Stress Management in Workplace

Stress is an inherent aspect of life for anybody who lives in this world. It displays a bad concept that has the potential to harm one's mental and physical health.

This document aims to assist members in recognizing the indicators of stress, developing stress management skills, and increasing their personal resilience. 

This study provides practical advice on how to deal with work stress.        

Stress can be a mental or physical condition and is the physical and mental reaction of humans to changes, events, and situations in their lives.

stress will be the result if the workload is too large for the number of workers and time available.

Individuals who work in high stress or dangerous jobs as well as those who are employed at a place where there is a high-pressure environment are often prone to experiencing stress.

Work environment, coworker relations, and customer pressures can all contribute to stress at work.

Understanding how to manage, minimize, and deal with stress can help people feel more relaxed and react when stressful situations as they arise 

   

Causes of Work Stress

Poor job design, poor management, and unsatisfactory working environment can all contribute to excessive and otherwise uncontrolled expectations and pressures. Similarly, these factors might lead to workers not receiving adequate support from others or having insufficient control over their work and its pressures. The majority of the factors that contribute to workplace stress have to do with how work is organized and managed. These components of employment are referred to be "stress related risks" because they have the potential to cause harm. The stress literature acknowledges nine categories of stress-related dangers, which are mentioned below.

a) Job Content

·       Tedious, under-stimulating, meaningless tasks

·       Lack of variety

·       Unpleasant tasks

 

b) Workload and Work Place

·       Having too much or too little to do

·       Working under time pressures

 

c) Working Hours

·       Strict and inflexible working schedules

·       Long and unsocial hours

·       Unpredictable working hours

 

d) Participation and Control

·       Lack of participation in decision making

·       Lack of control (for example, over work methods, work pace, working hours and the work environment)

 

e) Career Development, Status and Pay

·       Job insecurity

·       Lack of promotion prospects

·       Under-promotion or over-promotion

·       Unclear or unfair performance evaluation systems

·       Being over-skilled or under-skilled for the job

 

f) Role in the Organization

·       Unclear role

·       Conflicting roles within the same job

·       Responsibility for people

·       Continuously dealing with other people and their Problems

 

g) Interpersonal Relationships

·       Inadequate, inconsiderate or unsupportive supervision

·       Poor relationships with co-workers

·       Harassment and violence

·       Isolated or solitary work

·       No agreed procedures for dealing with problems or Complaints

 

h) Organizational Culture

·       Poor communication

·       Poor leadership

·       Lack of clarity about organizational objectives and Structure

 

i) Home-Work Interface

·       Conflicting demands of work and home

·       Lack of support for domestic problems at work

·       Lack of support for work problems at home

 

d) Behavioral

·       Substance (including alcohol) misuse

·       Inappropriate display of behavior

·       Segregation

·       Unpunctuality

 

How to Manage Workplace Stress

Step 1 – Identify Potential Work-Related Stress Hazards

·       Participate in processes to gather information about work related stress hazards.

·       Report works related stress hazards to your employer and HSR (Health & Safety representative) & encourage your colleagues to do the same.

Step 2 – Assess the Work-Related Stress Risks

·       Indicating when, how often and over what period of time work related stress risk occur.

·       Describing how work-related stress could affect or harm your health.

Step 3 – Control the Work-Related Stress Hazards and Risks

·       Contribute ideas on ways to control work related stress hazards & risks in workplace

·       With the help of discussion about how actions to control risks can be implemented in workplace.

Step 4 – Implement Continuous Improvement

·       Report the effectiveness of those measures to the management & HSR (Health & Safety representative)

·       Contribute ideas on how to improve effectiveness.

·       Report any new risk that the workplace or work changes may be generated.

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Conclusion

Workplace stress is a significant issue for both employees and their employers. The goal of this paper is to raise awareness about the negative effects of workplace stress and to educate people about how widespread it is. A stress culture can quickly emerge, with numerous negative effects for the company. There is no easy cure for an institution that has built such a culture. The greatest way to avoid the negative effects of stress on the workplace is to create a stress management culture that includes both management and employees. It is hoped that this knowledge would encourage businesses to investigate the stresses that exist in their own workplaces and to take efforts to reduce and/or prevent stress.

 

Reference

Cooper, CL, Liukkonen, P. & Cartwright, S. (1996) “Stress prevention in the workplace”: assessing the costs and benefits to organizations. Dublin: European Foundation for the Improvement of Living and Working Conditions

Jones F and Bright J, (2001) “Stress: Myth, Theory and Research”, Pearson Education, pp.18.

HSE, “A business case for the Management Standards for Stress”, (2006), HSE Books

Brewer, Kristine C., Gower, (1997) “Managing Stress”.