Understanding Stress: Definition, Causes, Consequences, and Coping Mechanisms, Study Guides, Projects, Research of Business Administration

Download Understanding Stress: Definition, Causes, Consequences, and Coping Mechanisms and more Study Guides, Projects, Research Business Administration in PDF only on Docsity! INTRODUCTION If you were to ask a dozen people to define stress, or explain what causes stress for them, or how stress affects them, you would likely get 12 different answers to each of these requests. The reason for this is that there is no definition of stress that everyone agrees on, what is stressful for one person may be pleasurable or have little effect on others and we all react to stress differently. That's easily illustrated by the list of 50 Common Signs And Symptoms Of Stress noted under Effects Of Stress and the attached diagram illustrating how it affects different parts of the body. Stress is not a useful term for scientists because it is such a highly subjective phenomenon that it defies definition. And if you can't define stress, how can you possibly measure it? The term "stress", as it is currently used was coined by Hans Selye in 1936, who defined it as "the non-specific response of the body to any demand for change". Selye had noted in numerous experiments that laboratory animals subjected to acute but different noxious physical and emotional stimuli (blaring light, deafening noise, extremes of heat or cold, perpetual frustration) all exhibited the same pathologic changes of stomach ulcerations, shrinkage of lymphoid tissue and enlargement of the adrenals. He later demonstrated that persistent stress could cause these animals to develop various diseases similar to those seen in humans, such as heart attacks, stroke, kidney disease and rheumatoid arthritis. At the time, it was believed that most diseases were caused by specific but different pathogens. Tuberculosis was due to the tubercle bacillus, anthrax by the anthrax bacillus, syphilis by a Docsity.com spirochete, etc. What Selye proposed was just the opposite, namely that many different insults could cause the same disease, not only in animals, but in humans as well. Unfortunately, Selye was not aware that stress had been used for centuries in physics to explain elasticity, the property of a material that allows it to resume its original size and shape after having been compressed or stretched by an external force. As expressed in Hooke’s Law of 1658, the magnitude of an external force, or stress, produces a proportional amount of deformation, or strain, in a malleable metal. This created even more confusion when his research had to be translated into foreign languages. There was no suitable word or phrase that could convey what he meant, since he was really describing strain. In 1946, when he was asked to give an address at the prestigious College de France, the academicians responsible for maintaining the purity of the French language struggled with this problem for several days, and subsequently decided that a new word would have to be created. Apparently, the male chauvinists prevailed, and le stress was born, quickly followed by el stress, il stress, lo stress, der stress in other European languages, and similar neologisms in Russian, Japanese, Chinese and Arabic. Stress is one of the very few words you will see preserved in English in these and other languages that do not use the Roman alphabet. Because it was apparent that most people viewed stress as some unpleasant threat, Selye subsequently had to create a new word, stressor, to distinguish stimulus from response. Stress was generally considered as being synonymous with distress and dictionaries defined it as "physical, mental, or emotional strain or tension" or "a condition or feeling experienced when a person Docsity.com boss gives a formal reprimand for poor performances). This is a form of distress. But there is also a positive, pleasant side of stress caused by good things (for example, a college student makes the dean's list, an attractive respected acquaintance asks for a date; an employee is offered a job promotion at another location.) This is a form of eustress. This latter term was coined by the pioneers of stress research from the Greek eu which means "good" applied to the workplace a recent large study by researchers at cornell University of 1,800 managers identified examples of "bad" stress as office politics, red tape and a stalled career and "good" stress as challenges that come with increased job responsibility, time pressure, and high-quality assignments. In other words, stress can be viewed in a number of different ways and has been described as the most imprecise word in the scientific dictionary. The word stress has also been compared with the word sin; "Both are short, emotionally charged words used to refer to something that other wise would take many words to say." Although there are numerous definitions and much debate about the meaning of job stress, ivancevich and matteson define stress simply as "the interaction of the individual with the environment". But then they go on to give a more detailed working definition, as follows, "an adaptive response, mediated by individual