Category: University of Mumbai BMS Notes

As a manager you want your team to do their best. And that naturally means making sure they have all the tools they need. Unfortunately, that new calendar app, communication tool, or project management software might be causing more harm than good.

As the name implies, technostress is the stress and negative psychological impact of introducing new technologies at work.

The term was first used by Craig Brod in his book of the same name back in 1984. Yet while Brod was talking about the widespread adoption of computers in the workplace, our dependence on (and frustration with) technology has only grown since.

1: Perpetual Distraction

The persistent beeping, vibrating and flashing of notifications mean that we are constantly distracted and driven to interrupt what we are doing to check our phones.  Indeed, a UK study found that smartphone users unlock their phones on average 85 times a day; and use it for about five hours each day.  This means we are unable to focus our attention and consolidate things properly into our memory, causing us to feel more and more ‘goldfish-like’, which can be quite distressing in itself.  This is backed up by research which is beginning to show correlations between high smartphone and internet use, and poor cognitive skills such as attention, memory and learning.

2: Sleep Dysregulation

Many of us use our phone at bedtime.  You get into bed intending to go to sleep, but you just want to check your phone (just for ‘a second’) to find out something innocuous like tomorrow’s weather… and then an hour later, there you are watching a totally random video, trying to decide whether you hear a computerised voice saying the word ‘yanny’ or ‘laurel’.  Looking at our phones when we should be going to sleep has the double whammy effect of over-stimulating our brains, making it hard to wind down and switch off, and exposing us to blue light from the screen. Research suggests that blue screen exposure can reduce melatonin production, which interrupts our circadian rhythm (i.e. sleep-waking cycles), making it harder for us to fall, and stay, asleep. Unfortunately, poor sleep tends to mean poorer resilience and higher levels of anxiety and stress.

3: Work/Life Balance

While in the past there was often a clear boundary between where work life ended, and home life began. His area is now very much grey.  Most of us have our work emails on our phones, making us constantly available and contactable.  This makes it very difficult for us to ever truly disengage from work and relax.

4: F.O.M.O

Or Fear Of Missing Out is essentially a type of social anxiety that arises from the fear that you are missing out on something; whether it’s an event, a work or social opportunity, a communication, or a potential connection, or just something cool and ethereal that you might like to see or be part of.  So we want to be connected. ‘just in case’.  To test this, just ask your friends and family if they’ve ever considered coming off social media. Like us, they probably have… but the majority probably decide not to, because of FOMO.  Ironically, the more connected we are, the more likely we may be to experience FOMO, because it is often caused by the posts we see on social media sites like Facebook leading us to believe our friends and acquaintances are having exciting and/or interesting experiences in our absence.  To find out more about research exploring the relationship between problematic smartphone use, FOMO and mental wellbeing.

5: Social Comparison

We can’t help but compare ourselves to others, and social comparison theory suggests that we use these types of comparisons to evaluate how we think and feel about ourselves.  Social Media, by its nature, actively encourages social comparison, as it is littered with information that can easily be used as metrics of apparent social success (e.g. friends, likes, shares, followers and so forth). These metrics are problematic in themselves, because if we don’t get enough likes to a comment or picture we have posted, or if someone has more likes or friends than us, it can make us feel inferior.  Furthermore, the disparity between real life and what people actually post on social media means that we tend to only see an extremely edited ‘highlight reel’ of other people’s lives. This effectively gives the false impression that others lead a more exciting/perfect/interesting life than our own, which, in reality has its fair share of ups, middles and downs for everyone. increasing the likelihood of negative social comparisons being made, which can have serious consequences on our wellbeing.

Causes of technostress

Technostress isn’t just about specific tools or apps. To understand its true impact, we can group the stressors that cause technostress into five categories:

1. Invasion: “Technology is taking over my life!”

Hands up if you’ve ever taken work home with you. Thanks to smartphones and high-speed internet, jobs are rarely restricted to just the workplace. With technology invading our work and home, it shouldn’t be surprising that we’re getting more stressed.

2. Overload: “I can’t keep up with all these tasks!”

Even when work somehow stays at work, we’re often overloaded by interruptions. With the average office worker receiving 121 emails every day (and who knows how many IM notifications), people often feel under fire and overworked.

3. Complexity: “This technology is too complicated!”

Many workers inexperienced with technology find new tools unnecessarily complex and intimidating. Every app comes with new “helpful” features and its own unique jargon that you need to learn. Even Gmail has so many different options and settings you probably won’t know about them all without a guide.

