Work Stress

This case study shows what organizations do to reduce its employee's stress levels, by first defining and describing what stress is, in its various forms, there are problems associated with stress for all involved, be it for the employees, the organizations, employee's families et cetra. There have been quantifiable results from the different organizations' activities to eliminate stress. Included are recommendations to further aid in eradicating stress.

1., 

Stress is a not a normal state of being, it may be due to a strain, demanding and/or adverse events, it can have both mental and emotional symptoms then become physical in manifestations. Despite its negative effects, surprisingly stress is quite common nowadays in the workplace. Stress can be induced by several factors anxiety over job security, familial situations, workplace interpersonal relations (for example; a difficult boss, uncooperative colleagues and insubordinate associates), health, economic situation, global events, financial matters, downsizing (the corollary of which are increased job responsibility/workload) "high performance work cultures" (Gibson, Donnelly, Ivancevich & Konopaske, 2012) and so on. Stress in an employee highly impacts output in many cases leading to lower function levels and less achievement, even eventual absenteeism due to reduced job satisfaction and lower motivation. 

For the organization with high-stress environment, this leads to higher employee turn-over rates, more spending on the recruitment of replacements and training of said replacements, though if the stress-inducing environment persists in the organization, the cycle continues with the new replacements. The onus is on the organization to nip it inn the bud, through it's management. It is worthy to note that a workaday level of stress is functional as it drives the employee to push himself further than he usually would to achieve set task(s).

2,.

A significant source of workplace stress is post-layoff  P.T.S.D. of the remaining employees (fear of being next on the layoff list) in an organization that just laidoff, 

In scores of cases of layoffs, certain actions of the management leaves the employees unhappy that is: 

            A. the proceeding is often not well handled for example the indicators for a spending reduction is often seen early but acted upon late hence creating a hurried staff-redundancy process.

          B. Organizations often cover up the situation either to try to save jobs (to avoid looking financial trouble) then in an eventuality of layoffs, the organization creates a "good news" announcement as a distraction (McKenna, 2009), 

          C. Organizations often act as if the layoffs did not happen.

          D. Management erroneously start to try to spread a cherry atmosphere when employees are still coming to terms with the layoffs.

despite the management's expected reaction of relief in remaining employees, for not being laid off employees still go through a change of attitude, motivation levels et cetra

After the global financial recession of 2007, the banking industry which had the top most secured jobs in the labor industry suddenly had to let people go as they were not making even close to it's previous revenue hence it was downsizing or to use correct lingo "right sizing". This led to a lot of bankers voluntarily leaving for other industries.

Some of the ways to better handle layoffs are to do it the layoff process should be handled by trained professionals (before, during and after), counselling should be made available if not mandatory then with incentive for remaining staff after layoff, this provides a safe outlet for them, organization can use the E.A.P.

Due to loss of trust as a result of lay off, more needs to be done to reassure the remaining staff of the organizations continued focus on their welfare. Plan to give employees grieving time. provide open doors for questions from employees not laid off, give extra attention to your top performers to ensure you retain them, 

3.,

The aim of the organization's management is to eliminate above "moderate" level stress, in employees in order to better staff health, staff welfare, reduce organization's cost/spending plus increase or normalize retention rates. Various organizations have taken different steps to fight workplace stress, for example organizations partaking in the Employee Assistance Program have seen certain improvements in the overall health of employees, reduction in stress-induced problems, more man-hours extricated from less sick time et cetra with focus on helping substance abuse & addiction which metamorphosed into psych care of employees, then extended to personal finance management; companies like IBM, Schools, Google and so on. Amazon also includes in the EAP benefits extending to family-members of employees on legal, financial, personal and such matters. Another form of stress combating done by organizations is the Wellness program, its focus is mental and physical health of employees. An example is Google's stocking of 8 inch plates beside 12 inch ones to encourage staff eating small portions. Piala Inc. a Japanese company, in it's response from non-smoking staff complaint about their smoking colleagues' 15 mins-paid-smoking-breaking, gave six extra vacation days yearly to non-smokers. This move by Piala not only reduced stress of the disgruntled non-smoking workforce but probably also inspired healthier choices in its smoking demography. To quote the CEO "I HOPE TO ENCOURAGE EMPLOYEES TO QUIT SMOKING THROUGH INCENTIVES RATHER THAN PENALTIES OR COERCION." (HUFFINGTON POST, 2017). 

IN MYPERSONAL EXPERIENCE WITH ZTE NIGERIA, I ONCE WORKED IN A PLACE WHERE WE HAD TWO HOURS, THIRTY MINUTES BREAK DAILY AND WE HAD A PLACE TO NAP DURING SAID TIME, MY DEPARTMENT HAD A LUNCH VOUCHER FOR THIRTY-FIVE DOLLARS EQUIVALENT DAILY IF AN EMPLOYEE IS OUT WORKING DURING THAT BREAK. 

IN THE HEADQUARTERS IN CHINA, SITTING WAS ARRANGED IN SUCH A WAY THAT YOU COULD PULL OUT YOUR COLLAPSIBLE CAMP BED AND SLEEP UNDER YOUR DESK . FIVE YEARS AGO, GOOGLE INCREASED MATERNAL LEAVE FOR WOMEN, THIS WAS DONE TO STEM THE OBSERVED INCREASE IN EMPLOYEE TURNOVER AND THIS WORKED, REDUCING THE ATTRITION RATE BY FIFTY PERCENT.  

MTNN GIVES PATERNAL LEAVE TO FATHERS  OF NEWBORN, THIS REMOVES STRESS OF WORKING IN THE FIRST WEEKS OF THE EMPLOYEE'S BABY'S LIVES WHERE THE BABY WAILS ALL NIGHT AND THE EMPLOYEE COMES TO WORK EXHAUSTED, SLEEP-DEPRIVED AND INCAPABLE OF OPTIMAL/FULL FUNCTION.

Many companies are on the right track with various things being put in place as studies into work and non-work stress has increased exponentially in the past few years.

References

Manjoo F. (2013, January 21st). The Happiness Machine, How Google Became A Great Place To Work. Retreived article from http://www.slate.com/articles/technology/technology/2013/01/google_people_operations_the_secrets_of_the_world_s_most_scientific_human.html

Gibson J.L., Donnelly J.H. et al. 2012, Organizations Behaviours, Structures, Processes. 14 Pp 194-222