differences and/or psychological processes. That is a consequence of any external (environmental) action situation, or event that place excessive psychological and/or physical demands on a person". Note the three critical components of this definition. (1) It refers to a reaction to a situation or event, not the situation or even itself: Docsity.com (2) It emphasizes that stress can be impacted by individual differences: (3) It highlights the phrase "excessive psychological and/or physical demands." Because only special or unusual situations (as opposed to minor life adjustments) can really be said to produce stress In another definition, Beehr and Newman define job stress as "a condition arising from the interaction of people and their jobs and characterized by changes within people that force them to deviate from their normal functioning". Taking these two definitions and simplifying them for the purpose of this chapter, stress is defined as an adaptive response to an external situation that result in physical, psychological and / or behavioral deviations for organizational participates. It is also important to point out what stress in not:- 1. STRESS IS NOT SIMPLY ANXIETY:- Anxiety operates solely in the emotional and psychological sphere, whereas stress operates there and also in the physiological sphere. Thus, stress may be accompanied by anxiety. But the two should not be equated. 2. STRESS IS NOT SIMPLY NERVOUS TENSION:- Like anxiety, nervous tension may result from stress, but the two are not the some. Unconscious people have exhibited stress, and some people may keep it "botted up" and not reveal it through nervous tension. 3. STRESS IS NOT NECESSARILY SOMETHING DAMAGING BAD OR TO BE AVOIDED:- Eustess is not damaging or bad and is something people should seek out rather than avoid. The key, of course is how the person handles the stress. Stress inevitable: distress may be Docsity.com prevented or can be effectively controlled. If you were to ask a dozen people to define stress, or explain what causes stress for them or how stress affects them you would likely yet 12 different answers to each of these request. The reason for this is that there is no definition of stress that everyone agrees on, what is stressful for one person may be pleasurable or have little effect on others and all react to stress differently. Docsity.com causes and consequences of stress and then consider what individuals and organization can do to reduce it. Docsity.com DEFINITIONS (1) According to Ivancevich and Matterson, "Stress is the interaction of the individual with the environment. It is an adaptive response mediated by individual differences and / or psychological process; that is a consequence of any external (environmental) action situation or event that places excessive psychological and / or physical demands upon a person". (2) According to Beehr and Newman "Job stress is a condition arising from the interaction of the people and their jobs, and characterised by changes with in people that force them to deviate from their normal functioning". (3) "Stress is defined as an adaptive response to an external situation that results in physical. Psychological and / or behavioral deviations for organizational participants". (4) "Stress is dynamic condition in which an individual is confronted with an opportunity, constraint, or demand related to what he or she desires and for which the outcome is perceived to be both uncertain and important" This is a complicated definition. Let's look at its components more closely. (5)”Stress is not necessarily bad in and of itself. While stress is typically discussed in a negative context, it also has a positive value. It is an opportunity when it offers potential gain considers, for example, the superior performance that an athlete or stage performance gives in “clutch” situations. Such individual often use stress positively to rise to the occasion and perform at or near their maximum.” Docsity.com NATURE OF STRESS Stress is highly individualistic in nature. Some people have high tolerance for stress and thrive well in face of several stressors in the environment. In fact, some individual will not perform well unless they experience a level of stress which activates and energises them to put forth their best efforts. On the other hand some people have very low level of tolerance for stress and they become paralysed when they have to interface with routine every day factors that appear undesirable to them. For every individual there is an optimum level of stress under which, he or she will perform to full capacity. If the stress experienced is below this level then the individual gets bored, the motivational level of work reaches a low point and apathy sets in. If one operates in very low stress environment and constantly experience boredom, the person is likely to he psychologically or physically withdrawn from work. Psychological withdrawl will result in careless mistakes being frequently made forgetfulness and absentmindedness. Physical withdrawl will manifest itself in increased rate of tardiness and absenteeism which will ultimately lead to turnover. If on the other hands the stressors in an individual's environment are