5 ways to manage your work-related stress

• 2-minute read •
Identify what’s stressing you out, then find ways to manage it.
Stress is a natural part of life, and in moderation it can help improve our work performance. However, too much stress can lead to physical ailments such as headache and stomach aches, and chronic stress can cause serious health problems such as depression and heart disease, according to the American Psychological Association. April is Stress Awareness Month, and it’s a good time to examine the level of work-related stress you’re experiencing and explore ways to better manage it.

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Managing job related stress

The fear of job loss has started affecting employees across all industries. With the Satyam fiasco, this fear has taken new dimensions. Employees are stressed out and this is bound to affect productivity.

The recent times have seen recession taking a toll on the Indian economy, especially for industries like IT and ITes whose work is directly affected by the US economic meltdown. Layoffs and the fear of job loss has started affecting employees across all industries. With the debacle of major IT firm Satyam, this fear has taken new dimensions. Employees are stressed out and this in the long run, is bound to affect their productivity, which may spell even more problems for the economy. Moreover, constant job-related stress can put people at risk for various emotional and physical disorders. Here are some tips that you may find handy in combating such job-related stress.

Set realistic goals and expectations at work: Take a stock of available resources such as time, manpower, infrastructure etc. to accomplish all necessary tasks. Also whenever and wherever possible, delegate, prioritize or schedule tasks in a manner that allows extra time for their completion.

Resolve conflicts: Conflict in work teams is not necessarily destructive, however it needs to be sorted out in a positive way, such as by talking in an objective, non-accusatory manner, calmly, politely and rationally. Focus on the situation and facts, avoiding gossip and personal attacks.

Balancing one’s personal and work time: All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy. Achieving this balance is very important because being constantly focused on work can end up lowering workplace productivity due to burnout from overwork. Take an occasional break, spend your weekends with your family to re-charge yourself.
Handling stress with right Attitude: “ To let stress dictate your life and chase out the enjoyment is like letting a foe dictate your schedule and forbid you to enjoy your work, family and friends.” Maintain a positive attitude. Read good books and be in the company of positive thinking friends, practice and enjoy good humour.

Maintain a healthy lifestyle: This includes eating a nutritious, well-balanced diet, getting proper sleep and engaging in exercise as recommended by a physician. Also, avoid too much caffeine or alcohol or smoking.

Practicing relaxation: Techniques, such as breathing exercises, meditation, yoga, massage therapy, reflexology or attending a lecture / satsang can help reduce stress and improve positive energy.

Look for an alternative: Finally, if things in the present work place can not be changed, know that it is the time to look for another job, especially if it can help in reducing job-related stress as well as increase personal happiness and satisfaction.

These tips work very well in mild stress cases. However, for extreme cases, it is recommended that individuals seek professional help such as consult a doctor, a psychiatrist or other mental health professionals.
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How to reduce stress at work

Imagine working only four hours a day, nine months a year and earning all the money you need to do exactly what you want with all your free time. Does that sound like your life?

That's the life a futurist of the early 20th Century predicted the average worker would be living by the 21st century.

Yet despite the introduction of many labour-saving devices in the workplace and home, Harvard University Economist Juliet Schor found by the 1990s people were working the equivalent of one month a year more than they did at the end of World War II.

As an example, Schor explained in her book Overworked American: The Unexpected Decline of Leisure how the introduction of automatic washers and dryers resulted in an increase in time spent doing laundry. Laundry that had previously been sent out now stayed home, and standards of cleanliness went up.

Laundry isn't the only task that has grown over the last century.

It seems that whenever a significant new "labour saving" product or service is developed we use it so much our workload actually increases.

After all, wasn't our work supposed to be made easier by voice mail, fax machines, cell phones and email? On the contrary, many of us find we are constantly on-call, frequently interrupted, and overwhelmed with communications that people expect to receive immediate responses to.

