Crunch-time Sleep Deprivation: Survival Strategies?

Question

Fore-warning: I'm typing this question on 3 hours' sleep in the last 48, after a month straight of long hours and sacrificed weekends. Launch deadline D-day was 12 hours ago, now we're in red time.

What do you do to make it through delivery deadline crunches? Survival strategies? Tips? Caffeine super-charge advice?

Answer 1

1. Get sleep whenever you can - even 20 minutes at a time
2. Avoid driving a car
3. Sign up here

Answer 2

Sleep.

There is nothing (caffeine included) that can replace sleeping, and you absolutely need sleep to function. If you have been awake for too long, you are more or less useless to the team.

Actually, what you create when you are too sleep deprived may actually cause problems that takes so long to solve that it delays the project instead of taking it forward.

After a few hours sleep you are so much more effective, that you will quickly make up for the sleep time.

Answer 3

As I said in my comment, I'm in a similar boat. Over the last several years, I've been on more than one Death March. I don't like them, but I have a few things that may help. And I certainly look forward to other responses.

Some do's:

• If you can see it coming, cut back on the caffeine leading up to it. Then, when you have to, hit your body with a coffee or soda (or 3) late in the afternoon. It should get you into the night. It helps me.
• Critique. At least make mental notes so if you do some kind of postmortem, you can attempt to reduce the next time it happens.
• Laugh. You have to make jokes to keep your sanity. Poke fun at yourself if nothing less.
• Every few hours, get away for 20-30 minutes. Take a walk, light jog, something for the body to cleanse the mind.
• Document all the cut corners and short cuts you're making so you can refactor them away once it's out the door and you can take a break.
• Listen to music that mentally takes you away.
• [Adding] - Prioritize. Determine, or get the Product/Project Manager to clearly indicate the order of precedence. Don't assume stuff and go down rabbit holes for no reason.

Some do not's:

• lash out at co-workers. You're all in this together. Turn it into a perverse team building exercise. Like Deliverance without the banjos.
• Swear it will never happen again. Never say never or the universe will make sure it happens again.

Most importantly, keep you sanity. Good luck. You will get through it.

Answer 4

Perhaps I've been in this job too long but these types of question irritate me enormously. As has already been said, this kind of situation is probably illegal in most parts of the development world (if it isn't then it ought to be).

Apart from anything else, it's stupid and self-delusory. I'm not impressed with these power-coders who put in chemically-supported (caffine or whatever) mega coding sessions and are then proud of themselves. The chances are they have just produced a pile of crap which will give some poor debugger nightmares.

I cannot tell you how often I've struggled with a problem through an afternoon and then gone home. In the morning, the problem melts away and is solved in minutes. Sure, if I had slaved away, pumped myself full of Jolt/RedBull/... I might have got there by the early hours too.

Sleep matters. It's not cool. Your mates won't find it so impressive. But it works.

** rant end ** (think I'll go and have a lie down now)

Answer 5

Don't do it. I did 120 hours overtime in one week. Then 115 the next.

Thus Week 1 was 160 hours, week 2 was 155.

Slept at work most of the time.

The source code took years to get back into shape.

It nearly killed me, and I was younger then.

For maximum no-sleep, you sleep on the floor, with bubble wrap for a pillow. You'll never manage more than an hour or so a day.

It turned out the code didn't get used for months.

The hardware wasn't done either, and it turned out to be impossible for the software to work ( many months later to work out the hardware was buggy.)

So go gently.

My advice is no crunches. Your performance drops and product quality suffers.

Answer 6

Change your job! Nothing is worth your health!

Answer 7

I'm surprised that no-one has explicitly mentioned polyphasic sleep yet. "Polyphasic" means simply multiple episodes per day but in this context research has should that it is possible to live happily for weeks or months on 2-3hrs sleep per day by taking 20min-30min naps every four hours continuously.

You may have heard anecdotally of polyphasic sleeping through "self-help" blogs around the place, but it has actually seen some measure of actual scientific research into whether/how it works. The book with the collated results is called ‘Why We Nap’, a collection of academic papers on the topic.

Particularly relevant quotes from Claudio Stampi's work therein:

The generally accepted upper limit for working intensively and continuously is between 2 and 3 days. In some situations the detrimental effects of sleep loss may appear within the first 24 hr of continuous work.

On the limits of regular sleep in such situations:

Research has demonstrated that if sleep is gradually reduced in amount, most performance can be maintained at normal levels with 60-70% of the usual amount of sleep (4.5-5.5 hr per day; e.g., Friedmann et al., 1977). Approximately 5 hr of nocturnal sleep certainly appear to be the best way to obtain minimal sleep.

