apparent advantages of having a well rested workforce, there has been precious little involvement of managers in the restfulness of their staff, bar the odd experiment with power nap pods and the like.

Getting a good nights Sleepio

Whilst no one expects HR to be a physical factor in our homes, an increasing number are using technology to try and help their employees be well rested.  One of the most popular is Sleepio, from UK health company Big Health.

Sleepio has recently undergone a randomized control trial in a major Fortune 500 company to test the impact on the productivity of employees.  The outcome, which was published in a recent paper, with a positive outcome on both productivity and absenteeism.

Sleepio offers users a sleep improvement program that’s designed to help improve their sleep. The program lasts for six weeks and is tailored based upon the results of a questionnaire undertaken at the start of the program that details the sleep habits of the user.

The user is guided through the program by an avatar known as ‘the Prof’, who will also suggest behavioral changes to the user alongside some common cognitive behavioral techniques they can deploy.

The company have recently secured a $12 million funding round, which they hope will enable them to grow their customer base significantly.

There are already some 750,000 employees using the Sleepio system to try and improve their sleep, and the plan is to rapidly expand this customer base.

“Over 750,000 employees now have access to our Sleepio program after our first full year in the U.S. market. This new investment allows us to push on towards our goal of helping millions back to good mental health, by growing the number of companies we work with and evolving our products to help address an ever-wider range of mental health issues. But we’ll only achieve this goal – and firmly establish a new “digital medicine” industry – by remaining committed to evidence-based solutions that deliver real outcomes for users,” co-founder Peter Hames says.

It’s normally the case that we regard digital devices as being anethema to good sleep, but maybe Sleepio will buck that trend.