That's on top of the already heavy workload existing in most organizations. For an employee, the consequences of this overload can be stress, burnout, and illness. For an employer, it can result in high turnover and poor performance.

Addressing the problem of overwork can help companies keep good employees.

A recent study by AON Consulting found that management recognition of an employee's need to balance work with personal life is one of the top five drivers of employee commitment to a company.

To help overworked employees, managers should be trained to notice signs that employees are overburdened. Such signs include consistently working late, working through lunch, coming to work even when sick, taking work home, rushing to meet very tight deadlines, expressing frustration, and not taking vacations.

Employees who are overwhelmed with work may not always tell you how they feel so make the effort to ask how they are doing. For some employees, having the opportunity to express their concerns and hearing appreciation for their extra effort may help alleviate stress during a temporarily busy period.

If an employee's heavy workload is more than temporary, you can assist them in brainstorming solutions to relieve their situation. And if you are the one who is overworked, you can try some of these solutions yourself. Here are some steps you can take to get your workload under control:

Spend your time working on things that are important.

This may sound obvious, but many of us are tempted to work on easy tasks first so we can have a sense of accomplishment. Time spent on those "easy" tasks can quickly add up, creating even more stress when there does not appear to be enough time left for the important work.

To find out what your time is being spent on, start keeping an "activity log". Every time you start and end a new activity, including taking a break, make note of the time. Most workers who charge by the hour have learned to do this automatically.

If you are not used to tracking your time it may be a bit of an adjustment, but within a few days you should be able to notice any time-wasters you might not have been aware of.

Set daily goals.

When scheduling your time, assume that something unexpected will come up and build in a cushion of time to deal with it. To minimize the stress of meeting self-imposed deadlines, avoid making promises about when tasks will be completed. If you must commit to a date, be conservative. If you consistently under promise and over deliver you could earn a great reputation while reducing your stress.

Aim to meet or even exceed expectations, but don't try to achieve perfection. Wherever possible, delegate routine tasks even if you think you can do them better than someone else.

Unless you are expected to be on call, work on eliminating interruptions. Select a time of day when you will return phone calls and emails. During other times, let your voice mail take messages for you. You can also create an auto reply for your email to let people know their message has been received. If your email says you will respond within 24 hours if a reply is required, it may deter someone from repeatedly trying to contact you in the meantime.

Avoid letting other people's problems become yours.

As Richard Carlson, author of Don't Sweat the Small Stuff at Work, says "If someone throws you the ball you don't have to catch it." Some managers find themselves solving their employees' problems instead of empowering employees to find solutions themselves. When someone comes to you with a problem that isn't yours, try limiting your contribution to advice instead of taking on the task yourself.

When you are feeling overwhelmed, say so. Companies want to keep good employees so most bosses will want to know when you are having difficulty. However, instead of saying "I can't do it," offer some possible solutions.

For example, if you won't be able to get a major report completed by a particular deadline, perhaps you could tell the boss you can either complete a condensed version of the report by the deadline, complete the entire report by a later date, or meet the deadline if you get some help from co-workers or temporary staff.

These techniques probably won't help you enjoy the life of leisure envisioned by those early futurists. But they can cut down on your stress and may make your work both more manageable and more enjoyable.

How To Get A Raise: Stress Value, Not Need

No one likes to ask for a raise. But there are situations when it makes common sense to say to the boss, "I believe I am worth more to this organization than I am being paid. I would appreciate a raise."

Never try to make a case for a raise on the basis of need. Organizations can stay in business only by paying people what they contribute to the bottom line, not their needs.
You are justified in asking for a raise when one or more of the following conditions exist.

• You are making a contribution toward your employer's goals above and beyond what is expected from your position. . You have been filling a more demanding position, which usually pays more money, for a considerable time.
  
• There is no formal system in place for performance reviews and you haven't had a raise in a reasonable period of time.
  
• You have an offer from another employer for more money and you are prepared to make a change if necessary.

