ABSTRACT Purpose: Sleep deprivation among employees has become commonplace in the workforce. In the United States, the number of hours individuals sleep per night has declined by an hour and a half per night since the 1960s. As of 2005, seventy-four percent of individuals were getting less than eight hours of sleep per night on weekdays. There are negative ramifications to the organization when employees are sleep deprived such as lost productivity, increased accident rate, and increased absenteeism. Originality/Value/Contribution of the paper: Although prior research has investigated the impact that sleep deprivation has on unique job positions (e.g., shift workers, transportation), no research has investigated how sleep impacts business-to-business sales employees. Due to the responsibilities of business-to-business sales employees, this type of position should not just be lumped in with other organizational employees. For example, business-to-business sales employees are boundary spanning employees that are responsible for generating revenue for the organization. These sales employees are also more likely to be physically, socially, and psychologically separated from the organization since they frequently work outside of the office. Because of these distinctive roles, this study examines if differences based on sleep duration exist for business-to-business sales employees for two individual and five organizational factors. The two individual factors consisted of grit and happiness while the five organizational factors consisted of perceived organizational support, perceived supervisory support, job satisfaction, organizational commitment, and turnover intentions. Methodology/Approach: Data was collected from 320 business-to-business sales employees using a cross industry survey. The survey was conducted using a Qualtrics panel. Sleep duration was broken into two groups with one group consisting of business-to-business sales employees who sleep, on average, seven or more hours per night and the other group consisting of business-to-business sales employees who sleep, on average, six or less hours per night. The sleep duration groups were determined based on prior research that found adults should regularly sleep seven or more hours per night in order to support optimal health. There were one hundred thirty-four respondents who slept six hours or less and one hundred eighty-six respondents who slept seven or more hours, on average, per night. Findings: The research question developed was answered by examining the differences between means for the two individual constructs and the five key organizational constructs. Differences in sleep duration for six of the seven sales constructs. There were significant differences between those that slept seven or more hours per night from those that slept six or less for grit, perceived organizational support, perceived supervisory support, job satisfaction, organizational commitment, and turnover intentions. Results found that business-to-business sales employees that slept seven or more hours per night exhibited more grit than those that slept six or less hours per night. In addition, business-to-business sales employees that slept six or less hours per night had higher perceptions of both organizational and supervisory support than those that slept seven or more hours per night. Furthermore, business-to-business sales employees that slept six or less hours per night displayed higher job satisfaction and organizational commitment than sales employees that slept seven or more hours per night. Finally, business-to-business sales employees that slept seven or more hours per night indicated higher levels of turnover intentions than sales employees that slept six or less hours per night. There were no significant differences between the two sleep groups for sales employee happiness. Although some of these results may appear to be counterintuitive, conservation of resources theory can be used to explain these findings. Research Implications: This exploratory study showcases the importance of good sleep among business-to-business sales employees. This study draws on the conservation of resources theory literature to explain the counterintuitive findings. This theory posits that individuals will retain and guard against resource depletion. Additionally, as resources become depleted, other resources are valued to a greater extent. In this study, the resource being depleted is the condition of sleep. When business-to-business sales employees experience a lower average amount of sleep per night (i.e., six hours or less), they perceive higher levels of support, job satisfaction, and organizational commitment than business-to-business sales employees who experience a higher average amount of sleep per night (i.e., seven hours or more). Although this study provides a good initial examination of how sleep impacts sales organizations, this study also highlights the need for additional business-to-business sales employee sleep research. This is the first study that has examined how sleep duration impacts business-to-business sales employees. Practical Implications: This study is important to sales research because it highlights the impact that poor sleep of business-to-business sales employees has on the organization. For sales organizations, we provide guidance on ways a sales organization can help promote healthy sleep for their business-to-business sales employees. Some examples of guidance provided can be categorized into four primary categories. These categories include (1) proper sleep education, (2) sales management training, (3) creating a sleep friendly workplace environment, and (4) creating specific workplace policies to minimize sleep disturbances such as setting reasonable work hours and sleep accommodating travel schedules.

