How Stress Can Play a Negative Role in the Workplace

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This article looks at the work-related stress and their influence on both physical and mental health. The authors used descriptive writing to expound on the relationship between stress and occupational injury. The authors used statistics to look at the prevalence of stress in place of work and their impacts on the company performance. They looked at the common elements of stress including depression, anxiety, and post-traumatic disorder. This topic is very important to this research as it gives a detailed measure that can be put in place to curb stress and anxiety in place of work.

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The article focuses on the stress in place of work and the problems associated with them. The authors defined the sources of work-related stress and their effects on the health of the employees and in their performance. This article is very important in the research as it details the strategies of coping with stress in place of work and even doing away with them completely.

It recommends the actions that can be taken by the employers to help employees cope or reduce stress and comments on how the employees can do away with stress in place of work.

The article is a study that was carried out in the quest to determine the causes of stress, consequences of stress and the best strategies for dealing with stress in place of work. The researcher utilized the use of primary sources of information by using interviews to gather information targeting to answer his research questions. In my study on stress, this article is very important as it looks at the firsthand information and report the experiences of the employees in places of work, and recommend the strategies of dealing with stress.

This journal has comprehensive information on the causes, signs, and how to manage stress in places of work. It was published by the occupational and environmental medicine, and thus, this article is very relevant to my study.

Reduction of Stress and Anxiety in Place of Work

Stress is the change in the psychological behavior of an individual due to pressure from the environment and their interaction between the individuals and the pressure facing them (Michie, 2002). When an individual is unable to cope with the demands or the situation is too difficult for him to deal with, then stress would be experienced. Nekoranec and Kmosena (2015) noted different causes of stress in place of work including work overload, conflicts, insecurity, and changes in the working environment. The presence of these stressors would change one’s behaviors resulting in anxiety, depressions, irritation, and difficulty in concentration. According to Nekoranec and Kmosena (2015), the effects of stress and anxiety in place of work include psychological, emotional, and behavioral disorders. As a result, the stressed individual’s work performance would go down, and their interaction with others would be negatively affected and thus resulting in the anti-social individual. This synthesis paper is going to recommend stress and anxiety reduction strategies that are important to organization managers.

Stress management is a tool that is geared towards improving the performance of the employees by ensuring that they are always jovial and ready to perform tasks assigned to them with less difficulty. Stress management is designed to reduce the effects of stressors and make the employees cope with them. In the general reduction of workplace stress, Nekoranec and Kmosena (2015) argued that a direct way of coping with stress is to change the source of the problem by eliminating the stressor or alter it to make it less harmful. For instance, the sources of noise and dust can be eliminated by putting in place the right measures such as the use of protective equipment. The fatigue experienced by the employees due to work strain can be modified by the engineers to have the machines work more efficiently. Overcrowding also can be done by expanding the working areas and thus giving the employees better working spaces.

In his work, Michie (2002) recommended two levels of managing stress in place of work; individual and organizational stress management. The individual level of stress management involves the steps taken by an employee to overcome stress and anxiety. The individual approaches include training, psychology services, and individual reflection. These strategies help to build individual skills and change their situation. For instance, training, in courses that build coping techniques, helps to reduce and prevent stress and anxiety by making the individual become aware of the signs and symptoms of stress, interrupt behavior patterns, develop active plans of coping with stress and practice low-stress situation. Michie further asserted that an individual who has gone through training could sit and think critically about his or her situation and have a positive solution of it. Shchuka (2010) in his work suggested communication as another individual strategy for dealing with stress. An individual is under stress can share the situation with colleagues can give them moral support and offer alternatives to the affected individuals. Moreover, a stressed individual can also communicate with the employer and inform the employer of his or her situation. As a result, the employer can take a step of working on the problem if the stress originates from the organization. The employer can also offer counseling services to the employees as a way of dealing with stress. Arguably, the individual intervention helps build skills and confidence in dealing with stressful situations, and thus organizations should encourage employees to deal with stress, whenever they fall victims, at the individual level.

Organizational stress management is another important strategy. Michie (2002) argued that organizations can be a source of stress and as a result, it is important that they intervene and offer stress management techniques to its employees. The organizational intervention can be through altering the structure of the organization and offering psychological support. In their research, Dopkeen and DuBois (2014) looked at the different causes of stress in place of work and recommended different organizational interventions. They recommended that employers should assess organizational cultures. The employers should be committed to promoting a positive culture which reinforces the values of well-being health, and safety of the employees. The organizations should try to promote interpersonal skills and ensure that the working environment helps reduce stress. Another strategy is that the employers should screen for individuals who are at high risk due to traumatic events or cumulative exposures. The individuals found to be at high risk should be given the attention needed. Besides intervention, the individuals at risk should be closely monitored and offered the needed mental health assistance.

Conclusively, stress and anxiety in place of work is a serious issue that needs intervention. Managers should be in a position to offer the employees with the much-needed support to overcome stress. They should encourage employees to have individual stress management strategies. Generally, stress management is important in improving the employee performance and subsequently the organizational performance.