STRESS MANAGEMENT
“Stress is a dynamic condition in which an individual is confronted with an opportunity, constraint, or demand related to what he or she desires and for which the outcome is perceived to be both uncertain and important.”
Feeling the effects of stress is a normal part of life, especially when you are facing major challenges. But each person responds to stress differently. What causes a lot of stress for one person may not cause stress for someone else. That’s become a large part of stress is a matter of perception-how stress it causes you. Therefore, only you can best evaluate the amount of stress in your life and learn better ways to cope with it.
STAGES OF STRESS
According to Selye, there are three stages of stress as discussed below:
1. Alarm reaction – Under this stage, an initial shock phase of lowered resistance is followed by counter-shock during which an individual’s defence mechanisms are activated.
2. Resistance – It is a stage of maximum adaptation when the individual restores the equilibrium.
3. Exhaustion – If the stressor continues or defence mechanism falters, individual moves to this stage.
NATURE OF STRESS
Eustress and Distress: Stress is anything that changes our physical, emotional or mental state while encountering various stimuli in our environment. Selye has used two separate terms to distinguish between the positive and negative effects of stress on the individual, even though bodily reaction to the two forms of stress are similar. Eustress is ‘positive’ stress that accompanies achievement and exhilaration. Eustress is the stress of meeting challenges such as those found in a managerial job or physical activity. Distress occurs when se feel insecure, inadequate, helpless or desperate as the result of too much, or too little, pressure or tension. Selye’s stress and job performance model applies this conception to job performance. It suggests that optimum stress (or eustress) may be achieved at work and r3eflected in job performance when jobs provide adequate challenges, but not too little or too much pressure, by the inverted u-shaped curve. Though optimum stress level is different for different individuals, each individual can sense and determine how much stress is functional for him or her to operate in a productive manner.
Stress is additive. It builds up. Each new and persistent stressor adds to an individual’s stress level. A single stressor, in and of itself, may seem relatively unimportant, but if it is added to an already high level of stress, it can be “the straw that breaks the camel’s back”. If we want to appraise the total amount of stress an individual is under, we have to sum up his or her opportunity stresses, constraint stresses, and demand stresses.
RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN STRESS AND PERFORMANCE
The best-known and most thoroughly documented pattern in the stress performance literature is the inverted-U relationship. Stress can be either helpful or harmful to job performance depending upon the amount of it. The stress performance model shows the relationship between stress and job performance. When there is no stress, job challenges are absent and performance tends to be low. As stress increases, performance increases as stress helps a person to tend to be low. As stress increases, performance increases as stress helps a person to mobilize resources to meet job requirements. Ultimately stress reaches a plateau that corresponds with a person’s top performance capability. At this point, additional stress tends to produce no improvement of performance. Finally, if stress becomes too heavy, performance will decline and if it increases to a breaking point, performance comes down to zero.
CAUSES OF STRESS
Robbins has classified the potential sources of stress under three categories:
ENVIRONMENT FACTORS.
1. Surroundings: If our surroundings are in dangerous or uncomfortable area where overcrowding, crime, pollution is a problem it will lead to stress.
2. Social situations: Sometimes situations such as poverty, loneliness or discrimination based on race, gender, age or sexual orientation causes stress.
INDIVIDUAL FACTORS
1. Health problems: If you have a chronic illness such as heart disease, diabetes, arthritis
2. Relationship problems: If you don’t have someone to share your feelings with then it can give you stress.
3. Emotional problems: Problems such as unexpressed or uncontrolled anger , depression ,grief, guilt , or low self-esteem
4. Conflicts with your belief systems: It means your perceptions and beliefs about the world, life and yourself. For instance, if you place a high value on family life but don’t have the family life you want, you may feel stress.
ORGANISATIONAL FACTORS
1. Factors related to task: Task demands are factors related to a person’s job. These intrinsic factors can be too much or too little work, deadlines, long hours, consequences of making mistakes.
2. Factors related to role: The source of stress in the organizational role includes role ambiguity, role conflict, responsibility towards people and other stressors. Role ambiguity involves lack of clarity about the work objectives, expectations of colleagues related to scope and responsibilities of job.
3. Interpersonal demands: The nature of relationship’s with one’s boss, subordinates and colleagues also form a major source of stress. Poor relations involve low trust, low supportiveness and low interest.