Before you rush in to ask for a raise, you should understand that one of three things could happen. One, you may get the extra money. Two, you may find out you are not nearly as valuable as you thought you were, and that your future is limited to your present position. Or, three, you could lose your job when you cause the boss to focus on your performance in terms of hard cash.

Be prepared; be sure of your facts. Remember, you are making a sales presentation for a product (your service to the organization) to a buyer (your boss) who has a limited budget from which to buy answers to a number of highly competitive needs.

Make sure you know how things are going with your boss and the company.

Common sense tells us not to ask for a raise when the company is in the doldrums or when the boss, himself, has just been passed over for a raise. Choose the time and place when your boss is most apt to give you a fair hearing.

Find out how your compensation compares to other jobs in the company and in terms of what other employers are paying for people with similar responsibilities and experience. Know what the fair market value is for your talents.

Get a reading on how your fellow employees and your boss rate your performance. (It had better be a reasonably good report before you ask for more compensation.)

Get directly to the point when you meet with your boss.

Review your contributions, being as specific as possible in such terms as savings, increased productivity, growth in sales.

Underscore your loyalty to the organization. Suggest your potential for even greater contributions based on demonstrated performance.

Present hard data to prove you are not paid up to scale when compared to similar jobs inside the organization and in your employer's business category.

Be prepared to define a range of increase you think is fair, if you are asked to do so. Do not demand. Be ready to discuss the pros and cons of your performance. Keep your cool. It will be a rare boss who will not be a bit annoyed that you have had to ask, either because he has allowed you to lose touch with reality or because he has failed to recognize your worth and frustration. Don't be surprised at some backlash. Accept both praise and criticism with equanimity. Be ready to work out a compromise.

It is unlikely you will get an answer on the spot ... unless it is a resounding negative. Leave the door open for a positive answer or at least further negotiations later.

If the final answer is "yes," express appreciation (but do not go overboard) and work twice as hard to prove your boss made a good decision. Start right then earning the next raise. If it is "no," buckle down, do a better job and prepare for another chance. Or leave for a more rewarding environment.

Five Ways to Beat Workplace Stress

"After all the highways, and the trains, and the years, you end up worth more dead than alive," said Willy Loman in "Death of a Salesman."

Do you no longer feel that you are getting satisfaction from your job, or are you questioning whether you are in the right job? Are you contemplating looking for a new position? If so, you are probably suffering from burn-out and not necessarily from a bad job.

It is caused by the way that you react to both positive and negative stress in your job. Stress is part and parcel of any job, so it is important to be able to identify the stress -- causing factors and turn them into positive experiences.

Here are some suggestions on ways to eliminate burn-out and stress.

1. Remember the good times
Think of the times when you felt a sense of professional achievement and identify the factors that contributed to that success, such as selling the big deal you had been working on for so long, winning promotion or creating new ideas.

2. Avoid negativity
Henry Ford said: 'If you think you can or you think you can't, you're probably right'. Using positive language creates an image in our minds that the subconscious soaks up. Researchers at the University of Pennsylvania interviewed 350,000 executives and discovered that the top 10 per cent performers held a higher sense of optimism.

So, instead of looking at your new sales target and saying, "That's unrealistic." It is better to say, "If I break this down into manageable, smaller targets I can see how I will achieve this."

Backbiting colleagues, gossips and office politics can, given time, have a negative effect on you. Counteract negativity by focusing on the positives aspects of your work -- the "neg-heads" will soon realise that you won't entertain their bemoaning.

3. Get out more
Allow time to get out of the office and go out for lunch or coffee instead of sitting at the desk where you spend so much of your day. Turn off your phone, Blackberry and laptop and take some "me-time" away from work. These may seem like frivolous acts but you will return to work feeling refreshed and rejuvenated.

