I finally had a chance to return to our blog. Let’s go back to discussing the topic of workplace stress. I discussed last week what stress was, the difference between good stress and bad stress, and gave you a general idea of a situation that can cause elevated stress over a long period of time without letting up.

Although stess is always a part of our everyday lives, it is an element that needs to be monitored particularly in the workplace. Stress in its good form can motivate employees in a positive way, such as rising to a challenge and increasing sales by 25% through developing creative and unique marketing ideas. But stress in its negative form can seriously harm an individual’s health as well as having a negative impact on an organization if the workplace stress is widespread. Organizations need to recognize where there is a problem and have a plan of action to resolve the issue before production and quality of work starts to slide and workplace injuries, as well as absenteeism, rises.

That’s right - stress can cause injuries. One of our consultants actually wrote a paper on the topic and something I will go into more in another blog. Stress is related to musculoskeletal disorders - an issue that regularly plagues a wide variety of industries.

Let’s first discuss what can cause stress in the workplace. Most people immediately think of tough and over-demanding employers whose mere presence in an office elicits fear in all staff. Obviously this is an issue, as is the office bully. There are many articles to be found on sites such as ErgoWeb and the Canadian Center for Occupational Health and Safety on workplace abusers and bullying. At one time this was an acceptable practice - and unfortunately is still seen as a strength rather than a weakness. But at some point, it needs to be seen that this practice is counter productive and is detrimental to the health of an organization, not to mention its employees.

Other examples of worplace stress include too much work or not enough (individuals need to be challenged too), if there is enough variety in the type of work and if it is meaningful to the individual. The environment can determine stess load (too noisy, too hot or cold) as well as shift work and working hours (overtime?). What are the working relationships like? Is it a supportive atmosphere, gossipy or is “back stabbing” present? What is the opportunity for individuals for career and personal development? Is there poor or excellent management-employee (two way) communication?

Take some time to look at your organization to see if there are any areas that could use improvement to reduce the amount of worplace stress.

Next time, I’ll discuss recognizing the signs of stress when it has hit the boiling point.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, May 27th, 2009 at 4:16 pm and is filed under Ergo Tips. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.