4. Insecurity: “If I can’t work out how to use this technology, I’ll get fired!”

Unfortunately, most workers are expected to learn the tool by themselves as they go along, without any additional training (or even time) provided.

Worse still, many feel that if they can’t keep up-to-date with the latest technology they’ll be replaced by someone who can. This results in performance anxiety and a very real sense of insecurity, putting even greater pressure on workers.

5. Uncertainty: “Wait, is this how this technology is supposed to work?”

Finally, as technology keeps advancing, many feel a sense of instability and uncertainty about what their work (and life) will look like tomorrow. Even we writers aren’t immune, as headlines of AIs taking our jobs become increasingly common.

Looking at the five categories of stress, it shouldn’t come as a surprise that highly innovative companies that are constantly pushing the boundaries had the highest levels of technostress.

Interestingly, though, those who only use technology occasionally are more likely to suffer from technostress, as people who regularly use technology seem to develop the necessary coping skills.

Along with burnout, technostress can cause a wide range of other symptoms, such as:

• Headaches, sore neck, back, and shoulder muscles, an inability to relax, and hypertension are just a few of the common physical symptoms of technostress.
• Workers feeling overwhelmed by technology have increased errors, worse productivity, more difficulty concentrating, and low morale, and they can become depressed, mentally exhausted, and cynical toward technology.
• Technostress can cause panic/anxiety attacks, feelings of isolation, and irritability. It can also lead to less time for sustained thinking, work/life imbalance, reduced job satisfaction, and increased mental and time pressure.

Pair these with all the other things that can contribute to workplace stress and that new technology you brought in could be doing more harm than good.

Even worse, your team might not even be using the thing. Studies found technostress can lead to workers ignoring or avoiding tech-related procedures. So rather than saving time and money, that new tech could be costing you without any actual benefits.

Audit in medical practice is now an accepted part of established procedure and is a tool which can be applied to all aspects of practice.

Audit can be performed in two main ways:

• External: An outside auditor examines how work is being carried out and
• Internal: Those who actually are employed in the workplace carry out the assessment.

There are advantages and disadvantages to both of these and the tool which is used depends on several factors including the purpose of the audit, the competence of those carrying it out and available finance.

A stress audit may be carried out by someone who is medically trained or by someone with a different background. Management consultants are increasingly involved in stress because of the close links between management style and stress problems. Other specialists and non-specialists may also offer audits and treatment services.

Stress Audit

Stress might affect job performance either because working conditions are stressful or because of personal stress factors outside work. A stress audit should be designed to differentiate between these. There are several reasons why a company may decide to tackle stress. Many organizations take action without having first established whether or not stress is a problem or indeed whether or not work-related stress occurs. An analogy might be made with prescribing medication without having made a diagnosis. A wise employer should endeavour to find out whether or not stress is a problem in their working environment, identify whether or not such stress is primarily due to working conditions and quantify the extent of the problem before deciding on any measures to combat the effects of stress. This means carrying out a stress audit

There are several levels at which a stress audit may be conducted:

• Evaluation of organizational dysfunction;
• Identification of work stressors such as work overload, job insecurity, poor channels of communication, ineffective management, constant change and frustration;
• Measurement of stress-related illness in employees and
• An evaluation of indicators such as absence or staff turnover

Significant stress is often associated with organizational dysfunction and a stress audit should concentrate on management style and gain an overall picture of the health of the organization and the way in which it is run in order to be effective.

Even when they recognize that there is a problem, some employers are reluctant to agree to an audit because they fear that this may expose their deficiencies. The situation is particularly delicate when senior executives are aware that management style is likely to be a major factor in stress causation.

Methodology for carrying out a stress audit

The first task is to decide on a clear objective for the audit This might be to ascertain whether or not stress presents a problem, the extent of stress-related illness in the organization or identification of the causes of stress in a particular work environment.

Most audits are carried out using a questionnaire distributed to a study population. There are those which have already been validated (such as the Occupational.

Stress Inventory and the Occupational Stress Indicator) and it is sensible to use one of these. Otherwise, it will be necessary to carry out a pilot exercise to validate the questionnaire. The study population may be the entire workforce or may concentrate on a specific department or problem area.

Alternatively, one-to-one interviews may be carried out with a sample population. These will give a more in-depth view of staff feelings regarding stress but, realistically, only a small number of staff can be interviewed in this manner because the process is time consuming.

Evaluation and feedback

Computer-based scoring systems are increasingly used. These allow ease of collating results and have the particular advantage that, depending on the programme which is used, comparisons of different departments and other key issues can be accessed.