too many or too intense, their effects on performance will again be adverse. Errors will increase, bad decision will be made and the individual will experience insomnia, stomach problem and psychosomatic illnesses. Organizational performance and individual health are at their peak at optimum level of experienced stress. It is explained with the help of the following figure. Docsity.com point in time managers should be careful in assuming this model accurately depicts the stress-performance relationship. Docsity.com SOURCES OF STRESS Stress is reality of our everyday life. There are both eustresses and distresses that come from our work and non work lives. It was pointed out by near, Rice and Hunt in 1980, by Sekaran in 1986 and by many others, that the work and non work domains of one's life are closely interrelated. Thus if one experiences much distress at work that stress will be carried over to the home, which will increase the sense of awareness of even small distresses experienced in a family sphere, likewise, stresses experienced at home or with friends or from other non work situations can be carried over to the work place which might heighten and multiply the stresses experienced at work. Thus we can say that stresses generate from four sources. a) Extra-organizational stressors b) Organizational stressors c) Group stressors d) Individual stressors Docsity.com SOURCES OF STRESS All these sources are explained in detailed as follows:- A) EXTRA-ORGANIZATIONAL STRESSORS:- Job stress is not limited to things that happen inside the organization during the working hours. Extra organizational factors also contribute to job stress. These stressors include the following factors. 1. POLITICAL FACTORS:- Political factors are likely to cause stress in countries which suffer from political uncertainties as in Iran. For example. The obvious reason is that the countries have stable political system where change is typically implemented in an orderly manner. 2. ECONOMIC FACTORS:- Extra organizational Stressors 1. Political factors 2. Economic factors 3. Technological factors Organizational Stressors Group Stressors Individual Stressors 1. Job related factors 2. Role related factors 3. Inter personal & group related factors 4. Organizational structural factors 5. Organizational leadership factors 6. Organization's life cycle 1. Group cohesiveness 2. Lack of Social support 3. Conflict's 4. Organizational climate 1. Job concerns 2. Career changes 3. Economic problem 4. Changes in life structure 5. The pace of life 6. Life change & life traumas 7. Personality of a person 8. Ability to cope Docsity.com 2. ROLE RELATED FACTORS:- Role related factors relate to pressures placed on a person as a function of the particular role he or she plays in the organization. Individuals can experience the following role related stress. (i) ROLE CONFLICT: - Role conflict occurs when two or more persons have different and sometimes opposing expectations of a given individual. Thus, there are two or more sets of pressures on the individual so that it is not possible to satisfy all of them. Role conflict takes place when contradictory demands are placed upon an employee simultaneously. For example, an advertising manager may be asked to produce a creative ad campaign while on the other hand time constraint is put upon him both roles being in conflict with each other. Another type of role conflict is the inter-role conflict where an individual plays more than one role simultaneously in his life and the demands of these roles conflict with each other. For example, a police officer is invited to his friend's wedding party where the guests use drugs, which are against the law. Here he faces a role conflict. (ii) ROLE AMBIGUITY: - Stresses from job ambiguity arise when an employee does not know what is expected of him or her or how to go about doing the job. For example, if an employee who joins an organization is lift to him to figure out what he is supposed to be doing and nobody tells him what the expectations of him or his role are the newcomer will face a high level of role ambiguity. Even an old employee can be given a responsibility without being given much information. For example, a production manager might tell a foreman that 500 units of steel rods are to be manufactured in next five days Docsity.com and leaves town immediately without specifying what kind of additional help will be provided, or what the purpose, cost, weight or design details are, The foreman is left with a lot of role ambiguity and does not know how he should go about doing the job. (iii) ROLE OVERLOAD: - Role overload refers to the situation. When an individual is expected to do too many things within a limited time as part of the daily routine. For example, if Mrs. X is expected to perform the duties of a supervisor, receptionist, public relations officer and an accountant, she is likely to experience a lot of stress from the several roles she has a play during the day. She may be able to manage the various roles for a short period of time, but if expected to continue in this fashion on a long term basis she is likely to fall sick or quit. 3. INTER PERSONAL AND GROUP RELATED FACTORS:- Interpersonal