December 24, 2008
Is Workplace Stress Affecting Your Job Performance?
Stress in the workplace is an extremely common thing most people have to face. Stress is a fact of life for most workplaces, but the key is to learn how to control it. You can manage stress and keep it to a minimum if you recognize the factors that can lead to stress in your workplace and utilize ways to minimize the effect they can have on you.
Here are some of the common stressors in the workplace and ways to handle them:
Rude co-workers
An unprofessional, tactless, or rude co-worker can cause a lot of stress in your working environment. Considering the number of people that we are required to interact with on a daily basis to perform the duties of our jobs it is guaranteed that a clash of personalities will eventually occur. The key is not to let an aggravating co-worker affect your work performance.
Several means of handling this type of problem exist. Here it’s important to choose your battles. If you can ignore the rude behavior and get your work done, let it go if at all possible.
Some co-workers take annoying too far. Some are downright rude or offensive. When ignoring the co-worker doesn’t work try confrontation. In a polite, but firm tone explain what behaviors are bothering you, why the bother you, and give suggestions for how the co-worker might improve. It is possible that the offender does not know they are upsetting you. Saying it out loud will help reduce the stress and anxiety surrounding the situation.
If that doesn’t help, you’ll have to go to your boss and tell them what’s going on and that it’s been affecting your work. Sometimes they’ll take ahold of the situation themselves in order for things to run smoothly.
Poor Management
If unprofessional co-workers are unpleasant to deal with then poor management has to be twice as stressful. The options for dealing with poor managers are more limited, but there is no reason to let poor management style give you stress or anxiety. As will co-workers ignoring the behavior is the first and most preferable option.
Bosses have bosses too. If a manager is creating a hostile or stressing work environment for you do not hesitate to involve their supervisor in your complaints. As with co-workers you will want to make sure that your complaints are factual, non-emotional, and supported by appropriate documentation. Write down offenses and document all inappropriate behavior before bringing the case to upper level management
Suffering silently with a management problem is not a good idea. It will make you miserable and anxious and eventually flow on to decrease your productivity and effectiveness. Most places of business want to hear about these types of situations and will do what they can to correct them.
Huge Workload
Having more work than you can handle will inevitably result in much more stress for you. Take on only what you can handle at one time. Ask for help from others and be willing to reciprocate and help them when they need it. A lot of things can be accomplished with teamwork.
Discovering, reducing, or eliminating workplace stress where possible is a positive step towards having a fulfilling and productive work experience. Stress in the workplace is inevitable, but correctly managing stress can help prevent job burnout and increase job satisfaction.
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Filed under Managing Stress by Anxiety Management Techniques







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