A report should include recommendations which give the employer action points and goals to achieve within a certain time-frame and which lead to the development of a stress policy if the employer does not have one already.

Feedback to the employer is vital. This may be the hardest part of the exercise if issues need to be raised which are not likely to find favour. However, the auditor must give an honest appraisal of the findings and encourage a positive viewpoint. The consequences of not being honest are that the auditor may be held responsible if the employer is subsequently found negligent for not tackling stress and can show that he was not aware of the audit findings. Ideally, there should be the opportunity to repeat the audit after a period of time (for example, one year) in order to evaluate what measures have been put into place and their effectiveness.

Stress could manifest as a result of increased pressure from work. It could also stem from bullying, harassment or discrimination.

No matter the cause, if left unaddressed stress may become overwhelming. This can lead to other physical, mental and emotional problems.

There are various ways to manage and support employees experiencing stress or other related symptoms at work. This post focuses on counselling for work-related stress.

While stress is a normal part of life and in some cases even manageable without the need for professional assistance, this may not always be the case.

Stress and anger management counselling is the process of talking to a professional psychotherapist about issues an employee may be experiencing.

Within the workplace, an employee assistance programme (EAP) can provide this support for employees. It allows them access to an independent and confidential helpline for them to discuss their issues with trained counsellors.

Counselling for stress at work aims to identify the causes of an employee’s work-related stress. When conducted in a private and judgment-free environment, it can help the employee to understand the cause of the stress, and find steps to manage and reduce it.

It’s common for people to experience stress at work. But it can affect everything from your mood to the way you treat friends, family or colleagues.

Extended periods of stress can be a risk factor for other underlying issues, such as depression or anxiety. This is when it might be helpful to consider counselling for stress.

As well as helping with identifying the causes of stress, counselling can also help to understand the role that your thoughts play in increasing your stress level.

The process also provides employees with a sounding board to talk about issues that they’re experiencing. It allows counsellors to work with them to develop better ways to manage these issues.

Talking to an experienced professional can provide you with a specific programme based on your particular situation and needs.

The benefits of stress management counselling

Talking is a tried and tested method of overcoming stress, anxiety or depression. Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT) offers employees an outlet for any negative thoughts or feelings, which can reduce stress as well as maintain their mental health.

Other benefits include:

• Better self-understanding: With the help of a therapist, employees are able to better understand themselves and find solutions to their problems. This leads to an increase in self-confidence.
• More engaged workplace: While talking to a therapist may not fully eliminate stress, it’s proven to drastically reduce it. Employees may find it easier to cope with, they’re also likely to be happier and more engaged with their colleagues.
• Reduced absences and turnover: When staff are less stressed, they’re unlikely to take extended time off work for mental health reasons. And because they’re aware you care about their wellbeing, they’re also less likely to leave your company for a competitor.

Sources/Causes of Stress

The factors leading to stress among individual are called as stressors. Some of the factors/stressors acting on employees are:

1. Organizational factors: With the growth in organizational stress and complexity, there is increase in organizational factors also which cause stress among employees. Some of such factors are-
   1. Discrimination in pay/salary structure
   2. Strict rules and regulations
   3. Ineffective communication
   4. Peer pressure
   5. Goals conflicts/goals ambiguity
   6. More of centralized and formal organization structure
   7. Less promotional opportunities
   8. Lack of employee’s participation in decision-making
   9. Excessive control over the employees by the managers
2. Individual factors: There are various expectations which the family members, peer, superior and subordinates have from the employee. Failure to understand such expectations or to convey such expectations lead to role ambiguity/role conflict which in turn causes employee stress. Other individual factors causing stress among employees are inherent personality traits such as being impatient, aggressive, rigid, feeling time pressure always, etc. Similarly, the family issues, personal financial problems, sudden career changes all lead to stress.
3. Job concerning factors: Certain factors related to job which cause stress among employees are as follows:
   1. Monotonous nature of job
   2. Unsafe and unhealthy working conditions
   3. Lack of confidentiality
   4. Crowding
4. Extra-organizational factors: There are certain issues outside the organization which lead to stress among employees. In today’s modern and technology savvy world, stress has increased. Inflation, technological change, social responsibilities and rapid social changes are other extra-organizational factors causing stress.