demands are pressures created by other employees. Group related stressors include factors like conflicts, poor communication, unpleasant relationship and fear of being ostracized form the group as a valued member. Working with superior, peers or subordinates with whom one does not get along can be a constant source of stress; some people can deal with conflicts and misunderstandings in an open way and resolve issues as they arise. Many however, find it difficult to do this and build internal stresses for themselves. Moreover lack of social support from colleagues and poor interpersonal relationships can cause considerable stress, especially among employees with a high social need. Sometimes, the individuals try to avoid these stresses by remaining absent as frequently as possible and even start looking for new jobs. Docsity.com 4. ORGANIZATIONAL STRUCTURAL FACTORS:- Organizational structure defines the level of differentiation, the degree of rules and regulations and where decisions are made. Excessive rules and lack of participation in decisions that affect an employee are examples of structural variables that might be potential stressors. 5. ORGANIZATIONAL LEADERSHIP FACTORS:- These factors represent the managerial style of the organization’s senior managers. Some managers create a culture characterized by tension, fear and anxiety. They establish unrealistic pressures to perform in the short run impose excessively tight controls and routinely fire employees who fail to turn up. 6. ORGANIZATION'S LIFE CYCLE:- Organizations go through a cycle. They are established; they grow, become mature and eventually decline. An organization’s life cycle creates different problems and pressures for the employees. The first and the last stage are stressful. The establishment involves a lot of excitement and uncertainty, while the decline typically requires cutback, layoffs and a different set of uncertainties. When the organization is in the maturity stage, stress tends to be the least because uncertainties are lowest at this point of time. C) GROUP STRESSORS:- Another source of stress in organizations is poor interpersonal relationships or conflicts. These conflicts can be among the members of the group or between the superiors and subordinates. Groups have a lot of influence on the employee's behaviour performance and job satisfaction. On the other hand, Docsity.com routine of his daily life causing concern and stress. The relocation can lead to the following problems:- (i) The fear of working in a new location (ii) Unpredictability about new work environment (iii) Anxiety about creating new relationship (iv) Uprooting of children from their schools and friends. (v) If the employee has got a working spouse the stress is greater. Uncertainty about getting a new job at the new location creates some degree of stress. Thus when a person is geographically relocated his stress will depend upon how many changes occur in his social relationship and family life. More the change more will be two stresses. 3. ECONOMIC PROBLEM: - Some people are very poor money managers or they have wants and desires that always seem to exceed their earning capacity. When individuals overextend their financial resources or in simple words, if they spend more than they earn, it will always cause stress and district the employees from their work. 4. CHANGES IN LIFE STRUCTURES: - The life structure of a person changes as he grows older. As a person grows older, his responsibilities to himself as well as others change and increase. The higher the responsibility, the greater the stress. 5. THE PACE OF LIFE: - As the responsibilities of a person increase, his capacity to execute them should also increase. A hectic pace of life when the person is always busy in business or otherwise can create more stress than a relaxed pace of life. Certain profession life teachings are less stressful than those of company executive's, bankers or businessmen. Docsity.com 6. LIFE CHANGE AND LIFE TRAUMAS: -Life change and life traumas are both stress producing, Life changes may be slow (life getting older) or sudden (like the death of a spouse). Sudden changes are highly stressful. Life traumas can be highly stressful. A life trauma is any upheaval in an individual's life that alter his or her attitudes, emotions or behaviours, Life change and life trauma look alike but there is difference between the two. To illustrate, according to the life change view, the death of a spouse adds to a person's potential for health problems in the following year. At the same time, the person will also experience an emotional turmoil. Which will constitute life trauma and life trauma will spill over to the work place. Thomas Holmes and Richard Roke developed "Social Adjustment rating schedule" to assess the degree of stress created by certain events in life. In order to develop the scale of impact, they asked people to rate as to how long it would take them to adjust to certain stress producing events in life. After considering the responses of the people, they developed a ranking and weighing schedule for each of these stress-producing events. The following table shows the ranking of these events along with the weights. Docsity.com RANKING LIFE EVENT WEIGHT 1. Death of spouse 100 2. Divorce 73 3. Jall term 63 4. Death of a close family member 63 5. Marriage 50 6. Fired from work 47 7. Pregnancy 40 8. Sex difficulties 39 9. Child leaving home 29 10. Change in residence 20 11. Christmas 12 7. PERSONALITY OF A PERSON: - The extent of stress is also determined by the personality of a person. In respect of personality the distinction between 'TYPE A' and 'TYPE B' behaviour patterns become relevant. As mentioned earlier TYPE A personalities may create stress in their work circumstances due to their achievement orientation, Impatience and perfectionalism. TYPE A people, thus, bring stress on themselves, TYPE B personality on the other hand is less stress prone. 