Workplace Stress and Solutions

Workplace Stress and Solutions

Stress is unhealthy for people and for organizations. It needs to be recognized and dealt with while it is acute, not when it has gotten out of control. Increasingly, stress is having a greater and greater impact on the bottom line, as you can't get high productivity with high absenteeism. Understanding the causes of employee stress and developing employee programs to deal with the negative consequences can help an organization maintain levels of productivity and employee morale during challenging periods.

Studies have shown that stress in the workplace reduces productivity, increases pressure on employees and managers, and makes people ill in many ways. Workplace stress also significantly reduces brain functions such as memory, concentration and learning, all of which are central to effective performance at work. In fact, cognitive tests performed by employees suffering from stress have shown up to 50% loss of performance. When you consider the negative impact on organizational performance over the long term, it is easy to conclude that we will need more than conventional “stress management” techniques to get beyond the stress of today’s workplace. We need to look at the key causes of stress and the role that leaders play in creating workplace stress.

We work with business leaders and members to help them gain insight into how stress is affecting the performance of their organization and its people, and we help organizations design approaches to reduce or eliminate stress at the source. Our approach to the process of Stress Reduction includes working with our clients to identify the triggers to stress for individuals and for groups; to understand the behaviour and communication styles that people are likely to use when experiencing stress; to illustrate the impact that these behaviours may have on others, and; to provide recommendations for new methods of responding to stressful situations.

We currently offer aservices that can help your organization to reduce the impact of stress, including:
• 1-to-3-day Workshops for leaders and/or teams on Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction, Conflict Styles and Striving Styles to help build understanding about the causes of stress
• Corporate Therapy and/or Individual Coaching programs for business leaders
• Mediation, Dispute Resolution and Employee interventions to resolve workplace conflict
• “Lunch and Learn” Seminars on topics such as Organizational Stress and Stress Styles
• Administration and interpretation of Stress Assessments and Employee Surveys
• Wellness Management Program development

Stress is unhealthy for people and for organizations. It needs to be recognized and dealt with while it is acute, not when it has gotten out of control. Increasingly, stress is having a greater and greater impact on the bottom line, as you can’t get high productivity with high absenteeism. Understanding the causes of employee stress and developing employee programs to deal with the negative consequences can help an organization maintain levels of productivity and employee morale during challenging periods. Leaders, too, need to understand the impact of their style on employees stress levels and to change their behaviour accordingly. They also need to watch for stress, staying alert for any sudden, persistent or progressive change in behaviour that threatens the functioning their team.