Stress in any and every organization has become common today, but excess stress can interfere your personal and professional life. This can be a cause to break down your professional network which will in fact impact on the productivity and spoil your physical and emotional health. Your ability to deal with it can mean out of the difference between success and failures.
It’s not in your hand to control everything at your workplace, but this doesn’t mean that you are powerless – when you are struck in any difficult situation. Finding ways to manage workplace stress or looking out to opt out of hat job will not be that helpful as it will give you temporary relief, but rather focusing on one thing will always be within your control.
For workers anywhere, the financial system may feel like an emotional move with layoffs and budget cuts which result increased fear, insecurity, and high-level of stress.
Your emotions should be communicable as stress can impact the quality of your interactions with others and sometimes many people lose their prospects because of this. The better you manage your stress, the more you'll positively influence those around you, and the fewer others stress will negatively affect you.
Let us look at some more tips that will help you to come out of stress and help yourselves to grow professionally and personally.
How to Manage Job Stress
There are many ways to reduce both your personal stress and the stress you get on the job side. They include:
- Take responsibility for improving your physical and emotional well-being
- Avoid pitfalls and stay away from negative attitudes which add stress to your work
- Improve your communication skills to ease and advance your relationships with the higher management and coworkers
Recognize warning signs of stress at workplace
When you feel stress at your workplace, you lose confidence and become irritable or introvert. This is the first reason which will make you less effective and less productive in your job. Thus, it also makes your work less rewarding. When you start ignoring the warning signs of stress at your workplace it leads to bigger problems. Chronic and intense stress can also lead to physical and emotional health problems.
Signs and symptoms of excessive stress at job
- Feeling nervous, irritable, or depressed
- Indifference, loss of interest in work
- Trouble Focussed
- Muscle tension or headaches
- Stomach problems
- Social withdrawal
Common Causes of excessive Stress
- Fear of Being Laid Off
- Working for Overtimes Due to Staff Cutbacks
- Pressure to Meet Rising Expectations
- Increase in No Job Satisfaction
- Pressure to Work at Most Favorable Levels Every time
Improve your personal Life
When you are unable to manage stress at work, improve your personal life, as it adversely impacts your health and makes you stress-free. When your own needs are taken care of, you will be stronger and resilient to stress. The better you feel, the better you’ll be equipped to manage your work stress without becoming overwhelmed. Taking care of yourself doesn’t mean that you overhaul your total lifestyle. Small to small things can lift up your mood, increase your liveliness, and make you feel that you’re back in the driver’s seat again.
Start your day with positives and always take things one step at a time, as this helps you to make more positive lifestyle choices, and you can soon notice a decline in your stress levels, both at home and at work. Get into regular exercise as it is the first stress burner; listen to good and soothing music, read good books, eat your favorite food which will not only increase your energy levels but help you to take the physical stress. To be positive in every situation is always suggestible by experts; so start adapting it. Break up your activities and do what you like most first, last but not least have a sound sleep as this will help you to wake up with a fresh mind and start your day with a refreshing way.
Prioritize & organize your tasks to cut down job stress
When your work and workplace stress threatens you, there are simple steps to regain control over yourself in some situations. Always be the first to adapt the ability to build a sense of self-control in stressful situations, as this will help you to be well-received by your managers, coworkers, and subordinates alike, and which also lead to good relationship building at your workplace.
Improve Emotional Intelligence
As we discussed, every job today is very stressful, retaining a large measure of self-control and self-confidence by learning and practicing emotional intelligence has also become very important in today’s lifestyle. Emotional intelligence is the skill which helps you to manage your emotions in positive and practical ways and use them properly. When it comes to love your work and increase the productivity, emotional intelligence matters just as much as intellectual ability. By adapting this skill you can communicate with others and draw people to you, one can easily overcome differences, fix wounded feelings, and learn how to defuse tension and stress.
Break your Bad Habits
Many of us take job stress and make their jobs worse with negative thoughts and behavior. Breaking out your stress at your workplace will never help you, but it makes your job more complicated. Thus to get rid of such situations one has to turn around these self-defeating habits so that you can very easily be able to handle the situations.
No project, situation, or decision is ever perfect, so trying to achieve perfection on everything will just add needless pressure to your work and day. Setting unrealistic goals and struggling to reach them is setting you up to fall short. Always aim to do your best, so that no one will ask for more than that.
Be on time and do not run late, set your clocks and watches fast to give yourself extra time. Do not make your desk mess, throw away the clutter; and make sure that you are aware where everything is as it saves your time and cuts stress. Make to-do lists and plan your day to make feel less overwhelmed.
Learn how managers or employers can reduce job stress
The manager should play the major role as to keep stress levels in the workplace to a minimum. As they can act as positive role models, particularly in times of high stress. If the manager can remain calm in stressful situations, it is much easier for employees to also maintain their calm.
In addition, there will be many organizational changes that managers and employers can make to reduce stress in the workplace. That include:
Improve Communication
Communicating effectively at work can help you to improve the teamwork; decision making will be easy with problem-solving techniques. That means not just by understanding the words or the information being communicated, you can also understand the emotions the speaker is trying to communicate within the group.
Consult your Employees
- Give workers opportunities to participate in decisions that affect their jobs.
- Consult employees about scheduling and work rules.
- Be sure the workload is suitable to employees’ abilities and resources; avoid unrealistic deadlines.
- Show that individual workers are valued.
- Offer rewards and incentives.
- Praise good work performance, both verbally and officially, through schemes such as Employee of the Month.
- Provide opportunities for career development.
- Promote an “entrepreneurial” work climate that gives employees more control over their work.
Develop a Friendly Social Climate
- Offer opportunities for social interaction among employees.
- Setting- up a zero-tolerance policy for harassment.
- Make management actions reliable with organizational values.
