How to Manage Stress at Workplace

Workplace stress is a serious issue. Most people experience stress sooner or later during their working life. Be it the tension to do more, handle extra work, additional responsibility, or working long hours – most of us have experienced the heaviness of stress. Stress experienced by the workers at workplace has a damaging impact on their health, efficiency and behaviour in the organization. Thus, stress must be managed properly.

Strategies and Tips: How to Manage Stress at Workplace

Following are some strategies for managing stress in the workplace:

• Employee Assistance Programme: This method means the provision of employee counselling services offered by a company. This approach is extremely popular.
• Give Workers Variety of Work: Designate jobs to offer meaning, excitement, and opportunities for employees to make use of their abilities and skills.
• Mental wellness forums: Pursuits which promote healthy practices for example home and life balance, exercising, diet, and stress reduction methods.
• Encourage stress reduction strategies in employees recruitment, induction and training procedures. Place pointers and suggestions for stress management in staff notices or on notice boards.
• Stress Management Training: This refers to training programs created to offer staff members with enhanced coping skills, such as yoga, biofeedback, muscle relaxation, etc.
• Stress Reduction Programme: This programme includes interventions made to alter the level or type of job stressors experienced by, employees, typically by means of job design or work reform.
• Technology, work organisation, and jobs should be created to ensure the worker is not put through physical or mental stresses which may result in illness or accidents. Forms of compensation and the distribution of working hours should be taken into account.
• Encourage: Motivate staff members by telling them they are performing great work, encourage them to get adequate rest, and inspire them have a balanced diet and exercise regularly. Research indicates that organizations which encourage workers to take a “body break” work more efficiently compared to those who do little or no exercise.
• Improve communication: Share information with staff members to minimize uncertainty regarding their jobs. Clearly specify employees’ roles and duties. Try to make communication friendly and efficient.
• Employee Participation: Offer employees chance to take part in decisions and actions impacting their jobs. Delegate responsibility and let others to call their own shots. When they feel they’re part of the decision, they will be happy to take responsibility, instead of moaning against their manager as well as the organization.
• Promote job rotation and job enrichment.
• Don’t Overload Your Employees: The amount of work must be in accordance with workers’ abilities.
• Offer an Enjoyable Working Environment: Sense of humor and laughter is the key.
• Praise good work performance, both verbally and formally, via schemes like Worker of the Month.
• Encourage an “entrepreneurial” work environment which provides employees more control over their job.
• Give opportunities for social discussion between staff members.
• Make management actions in line with company values.

The above text discussed some strategies on how to manage stress at workplace. Minimizing stress creates a better work place and promotes mutual effort amongst your staff, leading to higher quality of work.

Stress is unavoidable, but there are methods by which we can reduce the load and make the workplace more manageable. In this way, we can reduce stress in the workplace.