中文翻译：

---

睡眠真的很重要吗？检查销售人员的睡眠是否是关键工作因素的重要角色

摘要目的：剥夺员工睡眠已在员工队伍中变得司空见惯。在美国，自1960年代以来，每个人每晚的睡眠时间减少了一个半小时。截至2005年，有74％的个人在工作日每晚的睡眠时间少于8小时。当员工丧失睡眠时，会对组织产生负面影响，例如生产力下降，事故率增加和旷工率增加。该论文的独创性/价值/贡献：尽管先前的研究已经研究了睡眠剥夺对独特工作岗位（例如轮班工人，交通运输）的影响，但没有研究研究睡眠对企业对企业销售员工的影响。由于企业对企业销售员工的责任，这类职位不应仅仅与其他组织员工混为一谈。例如，企业对企业销售员工是跨越边界的员工，负责为组织创造收入。由于他们经常在办公室外工作，因此这些销售员工也更可能在组织上，社会上和心理上与组织隔离。由于这些角色的独特性，本研究检查了企业对企业销售员工基于睡眠时间的差异是否存在两个个人因素和五个组织因素。这两个因素分别是毅力和幸福感，而五个组织因素则包括感知的组织支持，感知的监督支持，工作满意度，组织承诺和离职意图。方法/方法：使用跨行业调查从320个企业对企业销售员工中收集数据。该调查是使用Qualtrics面板进行的。睡眠时间分为两组，一组由企业对企业销售员工平均每晚睡眠七个小时或更多小时组成，另一组由企业对企业销售员工平均每晚睡眠，每晚不超过六个小时。睡眠时间组是根据先前的研究确定的，该研究发现成年人应每晚规律睡眠7个小时或更长时间，以支持最佳健康。平均每晚有134位受访者睡了六个小时或更短时间，有186位受访者睡了七个小时或更长时间。发现：通过研究两个个体结构和五个关键组织结构的均值之间的差异，回答了提出的研究问题。七个销售结构中有六个的睡眠时间差异。晚上睡7个或更多小时的人与睡6个或更少的人在沙砾，感知的组织支持，感知的监督支持，工作满意度，组织承诺和离职意向上有显着差异。结果发现，每晚睡七个或更多小时的企业对企业销售员工比晚上睡六个或六个小时以下的员工表现出更大的毅力。此外，每晚睡眠时间不超过六个小时的企业对企业销售员工对组织和监督支持的理解要高于每晚睡眠时间不超过七个小时的企业。此外，相比于每晚睡眠七个小时或更长时间的企业对企业销售员工而言，每晚睡眠时间不超过六个小时或更少，表现出更高的工作满意度和组织承诺。最后，每晚睡眠七个或更多小时的企业对企业销售员工比每晚睡眠六个或更少小时的销售员工具有更高的离职意向。两个睡眠组在销售人员幸福感方面没有显着差异。尽管其中一些结果似乎是违反直觉的，但是资源节约理论可以用来解释这些发现。研究意义：这项探索性研究显示了企业对企业销售员工良好睡眠的重要性。本研究利用资源保护理论文献来解释违反直觉的发现。该理论认为，个人将保留并防止资源枯竭。另外，随着资源的枯竭，其他资源的价值也会更大。在这项研究中，消耗的资源是睡眠条件。当企业对企业销售员工的平均每晚睡眠时间（即六个小时或更短）较低时，他们会比经历“企业对企业”销售员工的睡眠，服务满意度和组织承诺水平更高每晚平均睡眠量更高（即七个小时或更长时间）。尽管此研究很好地探讨了睡眠对销售组织的影响，但该研究还强调了需要进行额外的企业对企业销售员工睡眠研究。这是研究睡眠时间如何影响企业对企业销售员工的第一项研究。实际意义：该研究对销售研究很重要，因为它突出了企业对企业销售员工睡眠不足对组织的影响。对于销售组织，我们提供有关销售组织如何帮助企业对企业销售员工促进健康睡眠的指南。提供的一些指导示例可以分为四个主要类别。这些类别包括（1）适当的睡眠教育，（2）销售管理培训，