And most notably:

Polyphasic sleep may be a feasible, and perhaps the only, strategy allowing remarkable levels of sleep reduction during prolonged quasi- continuous work situations, without unduly compromising performance effectiveness.

The ability to fall asleep quickly and being able to adapt to such a anti-social sleeping regime are certainly necessary to pull this off, but under the circumstances it sounds like neither of these issues will be a problem for you.

If you are strict about your sleeping patterns and your environment is conducive to naps every four hours, then by using this approach you should be able to survive indefinitely on 2-3 hours sleep per day.

Of course, you'll still burn out from the concentration of working the increased number of hours, but at least you won't be experiencing sleep deprivation at the same time.

Answer 8

1. Minimize exposure to electronic display device whenever you can.
   • The high intensity of light will disrupt your brain's sleep pattern.
2. Stop work immediately if signs of derilium occur.
   • You and your coworkers must keep a close watch on each other.
3. Take turn working. For example, you may work 10 hours, then pass on to the next person who will pick up from where you leave off.
   • Use a large whiteboard for latest update. (Call your office supplies company to place an emergency shipping order.)
4. Consider sleeping in the office, with decent inflatable beds and other amenties, in order to save the commute time and avoid traffic accidents due to fatigue.
   • Again, place an emergency shipping order if necessary.
5. Order food that is appropriate. E.g. sandwiches.
   • The same type of food eaten by Chilean miners during the rescue operation.

Basically, the Chilean mine rescue operation is the operational blueprint for many crises where lives are at stake and in extreme stress.

Answer 9

You are running straight into a burn-out situation. The most important advice I can give you, after many years of deadlines and stress and stuff: When you notice that you cannot long work efficently, stop staring at the screen, go home and get some sleep. Sounds obvious, but more often than not, people in this situation think that leaving the desk is not an option. It is, and when you come back 8 hours later, you will be able to work again. Don't punish yourself for missing the deadline.

Answer 10

I recommend reading the book Death March. It has some survival strategies as well as warning signs. Depending on the morale, death marches can continue for short or long times; as well as leave survivors saying "wow, that was fun" or "f this, I'm changing careers!" Morale of the workers is the most important feature, and this is something that only the (mis)managers can address. We had one last fall, and 7 months after it ended, I'm still burned out (my productivity is about 1/3-1/4 of what it was this time last year). I'm not sick of programming, I am not sick of putting out fires - I am sick of dealing with arson. All of our deadlines and personnel shortages were self-inflicted by our mismanagers. My immediate supervisor spread the rumor (in order to try to discredit me) that I wanted 2 months off (at one time) when the crunch was finally over. Looking back, I think that 2 months off would have been a good idea. The head of the office has had all his responsibilities removed and basically told to find another job by March. Yes, I'm interviewing, and folks know it.

I recommend that book because for many developers it is when they realise what was being done to them: "You mean it isn't just this one project, or even just my company that does this!"

When you reach your limit - and only you know what your limit is - just go home. Don't ask for permission. Don't listen to threats. Don't listen to promises made in the heat of passion (you've heard them all: "you'll get rewarded when this is over" or "of course I'll respect you in the morning"). Just go.

Based on historical data about myself, coding for more than about 12-14 hours straight is counter productive, as I end up in negative productivityland; I start introducing more bugs than I'm fixing.

An article written some years ago pointed out why other industries got rid of "crunch mode" (or "death marches") - they were the worst way to get work done. And the chart on that page shows the negative productivity one gets into in such forced overtime. But in software development, death marches are the norm and not the exception. Death marches are a sign of incompetent or malevolent managers, you'll find examples of both out in the wild. One story from years ago (by someone who wrote under the nickname "EA Spouse") gave an example of a company that intentionally included death marches into the schedule.

Some things I learned when dealing with sleep deprivation:

• go outside and get sunlight. Even if it is subzero temperatures, slap a coat on and walk around facing the sun like a flower for 10 minutes about 3 times during daylight hours. Do not look into the sun with opened eyes, but you do want sunlight on your face.
• drink plenty of water and cut down on caffeine.
• on weekends, just sleep to catch up on your sleep deficit. Ideally, you go to be much earlier and try to wake up at your regular time, but otherwise, just sleep in.
• exercise. Even if all that is is walking around in sunlight for 1/2 hour per day.

When I was carless, to catch the bus required to get to work meant getting up around 0330 and leaving the house by 0430. The last bus of the morning left downtown around 0630, and the next bus heading past my office left downtown at 1600. I'd get home around 1900, have a quick snack and throw myself into bed as quick as possible. That endured for about 14 months and it took about 18 months to recover from that sleep deprivation.

