Every one of us who has ever held down a job, must have at some point, felt the pressure of workplace stress. Stress at work happens, even if you love what you do. In the short-term, it may manifest from a pressure to meet one deadline or the other, however, in the long-term, a low salary or a lack of job satisfaction could weigh heavily on your mind. I suspect that a degree of good stress could be the fuel you need to bolster your productivity but when left unchecked, workplace stress can become overwhelming for your physical and emotional health.
This, of course, can blossom into anxiety, insomnia, or high blood pressure; to say nothing of other health conditions such as depression. As if that isn’t enough; many women who experience excessive stress often deal with it in unhealthy ways such as overeating, or alcohol abuse just to stay functional. All of which is understandable when you consider how well a woman is expected to juggle both her work and personal life.
Now here’s one other thing about workplace stress: it doesn’t just disappear when you head home for the day. It has a way of spilling into your personal space and soiling everything else you do after. We know that you can’t always avoid the tensions that occur on the job because you can’t control everyone’s behavior. That’s why we have collated the steps below as an easy guide to help you manage it all better:
Recognize Your Stressors
I read somewhere that our most stressful clients –or situations- often generate the least revenue or benefits in our careers and I have found this to be true. Regardless of whatever benefits they bring you, stressors (whether human or not) are bad for your wellbeing. That’s why the first thing you need to do is to identify which situations create the most stress at work for you so you can check how you respond to them. Do you raise your voice when a certain person comes around your desk? How can you respond better? If you’re being honest, I’m fairly certain you’ll find that a part of your workplace stress is self-imposed. An example could be if you’re too caught up in your colleagues’ perceptions of you. You can handle this by building your own self-confidence because you can’t control anyone else’s opinion or thoughts anyway. A funny thing here is that once you shift your focus from others’ approval of your work and focus on the work itself, you’re actually more likely to impress them without even knowing it.
Define And Maintain Certain Boundaries
Ours is a digital world and it’s easy to feel pressured to remain available to every Tom, Dick and Harry. That’s why your mail to your supervisor on a weekend starts off with an apology for not responding sooner; never mind the fact that you actually don’t work on weekends. It’s vital to put some work-life boundaries in place and it’s necessary to maintain these boundaries to tackle workplace stress. This could mean switching off your phones once you get home from work; no mails on weekends or not answering your cell during dinner; it’s all up to you. We all have different preferences when it comes to how to meld our work and personal lives. The important thing is that these boundaries are established. And that you stick to yours.
Eliminate Unnecessary Interruptions
Meetings and team tasks keep most of us really busy during the work day. Emails, phone calls, instant messages and sudden deadlines can further conspire to further leave us even more stressed at work. Now you probably don’t have any control over the million interrupters to your daily tasks, and that’s okay because most of us don’t anyway. The important thing is that you control your reactions to these triggers in order to limit your workplace stress. For instance, you can choose to accept the interruptions when they come, cut them off or determine just how important they are before you make any call. Having a preset criteria for which response you want to make, helps you compartmentalize faster and free up your time for more pressing needs. You could also train those around you to say, close the door when you need to focus.
Take Your Breaks As Seriously As Your Meetings
I’m sure you must have heard of this one before, but it really is so important that I had to save it for the last. Taking breaks in between work sessions would take care of your workplace stress faster than you can imagine. Most times, we attack our work days head on using a “push, push, push” approach, because some time ago some mentor or the other told us that if we worked the full eight to 10 hours, we’ll get more done. But here is what few people ever share; bouncing your mental energy from one task to the next all day with no rest burns you out fast. Your productivity takes a nose-dive and as it goes down, your stress levels would hit the roof. So work in smaller blocs of time because you actually get a lot more done this way. Schedule breaks throughout the day to walk, stretch at your desk or do a breathing exercise and take this seriously. If you have intense concentration for about 90 minutes, followed by a brief period of recovery, you can clear the buildup of workplace stress and rejuvenate yourself better.
Ultimately, your perspective of stress at work is subjective because most times, it’s all seen through the filter of your own self-doubt. So every now and then, try to step away and view it all objectively. You just might find that those challenges and worries aren’t about you at all and when you do, you’ll be more effective and less likely to take things personally.
Have you tried any of these or do you intend to? Let us know how it goes in the comment section.