Hemingway wrote standing at a desk he had designed himself. Leonardo da Vinci, Winston Churchill and Thomas Jefferson are said to have used stand-up desks. Even modern entrepreneurs like HootSuite chief executive, Ryan Holmes, insists the majority of his company executives follow his lead by working standing up.
Spending too long sitting at a desk may pose health risks
As people become aware of their workday stresses, both mental and physical, they’re also becoming more mindful of how dangerous an eight-hour shift behind a desk can be. Recent studies have shown that sitting still for prolonged periods kills at least 300,000 Americans each year. If Sedentary Death Syndrome (SDS) was a disease, it would rank behind heart disease and cancer among the country’s top three killers.
But SDS is more than one disease. An immobile workday is linked to a wide range of debilitating ailments — from osteoporosis and certain cancers to diabetes and depression. A sedentary working life has even been linked to sexual dysfunction. In Germany, where companies pay bonuses to staff who choose to stand rather than sit, it’s known as: Dead Man Sitting.
Recently published research, which examined the work habits of 100,000 men and women across the United States, found that 20 per cent more men who spent at least six hours a day sitting died — mostly of cardiovascular disease — over the course of the 14-year survey than those who used a standing desk for the same period. For women, the difference was 40 per cent. Surprisingly, the figures were equally true among office workers who exercised regularly.
Parallel research from the University of Leicester compared sitting time with health outcomes, and found that those people with the highest sedentary behaviour — meaning those who sat the most — had a 112 per cent increase in their relative risk of developing diabetes, a 147 per cent increase in their risk of cardiovascular disease, and a 49 per cent higher risk of dying prematurely.
“Many of us in modern society have jobs which involve sitting at a computer all day. We might convince ourselves that we are not at risk of disease because we manage the recommended 30 minutes of exercise a day, but we are still at risk if we sit all day,” said study leader, Dr. Emma Wilmot.
Standing is better for the back than sitting. It strengthens the legs and improves balance. And because it burns more calories than sitting, it could ultimately help you lose weight and stay trim.
There are other benefits. Mid-morning and afternoon energy slumps are common for the average office worker. Most of us find a way of powering through the afternoon slump, but Canadian research now claims working on your feet not only boosts energy, it also eliminates afternoon doldrums almost entirely.
“Silicon Valley’s newest status symbol is a humble piece of furniture. A growing number of workers at Google Inc, Facebook, and other hi-tech internet employers are trading in their sit-down desks for standing ones, saying they feel more comfortable and energized,” Jim Carlton said recently in the Wall Street Journal.
“If Silicon Valley is doing it now, one day we’ll all be doing it — and living longer.”