Somethings to do afterward are sit down and have a post mortem:

• What worked?
• What didn't?
• What warning signs were there that the schedule was slipping? You don't blow past deadlines all at once at the end, you slip day by day by day by day. Just like you don't wake up one morning and find out you're fat, you got there one cheeseburger at a time. Schedules bulge the same way and schedule slippage creeps up like a waistline.
• Will this happen again? If so, then you ought to know about it and find a different place to work, or learn to deal with it. Again, some strategies can be found in the book Death March.

Answer 11

On SO: "How to keep being productive when you are tired?"

You and the team are no use to anyone in the state you're in.

And it's software: not life or death.

What you have just worked would be illegal in most places in Europe too.

Answer 12

Exercise.

You've got to keep your metabolism up to stay alert. It's often the last thing you want to do when you're exhausted, but use those breaks to do pushups, jog in place, toe touches, brisk walk, something.

Answer 13

I did this for about 2.5 years... It is never fun.

Long term, be looking for a different job OR looking for a permanent way to correct the situation in the current job if you REALLY trust that they won't do it again.

In the near term some things that help:

• sleep when you can
• have someone who is getting some sleep keep notes of what is going on
• make them bring you as much food/coffee/soda/whatever to keep you not hungry/awake
• dont eat too much or you will fall asleep when you dont want to
• work mobile part of the time so you at least put in some appearance in the rest of your life
• avoid driving in complicated areas or for more than 30 min at a time
• drive right after waking up if possible
• make management get everyone else out of your way
• make management get everyone else to do whatever you need ASAP when asked
• personal hygiene - US military has studies that show it improves your perception of the situation
• reconsider anything you discarded as inelegant, you might find a solution
• make certain management is aware they are robbing Peter to pay Paul
• make certain there are arrangements in place to cover your daily tasks and the new products support when everyone crashes for a week or two at the end of the death march

Having said all that, good luck, and hopefully you are learning some good stuff that can help you in the future.

Answer 14

Punch all the managers responsible for it in the face.

If it's really an important task, they wont be able to fire you - use the survival techniques others have mentioned. Especially the laughter.

If they do fire you, celebrate because you're in a better place. Health always comes before any job.

If they try to press charges or sue you, you can claim insanity (brought on by stress, overwork, lack of sleep, etc) caused you to follow the advice of a maniac on the Internet.

:)

Answer 15

Sleep and rest has been repeated enough. You're just not productive any more, simple as that. Actually, I do more in a day if I work 8-10 hours and then relax than if I force myself in 14 hours of coding.

One other advice : drink enough water and stay away from caffeine or too much sugar.

You're laughing? A brain needs to be in good condition to function well. Especially for your brain, deprivation of water seriously jeopardizes its functioning. You'd be amazed what a difference one liter of water a day can make regarding freshness of your brain. I really said water, not juice, not tea, not coffee, not anything else. Water. The rest doesn't count.

Next to that, both caffeine and sugar give you a temporary boost of about half an hour. Your body will react by starting up all mechanisms for processing either of those until they reach a "normal" level again. But the body can't switch those mechanisms on or off very fast, so you always get a an overshoot. In the end, you're going to end up worse than before ("Boy, I need another coffee!"). Ever wondered why people get addicted to coffee or sugar, and why it doesn't seem to help... ?

Since I gave up coffee, I still feel rather fresh at the end of the day, I can concentrate better. And my breath doesn't smell like dead rats any more.

Answer 16

I'm going to have to agree with everyone else here that says, just don't do it. I'm sure I can dig around and find studies to back this up, but generally, the longer you are awake without good rest, your ability to do complex tasks (like writing software) diminishes and you are more likely to be hurting code base than you would be helping it. Likewise, depending upon what country you are working in, asking someone to work such hours is borderline illegal and you have a right to refuse to work those hours.

That said, if you absolutely must stay and work, the best thing to do is to get sleep. At some point you are going to need to set aside a good block of time (at least six hours) to get some uninterrupted sleep and allow your body to recharge before getting back to work. Beyond that, getting up and moving around periodically also helps along with just talking to the people around you so can switch tasks for a bit.

Answer 17

Could not get all of this into a comment @Tim Williscroft

+1 Don't do it. You are digging yourself into a deeper hole each time. The code you write now will be of low quality, which means you'll have more debugging to do, which means less time to hit the next 'deadline'. (What a silly word!)