8. ABILITY TO COPE: - How a person is able to cope with the stress and the sources a person seeks to deal with stress are also very important. For example, people who have strong faith in god and his will find it easier to deal with stress full situation like the loss of a loved one. Similarly family relations and friends are a source of great comfort at such times of crisis. Docsity.com (A) CONSEQUENCES FOR THE INDIVIDUAL: - Stress shows itself in a number of ways. An individual who is experiencing stress may develop the following symptoms: 1. PHYSIOLOGICAL SYMPTOMS: - Most of the early concern with stress was directed at physiological symptoms. This was predominantly due to the fact that the topic was researched by specialists in the health and medical science. This research led to the conclusion that stress could create changes in metabolism, increase heart and breathing rates, increase blood pressure, bring on headaches, and induce heart attacks. In the initial stages, the major concern of stress was directed at physiological symptoms. The reason was that this topic was researched by specialists in the health and medical science. According to the researchers high degrees of stress are typically accompanied by severe anxiety frustration and depression. Some of the physiological symptoms of success as given by BUSINESS WEEK are as follows: (i) STRESS: Irritability insomnia, alcohol and food abuse. Physical changes including rapid breathing and heart beat, tensed muscles. Prolonged stress can cause muscular twitches, skin problems, boldness and sexual problems such as impotence. (ii) ANXIETY: Excessive worry, irritability anger nervousness as well as unability to concentrate or sleep, physical changes include palpitations, chest pain and dizziness. (iii) DEPRESSION: Feeling of sadness hopelessness, guilt and worthlessness, loss of interest in activities, change in appetite or weight difficulty in concentrating and suicidal thoughts. The link between stress and particular physiological symptoms is not clear. According to academy of management Docsity.com journal there are few, if any, consistent relationships. But the fact which is relatively significant is that physiological symptoms have the least direct relevance to that student of human behavior. Our concern is with behavior and attitudes. Therefore, the other two categories of symptoms are more important to us. 2. PSYCHOLOGICAL SYMPTOMS: - While considerable attention has been given to the relationship between stress and physiological symptoms, especially within the medical community not as much importance has been given to the impact of stress on mental health. But psychological problems resulting from stress are very important in day to day job performance. Stress can cause dissatisfaction. Job-related stress can cause Job-related dissatisfaction. Job dissatisfaction, in fact, is “the simplest and most obvious psychological effect” of stress. But stress shows itself in other psychological states-for instance, tension, anxiety, irritability, boredom, and procrastination. The psychological impacts of stress may be:- (i) Stress can cause dissatisfaction Job related stress can cause Job-related dissatisfaction. Job dissatisfaction "Is the simplest and most psychological aspect of stress." (ii) High levels of stress may be accompanied by anger anxiety depression nervousness irritability, tension and boredom. One study found that stress had the strongest impact on aggressive action such as sabotage interpersonal aggression, hostility and complaints. (iii) The psychological problems form stress may lead to poor job performance, lowered self esteem, resentment of supervision, inability to concentrate make decisions and job dissatisfaction. Docsity.com (iv) Research indicates that when people are placed in jobs that make multiple and conflicting demands or in which there is a lack of clarity as to the individual's duties, authority and responsibilities both stress and dissatisfaction are increased. (v) The less control people have over the pace of their work the greater the stress and dissatisfaction. 