4. Change your daily routine
The monotony of performing the same tasks daily can be frustrating. Take a different route to work, reorganise your desk or ask your boss for a new challenge -- perhaps taking on the responsibility of running the next team meeting or training new starters.

5. Finally, ask for help
There is no shame in asking for help, we are all human beings not human doings. All of us go through tough periods and you will earn the respect of your managers and peers if you ask for their advice and support. In my experience, what comes around goes around -- one day you may be the one that someone turns to for help.

To use a cliché, knowledge is power. Now you know what you can do when you are burnt-out and avoid letting things slip out of control like Willy Loman in Death of a Salesman. It is not the situation that you are in now that matters; it's what you do about it.

Handling Stress at Work

Are you stressed at work? Do you have more tasks to do than you have time to do them in? Do you ever feel that you are further behind at the end of the day than you were at the beginning? If so, you’re not alone. Stress-related sickness costs industries over £7 million every week.

Of course we all have the odd day where everything seems to go wrong, but if you’re constantly feeling stressed out by the pressures of the office, what can you do?

Here are some good coping strategies:

• Don’t try to do too much. Often we place completely unreasonable demands on ourselves. This just adds to the pressure and actually makes us less effective. Remind yourself that it’s ok not to be perfect all the time.
  
• Prioritise. First thing every day, make a list of what you MUST get done that day – and then get on with it! Tackle the task you’re dreading most first – once you’ve done it, you’ll feel so pleased with yourself that you’ll breeze through the rest of your work. At the end of the day, take 10 minutes to update your to-do list and plan for the next day.
  
• Learn to say “no”. Often we end up taking on work that isn’t our responsibility because we’re scared of upsetting someone by saying no. There is a limit to what you can do and you shouldn’t be afraid to say so. If your boss is making too many demands, calmly explain that you can’t do everything at once and ask which tasks are the priority – it is your boss’s responsibility to prioritise too!
  
• Get organised. Clear the clutter from your desk. If you don’t have one already, put in place a straightforward filing system. Set aside time every day to clear routine emails and paperwork. Try to handle each piece of paper only once – deal with it straightaway if you can. And resist the temptation to keep checking your email – that’s one of the biggest time drains!
  
• For bigger tasks, be clear what your deadlines are and plan accordingly. Don’t leave a big project until the last minute – that just gives you unnecessary extra stress. Break it down into smaller chunks and do a little every day. That makes the task less daunting and means that you won’t end up panicking and having to work flat out at the last minute.
  
• Take regular breaks. Always have a lunch break and, if you can, get outside for some fresh air. It will clear your head and help you to focus better. If you find yourself regularly working very long hours, book an appointment at least once a week - a gym class, massage or just arrange to meet friends - so that you are forced to leave work on time. And don’t allow yourself to get drawn into the “I must be the first to arrive/last to leave” competition that often happens in an office environment. As long as you’ve done what you need to do, don’t be afraid to get up and go home at the normal time. Other people will thank you for it!
  
• Make sure, too, that you take your full holiday entitlement. No one is indispensable – the company will NOT fall apart if you are not there for a few days. And no one ever wished on their deathbed that they’d spent more time in the office! The key is to get the balance right so that you enjoy, rather than dread, going to work and can switch off effectively when you leave.

If, despite adopting all these strategies, you find that you simply are not coping with the demands being made of you, talk to your manager about it. Explain the pressure that you’re under and suggest a number of ways in which things could be improved – for example, if your boss always gives you lots of tasks at the last minute, ask if you can have a regular “forward look” meeting to spot what will be coming up and plan for it better. Try to be positive in the way you approach this and make suggestions that will improve things for other people in the office too.

And if none of this helps, don’t be afraid to re-think your position. You owe it to yourself to have a job that you enjoy. If you’re constantly stressed and miserable at work, you should think about moving. Think about the bigger picture and ask yourself what you really want. Forget about other people’s expectations – concentrate on finding a job or role that you’re going to be really happy in. Good luck!