Handling Workplace Stress
What are some ways that you have personally handled workplace stress or helped others to do so?
The best stress reducer I have found is to ride my bicycle as hard as I can for 30 minutes during my lunch hour. Another more powerful stress reducer is to read a passage of scripture from the Bible and reflect on it for a few minutes. The best stress reducer ever is to acknowledge that Christ is in charge and trust Him.
William,
Physcial exercise is always a great stress reliever. In the book "Brain Rules" by John Medina he writes on the value of physical exercise and has a complete chapter on stress.
Stress relief is conditioned on three factors each of have to have in control. The three factors are:
1. Mental
2. Physical
3 Spiritual
I personally infuse a little humor into the situation. It breaks up the tension and gives the employees time to relax and re group. I find it a very effective tool.
Suzanne,
In John Medina's book "Brain Rules" mentioned the value of several activities that help people think and perform better. Putting people into a more relaxed atmosphere even when you may be talking abut critical issues is a good methodology. Good Idea! Keep it up.
I also enjoy riding my bike. I work long hours 3 out of 5 days usually end up atbeing 12 hour shifts. So when I get home I usually take a long walk around my yard and check out my pool and the flower garden then I say hello my cat that is always waiting for me. Finally I go in the house change into gym cloths and get on my bike and ride the most difficult course and the highest resistance I can for at least 30 minutes. After that I wind down with a hot shower and then I am ready to leave the stress of the day behind and engage my family and a nice hot cup of tea.
What a nice routine. Your work schedule produces natural stress and to compete with stress your mind has to be under control. I would suggest you read the book "Brain Rules" by John Medina. Your routine for stress relief is one of his chapters. You would be a good subject to be proud of.
At work stress can be handled better if you have exercise,rest and eating right.
As the school director I find that my employees often follow my lead. So when I feel workplace stress creeping up due to project deadlines or new class starts, I always break up the tension by adding a little humor to the conversations. I often find myself quoting famous lines from Monty Python. I also encourage open conversations about the afflicting issues
Venting is a great tool for releasing pressure and stress. Every morning the staff takes a few moments to remind each other and themselves how much they love their job. We embrace stress and work through it as a team.
By the end of each day we leave satisfied with or accomplishments and enriched by our interactions. We leave the stress of the day behind when we lock the door and we know that tomorrow we will all be back to share the stresses of the day together as a team.
I find that this type of leadership style often helps to combat stress in the workplace and I encourage all of my reports to follow it. Having a great support system does wonders for dealing with stress.
Good Ideas! Somtimes you may have a few saboteurs in your employment. It is best to remain positive. If negative comments continue to influence other employees you can use an activity I have seen used successfully.
Have all your employees where a colorful rubber band on their wrist. These are the wide rubber bands. When anyone is saying something negative the person they are talking to can ask them to snap thmesleves for being negative. This is fun and many times people who didn't think what they were saying was negative they found out people thought they were. When you have your employee meetings you can ask about the process and see how it is working. It is an eye opening process.
Physical exercise a bike ride or a walk at the beach. Getting up from my desk and stretching
Stress can be both good and bad. The stress of physical exertion within your health limits can be very good for you. Emotional stress can be very disturbing to the life functions of the body. (blood pressure,despression,blood surgar,heart beat etc) To control this is dependent on your ability to control your brain when it signifies high emotion. This is when your rationale and reasoning places you in a mode of a decision maker and a controlled destiny of what you do next is up to you.
I recall when working for a large coporation the SEC, Department of Education and The Office for the Inspector General all were investigating our company which obviously raised our emotions to new levels. But/with our leader he immediately took control and made new plans to meet this challenge with a positive message. My emotions and stress was reduced do to his abilty in presenting our plan of action with positive outlooks.
The last three jobs I have had were high stress in nature. I have found the following tend to help reduce the stress level.
1) Step outside for a few minutes and take a few a minutes to relax.
2) Exercise after work, only if it means a short walk.
3) After work listen to music with head phones to eliminate any back ground noise.
4) After work walk my dog….a nice break without having to talk.
5) Talk with my spouse.
All of your techniques are both appropriate and healthy. Some stress for our human body is good for getting the blood flowing but overstress puts pressure on all our working bodily functions. Having stressful job and recognizing it keeps us in a cognizant mode of what strategies we need to employ to keep us from over reacting and affecting our attitude and personality. Some stress arises in a crisis and requires instantaneous decisions and actions. This type of stress requires a calm, clear focus on the issue at hand. Great leaders can remove themselves from the emotion and deal with the situation with a practical and calm communication to the necessary steps for action. I had a superior several years ago handle a crisis in our company with leadership, resolve and patience with the employees to ensure we would all be ok.
Good answer, I am sure your experience helps with discussing your issues with your spouse.
Dr. Carlson
Ms Hicks,
Those statements could not have been written any better, I'm kind of in the same situation as your are as an assit director of training at our school, I plan for stress and try to solve them as well any problems that comes up on a days work and work as a team to solve these problems, close the doors at the end of the day, start a new day on the next.
This is what makes a leaders job so enjoyable to be a problemsolver. People gravitate to leadership that doesn't back away from the challenges. It even helps reduce stress on the team when you can accept the responsibility.
You become the mentor and leader of your team by your actions in a stressful environment.
To relieve stress, I log into MaxKnowledge and pump out a continuing ed class or two. Good for both the blood pressure and the brain.
Enjoyed the course, thanks.
A great deal of the stress in my workplace comes from not knowing what may happen--we have become used to frequent change, but never knowing what changes will take place or when can be frustrating. The best way to alleviate this stress is to directly ask for communication. When leaders discovered that the lack of information was leading to rumors which caused stress and poor morale, they began sharing information as they got it.
Personally, before I walk to my car I give myself a talking-to. I remind myself that work belongs at work, not at home. And if I catch myself in negative self-talk, I evaluate what I'm thinking and rephrase it in an actionable, positive task to correct the potential problem.
You are on the right track with eliminating negative talk. Self-talk is going on in our heads all the time. It has been reported that we can over burden oursleves with negative thoughts over 90% of the time. Positive self-talk is a healing and productive type of therapy for all leaders and managers. It is a good practice to let your subconcious make you aware of negative thought and let you make the adjustments that would be appropriate. From the time you get up in the morning you can be the judge of your feelings and actions. Put a rubber band on your wrist and every time you think you are being negative snap your wrist. This will give you a measure of what challegne you have in front of you.
I agree that humor is one of the most important aspects in combating stress. In my past years, I was an actor and clown, and have used those traits in dealing with co-workers and friends with positive and stress free results.
Laughter can extend
life by many years!
Do any of these hold the most importance?