It can happen that you are in crunch-mode, but that would only be because an issue with the deployment onto production is causing all of the business to stop. Or that some critital production error has come up. My two only reasons to ever crunch.

Are you a 'lone-coder'? Doing all the work on the project yourself? If so, you have a problem.

Are you the only one doing crunch-time in your team? Then stop right now, you are bringing the team into trouble. "But I'm the only one trying to save the team from shame!!" You are to good for the team, stop crunch time. There is a serious problem in the team: it is not a team, there is no I in Team

So any other reason for crunch time is usually caused by bad practices. Time Management, Waterfall process, ScrumButs, Fixed Price Projects, Lack of software craftmanship, ...

Seriously, read up on e.g. Kanban to help you get out of this negative spiral. Then see if Scrum (real Scrum) can be implemented in your team.

Stop being just a coder, become a Software Professional!

Answer 18

Spend time on the most important items... lack of sleep will mess with your judgement. Ask your team leader (or client) for guidance. Don't get obsessed with a small bug, or feature you like.

Get rid of your ego.

Remind your peers to get rid of their ego (if possible)

In the big picture, nothing matters but your life and what you learn from going through experiences like this. Although the pressure is important , you need to make sure you (and the rest of your team) now (more than ever) do the important and urgent things first.

Don't worry about multi tasking. Multi tasking in humans usually results in less productivity. Leave that job up to devices with more than one 'core'.

Consider if your project manager is being unrealistic with his team and goals. Try talking to your PM and telling them what you need to succeed. More staff? More training? More time? More deadlines but with smaller goals? etc...

Accept that it won't be perfect when you release. There will always be imperfections in software made by humans.

Set expectations accordingly. The more people see you as a person who can manage yourself, the more respect you will get. You can't continue this patter of no sleep and production for long. Quality will lower, and you will hate your job. Don't let that happen, and be honest and reset expectations as you learn of new information... new timelines, new resources, etc. No-one knows everything perfectly to not need help.

Especially in the world of software, thank goodness you have websites and anonymous strangers who have compassion for your situation and are willing to help.

Best of luck!

Answer 19

Stop taking caffeine.

Wait 6 months.

Now, when you need to stay up for 48 hours straight, drink some caffeine.

It's amazing what drugs can do when you don't abuse them to the point of maintaining an unhelpful tolerance.

Answer 20

Surprised no one has mentioned it, but there are drugs out there that can help with this for short term. In Europe they are OTC, I think they are schedule 6 in U.S. (meaning you need a prescription, claim SWSD, which you would technically have), but check out modafinil and related substances (brand names for some: Provigil, Modavigil, Armodafinl, Nuvigil). Many are somewhat pricey. Also check out 5 hour energy, it has some caffeine, but that's not its only trick.

Also, as many others have said, start looking for a new job.

Answer 21

One piece of advice would be to ensure you are working at an optimized time. I find that when I'm at crunch time its better to be sleeping when your usual interruptions would occur then work the hours that nobody else wants to work. If I plan to sleep from 6AM to 12PM I tend to miss most of the meetings and the other time is then far more productive.

Answer 22

Haylem's Survival Guide to Code-Rushes

1. Master your Sleep
2. Be Active and Healthy
3. Be a Team
4. Sleep!

Master your Sleep

The most important thing is to master the art of sleeping well. Listen to your biological clock and be aware of your Circadian rythm. Learn to understand your sleep cycles and sleep patterns. (Go beyong and get into Chronobiology if you must. Who knows, maybe there's an oscillating gene of the crunch-time programmer).

Once you master these, that REM and NREM phases have no secret for you and that you can write a dissertation on your friend Melatonin, you can have a good and efficient sleep over very short periods of time. Which may be critical in helping you through a hard phase.

One of the worst things is to interrupt a deep sleep cycle. It's highly counterproductive has you are not rested when you wake up, and still completely numb and sleepy. Whereas if you optimize you sleep time to "power-nap", you get the best of the benefits of sleep, and none of the wake-up disadvantages. If you have to crunch through a deep sleep phase, then fine, skip it and bit the bullet. But be sure to jump on the next one.

If you are in a situation where even an interrupted cycle can be good to grab, do it. For instance, if you are jumping on the train or bus for your commute, just lay your head down and nap (don't miss the stop though). You'll be sleepy and grumpy when you get off, but you'll be back to normal while you walk to your home or office.

But most importantly, have a good night sleep when you can.