Stress experienced by the employees in their job has negative impact on their health, performance and their behaviour in the organization. Thus, stress needs to be managed effectively so as to set off these harmful consequences. Strategies for managing stress are as follows:

Organizational strategies for managing stress

1. Encouraging more of organizational communication with the employees so that there is no role ambiguity/conflict. Effective communication can also change employee views. Managers can use better signs and symbols which are not misinterpreted by the employees.
2. Encourage employees’ participation in decision-making. This will reduce role stress.
3. Grant the employees greater independence, meaningful and timely feedback, and greater responsibility.
4. The organizational goals should be realistic, stimulating and particular. The employees must be given feedback on how well they are heading towards these goals.
5. Encourage decentralization.
6. Have a fair and just distribution of incentives and salary structure.
7. Promote job rotation and job enrichment.
8. Create a just and safe working environment.
9. Have effective hiring and orientation procedure.
10. Appreciate the employees on accomplishing and over-exceeding their targets.

1. One thing at a time. This is the simplest and best way to start reducing your stress, and you can start today. Right now. Focus as much as possible on doing one thing at a time. Clear your desk of distractions. Pick something to work on. Need to write a report? Do only that. Remove distractions such as phones and email notifications while you’re working on that report. If you’re going to do email, do only that. This takes practice, and you’ll get urges to do other things. Just keep practicing and you’ll get better at it.
2. Simplify your schedule. A hectic schedule is a major cause of high stress. Simplify by reducing the number of commitments in your life to just the essential ones. Learn to say no to the rest and slowly get out of commitments that aren’t beneficial to you. Schedule only a few important things each day, and put space between them. Get out of meetings when they aren’t absolutely essential. Leave room for down time and fun.
3. Get moving. Do something each day to be active walk, hike, play a sport, go for a run, do yoga. It doesn’t have to be gruelling to reduce stress. Just move. Have fun doing it.
4. Develop one healthy habit this month. Other than getting active, improving your health overall will help with the stress. But do it one habit at a time. Eat fruits and veggies for snacks. Floss every day. Quit smoking. Cook something healthy for dinner. Drink water instead of soda. One habit at a time.
5. Do something calming. What do you enjoy that calms you down? For many people, it can be the “get moving” activity discussed above. But it could also be taking a nap, or a bath, or reading, or having sex (which can also be considered a “get moving” activity if you do it for longer than 5 minutes). Other people are calmed by housework or yardwork. Some people like to meditate, or take a nature walk. Find your calming activity and try to do it each day.
6. Simplify your finances. Finances can be a drain on your energy and a major stressor. If that’s true with you, figure out ways to simplify things. Automate savings and bill payments and debt payments. Spend less by going shopping (at malls or online) much less. Find ways to have fun that don’t involve spending money.
7. Have a blast! Have fun each day, even if it’s just for a few minutes. People like to play with my kids they take my mind off everything and are really hilarious, also like to play sports (again, often with my kids). Board games are fun. Sex, again, can be a fun activity. Whatever you choose, be sure to laugh.
8. Get creative. Throwing yourself into a creative activity is another great way to de-stress and to prevent stress. I like writing, but others like to paint or play music or sketch or make pottery or do interior design or build things.
9. Declutter. This is a favourite of mine. I like to take 20-30 minutes and just go through a room, getting rid of stuff we don’t use or need anymore. I look around at anything that’s cluttering up a room, and get rid of it or find a better place for it. When I’m done, I have a nice, peaceful environment for work, play, and living. Do this a little at a time it can be one of your “fun activities”.
10. Be early. it’s hard to be early when you have to get 6 kids ready. But being late can be very stressful. Try to leave earlier by getting ready earlier, or by scheduling more space between events. Things always take longer than normal, so schedule some buffer time: extra time to get ready, to commute, to do errands before you need to be somewhere, to attend a meeting before another scheduled appointment. If you get somewhere early, it’s good to have some reading material.

A lot of research on happiness and subjective well-being has been done over the last 50 years or so. It seems like everyone wants to determine the exact formula for joy.

While there is never going to be a specific prescription for attaining happiness, there are some important findings that can be guidelines for us. Here are five prerequisites for finding satisfaction or experience happiness in life:

