Pillow Talk

ARIANNA HUFFINGTON updates ISHETA SALGAOCAR on her mission to create a gender-equal workplace by evangelising the power of sleep

Arianna Huffington—media mogul, author of over 15 books, and one of the most powerful women in the world, according to Forbes magazine’s 2014 listing—describes herself as a mother, sister, flat-shoe lover and sleep evangelist. On a crisp sunny day in Manhattan, I join her for a breakfast of fresh fruit and croissants at her plush SoHo apartment that is lined with books, family photographs and art by her 26-year-old daughter, Isabella. Huffington has just returned from Davos, and, soon after our breakfast, is scheduled to head to San Francisco for a Thrive Global event with Alibaba employees, with a conference call squeezed in en route. Thrive Global is the company she launched in November 2016, when she stepped down as the long-time editor-in-chief of the Huffington Post. At precisely 8.59am, she walks through the doors of her spacious living room in a perfectly tailored black skirt and Dolce & Gabbana grey tweed blazer, her trademark coiffure providing a swish of gold. The conversation begins with her remark about our shared affinity for taking notes by hand and soon ventures into a meditation on sleep.

Tell us about Thrive Global. What made you launch this new venture?

There is a cultural shift happening [where people are learning that sleep is not optional] and I wanted to accelerate this, both by bringing together all the latest science and also by using role models. For example, on the day we launched, we had a piece by Jeff Bezos of Amazon titled ‘Why getting eight hours of sleep is good for my shareholders’. It was a completely new way of looking at sleep as something that improves decision-making and leadership.

When did sleep become a bad word?