The Necessary War Story

I had to work overnight for the past 5 nights even though I have a full-time job during the day from 9 to 5 (and actually it's more 7am to 7pm + travel time). I usually went home, played with my baby, fed him and put him to bed, spent one hour with my partner watching TV (falling asleep in front of it 2 out of 5 nights) and then napped a bit to be woken up by my alarm I had previously set up for the right time. Problem solved. BUT there's a period of the day (mid-afternoon) where my body is in a deep cycle again where it gets reeeaallly hard to stay awake at work because of the still strong lack of sleep, and I cannot nap at work. In that case, use the other tricks. If you feel like your nose is diving to hit your keyboard, get up, walk around, breath a lot (oxygenation helps!), have something sugary to boost you. And when I am done with that, a good 10 to 12 hour night gets me right back where I was before (or more: I once slept 22hours straight after a very intense week of 140 hours of work... A colleague slept 26 hours straight. Must feel weird to skip a day...)

Be Active and Healthy

Fatigue is not the only bad effect of sleep deprivation. It's only the most obvious one. You also ruin your metabolism and your body's ability to process nutrients efficiently, and by perturbing your sleep schedule your disrupt the scheduling of many other things. Your appetite and good functioning of your digestive system being another one.

You also screw up a few other things. Feel sticky and stinky during these crunch periods, even though you take showers all the time - because they also keep you awake? Well, that's normal, your perspiration system is also not happy.

Other things include cariovascular activity (slower heart-rate and low blood pressure, but evidently higher heart-rate whenever you get back into stress mode), lack of focus and coordination (you get clumsy and make mistakes all the time).

It might not be worth it. I always used to have people telling me "you can't do that, that's inefficient. You'd be better off sleeping and then working. Working while sleep deprived is counter-productive." They might be right in some cases, but in others obviously your deadline is so short that there's no going around it: it has to be done now, or it won't be done at all. It's up to you to decide.

Energy Drinks

You can always resort to energy drnks. I used to never use any, out of personal distaste and also because of side-effects and a refusal to become used to these. But now that I'm not at uni anymore and not able to go through weeks hardly sleeping more than a few hours a week, I do use some occasionally if I need a boost. Or caffeine tablets.

But still, don't use these too much. They have bad side effects (usually your stomach won't be a fan, and it's already not happy with your sleep deprivation anyway). Including dependency (coffee as well). See the Further Reading section.

There's a counter-point to the "be healthy" part: note that even if it's not always "healthy", eating/drinking will reboot your body into an active state, thus turning you back on as well (don't eat a whole turkey though, or then you go into full-sleep mode!). have a coke, a bagel, something.

Keep yourself hydrated. Very important. Done any sport? Think like a marathon-runner!

Keep yourself fed.

And please take showers.

Be a Team

Because 2 (sleepy) brains are (potentially) better than one. Well, if you don't work with a donkey.

When working very intensive hours, I used to do it always with a very great colleague.

The plus sides:

• You check each other's code and documentation.
• You nap while he codes, and vice-versa.
• You check each other's decisions.
• You control each other's health: if one of you starts to really be a mess, the other one is the voice of reason.
• You keep each other's mood up.
• You can get stuff for each other (coffee, food...). Even if taking a break together to relax (or brainstorm idly) might be better, if you need to work around the clock, then that team work does wonders.

You need someone you are really comfortable working with for this, but the benefits are huge. Obviously pair programming is always a good thing, but it's vital in these situations.

Aside Considerations

• You might want to change your job. Except if you like/love it. But be sure that you like it more than your health.
• Try to improve your team's aptitudes and teamwork to avoid these crunch periods.
• Try to improve your office environment to make these conditions easier to deal with:
  • dedicated sleeping areas (well, the floor does fine for me... but I wouldn't mind a couch!)
  • no bright lights
  • if you can dim said lights, then even better
  • free food
  • free coffee
  • deals with neighbouring shops for food pick-ups
  • a dedicated area for relaxation. Not the one dedicated for sleeping! Nothing worse than morons waking you up because they don't care or because they take their break and have a heated discussion about the Tannenbaum/Torvals feud.

Further Reading

• On Coffee:
  • Caffeine Dependency is Easier to Develop Than you Think
  • What Caffeine Does to Your Brain
  • What the heck, if you like coffee, embrace the whole LifeHacker Coffee tag

PS: For the record, I come from a very intensive background, plus I used to have pretty strong insomnia issues (which I had before that career, but at times throughout as well), so I got used to dealing with sleep deprivation.

Answer 23

Be aware of your rights.
If you're in the EU you are covered by the Working Time Directive. This restricts the amount of time you're employer can require you to work (unless you opt out).
The basic restriction is no more than 48 hours in a week (averaged over 17 weeks).