Everyone feels stress. It is inescapable. There are three important questions to consider when thinking about stress:

1. Do you generally consider stress “good” or “bad?”
2. Is your ongoing relationship with stress motivating or debilitating?
3. Do you handle stress at home differently than you handle stress at work?

Eustress or Distress?

While everyone has stress, sometimes it feels worse than at other times.

Have you ever heard of the word, eustress? Eustress is a positive form of stress that can keep you motivated and engaged. It can actually enhance your performance. Eustress can provide you with a positive kick and a challenge that can help you perform at peak performance.

You are probably familiar with the word, distress. Distress interferes with your ability to make good decisions. It can act as an obstacle to derail your job performance. Distress can fill you with negativity and can cause crippling fear. It can feel overwhelming.

At work, stress can result in:

• absenteeism
• lower productivity
• staff turnover
• staff dissatisfaction
• lack of brand or employer loyalty
• physical and/or emotional conditions sometimes resulting in workers’ compensation claims

Work-Related Stress Is a Management Issue

While people are 100% responsible for their own thoughts, feelings, and behavior, employers play a huge part in the work-related stress of their employees. When staff are overwhelmed, dissatisfied, or lack loyalty, it becomes a management issue.

It is vital for employers to recognize work-related stress as a significant health and safety issue. A company can and should take steps to ensure that employees are not subjected to unnecessary stress. Good communication and listening skills by management are important to employee satisfaction.

Causes of Workplace Stress

The top ten most reported causes of stress at work:

1. Working more hours than in the past. Some employees are working the equivalent of a 13th month every year
2. Businesses are downsizing the number of people on their staff.
3. Workloads are being upsized and more is expected.
4. Fear of AI and other technology eliminating their jobs.
5. A toxic work environment including bullying, violence, harassment, and discrimination.
6. Constant change and inconsistent expectations.
7. Poor communication or instruction, such as a mismatch of expectations, vague instructions, insufficient training, deadlines becoming a moving target
8. Workplace politics, including favoritism and nepotism.
9. Expecting perfectionism and/or a high-stakes work environment such as that of healthcare workers, first responders, etc.
10. Blurring of the home-work balance.

Facing Your Work-Related Stress

It can sometimes feel like a personal failure to say you are experiencing work-related stress. It shouldn’t. At work there are so many factors that you have absolutely no control over. For example, you cannot control the fact that your boss hired his nephew for a key position for which he is not qualified. You cannot control that an enormous conglomerate is downsizing the number of staff, but increasing your workload. And you cannot control the harassing, bullying behavior of another staff member.

You only have control over yourself.

Contrary to popular opinion, if you are experiencing work-related stress, you have options. You might not like all of your options, but they do exist.

Self-Help When You Experience Workplace Stress

If you are experiencing workplace stress, there are things you can do to decrease your stress:

• Take care of yourself. Eat a healthy diet, stay hydrated, keep physically active, and make time for relaxation. Find time to destress, relax and rejuvenate (“me time”) every day.
• Focus on a healthy work – home balance.
• Think about the changes you need to make at work in order to reduce your stress levels. Then talk with someone about it.
• Talk over your concerns with your employer, manager, or human resources manager. This is not whining, criticizing or complaining; it is a plea to understand the stress.
• Build a social support network that can contribute to a more peaceful life.
• Schedule the most difficult tasks of each day for times when you are fresh, such as first thing in the morning.
• Don’t take out your stress on loved ones.
• Avoid drugs, alcohol, tobacco, etc.
• Seek professional help through your company’s EAP (Employee Assistance Program).
• Dust off your resume and start looking for a new job.

Summary

You are not alone in your work-related stress. Everyone experiences it. But you have options, even if they are options you don’t particularly like, for example, finding a new job.

Recognizing that you aren’t alone is important in looking at other options.

You may also be interested in my book: Crush Your Stress: 302 Coping Skills for Managing Your Stress.

With warmest regards,

Thank you so much for reading this blog. If you enjoyed the content, please check out other blogs at:
RelationshipsRelearned.com
RVingNomads.com

In addition to blogs and articles, I have written a series of self-help books called The Personal Empowerment Series and a fictional series named The Charlotte Novella Series. To view my books and novellas I have written, please go to my Amazon Authors Page.

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If you live in the State of Maine or Texas and seeking individual therapy, please go to my Therapy website: KathrynMaietta.com

Kathryn Maietta, MSW, LCSW Licensed Clinical Social Worker / Author and Blogger

I am a licensed clinical social worker in Maine and in Texas. The focus of my practice has been working individually with adult men and women and working with couples. I received my BSW from Baylor University and my MSW from Boston University. Since 2020 I have published a series of self-help books and written a bi-weekly mental health blog.

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Anger Management Domestic Abuse/Violence Relationships Stress and Anxiety Communication Resilience