3. BEHAVIOURAL SYMPTOMS: - Any behavior which indicates that you are not acting you usual self may be a sign of adverse reaction to stress. Direct behaviour that may accompany high levels of stress includes. (i) Sleeplessness (ii) Undereating or overeating (iii) Increased smoking and drinking (iv) Drug abuse (v) Nodding off during meetings or social gatherings. (vi) Losing your sense of humour. (vii) Moving in a tense and jerky way. (viii) Reacting nervously or irritably to everyday sounds. (ix) Absenteeism and turnover (x) Reduction in productivity. Consistently acting and feeling out of character is a serious warning that we are losing our ability to copy with tension. Inability to feel or express any emotions or a sense of being indicates loss of contact with our surroundings and us. The above indicators can help us in overcoming the tensions in our day to day life…. Like the psychological problem resulting from stress, the behavioural problems are often not attributed to stress by co- workers or supervisors and generate little sympathy. Docsity.com APPROACHES OF STRESS When we look at stress from organizational point of view, management may not be concerned about the low to moderate levels of stress experienced by the employees. The reason is that some functional level of stress is necessary to improve employee performance. But high levels of stress and sustained low levels of stress are a cause of action by the management but when we look at stress from individual's point of view even the low levels of stress are perceived to be undesirable. Keeping this in mind we can discuss the individual and organizational approaches towards managing stress. Before discussing these approaches we must keep in mind two points:- (i) Firstly we must not make any generalisation. Each of us have different limits different optimum stress levels and will perceive the sources of stress differently. One person's overstress may be another person's challenge and optimum stress. (ii) Secondly, we need to differentiate between what we can do to equipourselves and to organize our environment to prevent us from becoming over or under stressed. We label this as PREVENTION. Yet however will we prepare ourselves and try to control our environment from time to time we will still experience undesirable stress. It is then that we need to have developed Docsity.com MANAGEMENT SKILLS Now we discuss the individual's and organizational approaches to managing stress. MANAGEMENT SKILLS (A) Individual approaches (B) Organizational approaches 1. Knowledge about stress 1. Selection and placement 2. Physiological fitness 2. Goal setting 3. Time management 3. Improved Communication 4. Assertiveness 4. Redesigning Jobs 5. Social Support Network 5. Participative Decision-Making 6. Relaxation Techniques 6. Building Teamwork 7. Plan your life in advance 7. Personal Wellness Programmers 8. Readjust life Goals A) INDIVIDUAL APPROACHES: - As we know that stress has got a number of negative consequences for the individual that is why every individual should take personal responsibility for reducing his or her stress level. There are a number of ways by which a person can either avoid stressful condition change them or learn to copy with them. Stress can be managed by an individual, which will enable him to regain control over his life. Some of the stress reducing strategies from individual's point of view are. Docsity.com 1. KNOWLEDGE ABOUT STRESS: - In the first stage an individual should become knowledgeable about stress. He should know about the process and effects of stress. He must find out the major sources of his stress. He must anticipate stressful periods and plan accordingly in advance. He must be honest with himself and decide what he can copy with what he cannot. 2. PHYSIOLOGICAL FITNESS: - Exercise in any form can help people in coping with the stress. Non competitive physical exercise such as aerobics, walking, jogging, swimming, riding a bicycle, playing softball or tennis has been recommended by physicians as a way to deal with excessive stress level. There is evidence to suggest that individuals who exercise are much less likely to suffer from certain types of stress related exercises. With proper exercise, diet control and non-smoking habits, blood pressure and cholesterol become controlled and the body becomes more resistant to pressures. People are more likely to get physically sick or emotionally depressed if they are over weight or poorly nourished. 3. TIME MANAGEMENT: - Most of the people are very poor in managing their time. They don't know that what must be done and when it would be desirable to do so. The result of poor time management is feeling of work overload, skipped schedules and tension. A well organized person can often accomplish twice as much as the person who is poorly organized. Therefore, an individual must understand how to manage his time see that he can cope with tensions created by job demands. 4. ASSERTIVENESS: - An individual should become assertive. He should not say 'Yes' when he wants to say 'No'. He should start saying No to people or managers who demands too Docsity.com 3. IMPROVED COMMUNICATION: - Sometimes due to lack of effective communication from the superiors, the employees do not know what they have to do and how they have to do it. This result in role ambiguity. Similarly, when two or more persons have contradicting role demands from an employee, it leads to role conflict if there is lack of proper communication. Effective communication with employees reduces the uncertainty by lessening role ambiguity and role conflict. 