CONSEQUENCES OF STRESS
These can be summed under three general categories:
1. Physiological symptoms.
Frequent Headaches
Heart Attacks
High Blood Pressure
Indigestion
Insomnia
2. Psychological Symptoms
Tension
Anxiety Boredom
Procrastination
Irritability
Job Dissatisfaction
3. Behavioral Symptoms
Changes In Eating Habits
Increased Smoking
Drugs
Rapid speech
Sleep disorders
Consumption Of Alcohol
STRATEGIES OF STRESS MANAGEMENT
Stress is inevitable in human life. There is, therefore, no way out but to cope with stress or fight with it. There are two types of strategies that can help the employee to cope with stress, namely, the coping strategies at the “organisation level” and the coping strategies at the “individual level”.
Coping strategies at the organisational level
i. Stress Reduction And Stress Management Programmes. Stress reduction programmes aim to identify relevant organizational stressors and to reduce their effects by redesigning jobs, reallocating workloads, improving supervisory skills, providing more autonomy or job variety. Stress management schemes usually focus o training individual employees, or their workgroups, to manage their stress symptoms in more effective ways. Stress control systems usually combine stress reduction (stressor control) with stress management (individual symptom control).
ii. Job Redesign. Jobs may be a source of stress to many individuals. Properly designed jobs and work schedules can help ease stress in the individuals and the organization.
iii. Collateral Programmes. A collateral stress programme is an organizational programme specifically created to help employees deal with stress. Organizations have adopted stress handling programmes. Health promotion programmes, career development programmes, and other kinds of programmes for this purpose.
iv. Counseling. Counseling is discussion of a problem with an employee with a view to helping the employee cope with it better. Counseling seeks to improve employee’s mental health by the release of emotional tension which is also known as stress management.
v. Meditation and Yoga. Meditation involves quiet and concentrated inner thought in order to rest the body physically and emotionally. It helps an individual to remove stress from his life. Along with meditation, a person can do yoga to relax himself. For instance, Shavaasan is a yogic aasan (posture) in which a person can relax all his muscles from the feet and moving towards the head. Yoga helps individuals to get out of the stressful. Apart from this cognitive theory and networking it provides mental support to get out the person through stressful situation. When one does yoga, the mind gets submerged in the Parabrahman (God) and one feels totally content within oneself. Today business leaders are propounding introspection as the first step on the road to success. In Japan and Korea, the business executives engage in meditation at the end of a stress filled working week.
Coping strategies by individuals
Individuals can use the following techniques to overcome stress:
i. Relaxation. Coping with stress requires adaptation. Proper relaxation is an effective way to adapt. Relaxation can take many forms. One way to relax is to take regular vacations. A recent study found that people’s attitudes toward a variety of work-place characteristics improved significantly following a vacation. People can also relax while on the job. For example, it has been recommended that people should take regular rest breaks during their normal workday. A popular way of resting is to sit quietly with closed eyes for about ten minutes every afternoon.
ii. Time management. Time management is often recommended for managing stress. The idea is that many daily pressures can be eased if a person does a better job of managing time. One popular approach to time management is to make a list every morning of the things to be done that day. The things to be done may be assigned in the list according to their importance. This strategy helps people get more of the important things done every day. It also encourages delegation of less important activities to others.
iii. Doing something you enjoy. A meaningful activity helps relieve tension. This can a hobby, such as gardening, a creative activity, such as writhing, crafts, or art, or doing volunteer work for a cause that benefits others. Playing with and caring for pets also can help you relax. Although you may feel that your are too busy, making time to do something you like can help you relax and make you more productive in other areas of your life.
iv. Body-centered relaxation. Body-centered relaxation skills are especially useful for people who experience physical symptoms of stress. These skills include:
v. Breathing exercises. Breathing exercises, such as roll breathing, a type of deep breathing.
vi. Massage. Massage, such as shoulder and neck massage. You can see a massage therapist, have a friend or family member give you a massage, or even give yourself a massage.
vii. Aromatherapy. Aromatherapy, which uses the aroma-producing oils (essential oils) from plants to promote relaxation.
viii. Expressing your feelings. Let your feelings out. Talk, laugh, cry, and express anger when you need to.
ix. Music Therapy
x. Humor Therapy
xi. Physical Activity
Stress management-other places to get help
National Institute For Occupational Safety And Health (NIOSH)
200 Independence Avenue SW
Suite 715-H
Washington, DC 202201
Web Address: www.cdc.gov/niash
The National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) conducts research and makes recommendations for the prevention of work-related Injuries and Illnesses. NIOSH also provides Information to the public.
American Institute of Stress
124 Park Avenue
Yonkers, NY 10703
E-mail:stress125@optonline.net
Web Address:http://www.stress.org
The American Institute of stress monthly newsleek Health and Stress, Provides updated Information on a variety of stress-related topics. The organizations also organizes and participates in relevant Conferences and prepares informational packets on all stress related topics.