4. REDESIGNING JOBS: - Organizations should redesign the jobs in such a way as to give employees more responsibility, more meaningful work, more autonomy and increased feed back. This will help reduce the stress caused by monotony, routine work overload or underload and role ambiguity. Job redesigning enhances motivation, reduces the stress among the employees and enhances "Quality of work life". 5. PARTICIPATIVE DECISION MAKING: - If the organizations give the employees participation in those decisions that directly affect them and their job performance it can increase employee control and reduce the role stress. The main reason of role stress is that employees feel uncertain about their goals, expectations and how they will be evaluates. These uncertainties can be reduced by the management by giving the employees a right to participate in the decision-making. 6. BUILDING TEAMWORK: - The- management should try to create such work environment in which there is no provision for inter personal conflict or inter group conflict. Such conflicts are the causes of stress; such should be prevented from building or eliminated if they develop. Accordingly such team work should be developed that group and the members are mutually supportive Docsity.com and productive. Members of the group should consider themselves as member of the same family and seek social support form each other. 7. PERSONAL WELLNESS PROGRAMMES: - These personal wellness programmes focus on the employees total physical and mental condition organization can provide facilities at their premises for physical fitness such as gyms, swimming pools, tennis courts, etc. as well as psychological counseling. They should hold seminars or workshops to make the employees understand nature and sources of stress and the possible ways to reduce it. These workshops should help these individuals who are already under stress. Moreover, a supervisor can impact personal wellness of his subordinates through positive example, encouragement an by practicing the basic concepts and techniques of human resource management. Increasing formal organizational communication with employees reduces uncertainty by lessening role ambiguity and role conflict. Given the importance that perception play in moderating the stress-response relationship, management can also use effective communications as a means to shape employee perceptions. Remember that what employees categorize as demands, threats, or opportunities are merely an interpretation, and that interpretation can be affected by the symbols and actions communicated by management. The final suggestion is to offer organizationally supported wellness programs. These programs focus on the employee’s total physical and mental condition. For example, they typically provide workshops to help people quite smoking, control alcohol use, lose weight, eat better, and develop a regular exercise program. The Docsity.com assumption underlying most wellness programs is that employees need to take personal responsibilities for their physical and mental health. The organization is merely a vehicle to facilitate this end. Docsity.com 3. REDUCE THE INTENSITY OF YOUR EMOTIONAL REACTIONS TO STRESS. The stress reaction is triggered by your perception of danger...physical danger and/or emotional danger. Are you viewing your stressors in exaggerated terms and/or taking a difficult situation and making it a disaster? Are you expecting to please everyone? Are you overreacting and viewing things as absolutely critical and urgent? Do you feel you must always prevail in every situation? Work at adopting more moderate views; try to see the stress as something you can cope with rather than something that overpowers you. Try to temper your excess emotions. Put the situation in perspective. Do not labor on the negative aspects and the "what if's." 4. LEARN TO MODERATE YOUR PHYSICAL REACTIONS TO STRESS. Slow, deep breathing will bring your heart rate and respiration back to normal. Relaxation techniques can reduce muscle tension. Electronic bio feedback can help you gain voluntary control over such things as muscle tension; heart reate, and blood pressure. Medications, when prescribed by a physician, can help in the short term in moderating your physical reactions. However, they alone are not the answer. Learning to moderate these reactions on your own is a preferable long-term solution. 5. BUILD YOUR PHYSICAL RESERVES Docsity.com Exercise for cardiovascular fitness three to four times a week (moderate, prolonged rhythmic exercise is best, such as walking, swimming, cycling, or jogging). Eat well-balanced, nutritious meals Maintain your ideal weight. Avoid nicotine, excessive caffeine, and other stimulants. Mix leisure with work. Take breaks and get away when you can. Get enough sleep. Be as consistent with your sleep schedule as possible. Docsity.com 6. MAINTAIN YOUR EMOTIONAL RESERVES. Develop some mutually supportive friendships/relationships. Pursue realistic goals which are meaningful to you, rather than goals others have for you that you do not share. Expect some frustrations, failures, and sorrows. Always be kind and gentle with yourself -- be a friend to yourself. Docsity.com