• Human beings need relationships to enjoy optimal well-being and happiness. This is a simple truth we are born with a strong drive to establish connections with others. While many of us think that we will be happy when we find “true love,” or whatever we feel approximates that, it is not romantic relationships that are required for happiness. Simply having good friends who encourage and support you will contribute just as much to your overall feelings of happiness and contentment in life.
• Being kind to others is essential to finding a sense of personal happiness. Our human brains are wired so that we feel joy when we behave in altruistic ways. Just making plans to do something nice for others whether it is throwing a party for a friend, volunteering your time for a worthy cause, or planning a monetary donation will give you a boost and generate a sense of satisfaction and well-being.
• Acknowledging the abundance of your own life no matter how austere or extravagant it might be and experiencing gratitude for these people, experiences, and things also positively contribute to a sense of well-being. The drive to attain more and more is counter to the expression of gratitude and a feeling of contentment with who and where you are in life. The pursuit of “things” only has value if you cherish the pursuit more than the “thing” it might yield.
• Finding a sense of meaning and purpose in your pursuits are necessary for contentment and happiness. Believing that you are contributing to something beyond yourself and being a part of something larger than your individual existence is also necessary to experience a feeling of peace that is a part of happiness.
• Making healthy lifestyle choices in terms of your basic needs sleep, nutrition, and exercise also contributes to your happiness. There are many research studies that show that regular exercise even just a daily walk is effective in reducing depression. Contemplation activities, such as yoga, meditation, reflection, also are proven to reduce stress and promote well-being. Depending on your age, many people think a good night’s sleep is “optional,” but research shows that poor sleeping habits lead to greater stress, increased risk for cardiovascular illness, and even weight gain. Sure, you can “sleep when you’re dead,” to paraphrase a movie title, but why would you want to risk an earlier demise than you would otherwise need to? Regarding nutrition, healthy diets really do affect your overall health. And your physical health affects your happiness significantly. A recent research study has shown that including fresh fruits and vegetables in your diet also reduces depression and anxiety. Trading the short-term convenience of addictive processed foods or the pleasures of overindulgence of alcohol or nicotine or others recreational drugs may bring that fleeting “high,” but the crash that follows not only affects you the day you feel it but has a lasting negative effect on your long-term health and long-term happiness.

Coping Strategies

• Take a time-out. Practice yoga, listen to music, meditate, get a massage, or learn relaxation techniques. Stepping back from the problem helps clear your head.
• Eat well-balanced meals. Do not skip any meals. Do keep healthful, energy-boosting snacks on hand.
• Limit alcohol and caffeine, which can aggravate anxiety and trigger panic attacks.
• Get enough sleep. When stressed, your body needs additional sleep and rest.
• Exercise daily to help you feel good and maintain your health. Check out the fitness tips below.
• Take deep breaths. Inhale and exhale slowly.
• Count to 10 slowly. Repeat, and count to 20 if necessary.
• Do your best. Instead of aiming for perfection, which isn’t possible, be proud of however close you get.
• Accept that you cannot control everything. Put your stress in perspective: Is it really as bad as you think?
• Welcome humor. A good laugh goes a long way.
• Maintain a positive attitude. Make an effort to replace negative thoughts with positive ones.
• Get involved. Volunteer or find another way to be active in your community, which creates a support network and gives you a break from everyday stress.
• Learn what triggers your anxiety. Is it work, family, school, or something else you can identify? Write in a journal when you’re feeling stressed or anxious, and look for a pattern.
• Talk to someone. Tell friends and family you’re feeling overwhelmed, and let them know how they can help you. Talk to a physician or therapist for professional help.

Fitness Tips: Stay Healthy, Manage Stress

For the biggest benefits of exercise, try to include at least 2½ hours of moderate-intensity physical activity (e.g. brisk walking) each week, 1¼ hours of a vigorous-intensity activity (such as jogging or swimming laps), or a combination of the two.

• 5 X 30: Jog, walk, bike, or dance three to five times a week for 30 minutes.
• Set small daily goals and aim for daily consistency rather than perfect workouts. It’s better to walk every day for 15-20 minutes than to wait until the weekend for a three-hour fitness marathon. Lots of scientific data suggests that frequency is most important.
• Find forms of exercise that are fun or enjoyable. Extroverted people often like classes and group activities. People who are more introverted often prefer solo pursuits.
• Distract yourself with an iPod or other portable media player to download audiobooks, podcasts, or music. Many people find it’s more fun to exercise while listening to something they enjoy.
• Recruit an “exercise buddy.” It’s often easier to stick to your exercise routine when you have to stay committed to a friend, partner, or colleague.
• Be patient when you start a new exercise program. Most sedentary people require about four to eight weeks to feel coordinated and sufficiently in shape so that exercise feels easier.

6 long-term strategies for coping with anxiety

If anxiety is a regular part of your life, it’s important to find treatment strategies to help you keep it in check. It might be a combination of things, like talk therapy and meditation, or it might just be a matter of cutting out or resolving your anxiety trigger.

If you’re not sure where to start, it’s always helpful to discuss options with a mental health professional who might suggest something you hadn’t thought of before.

Identify and learn to manage your triggers

You can identify triggers on your own or with a therapist. Sometimes they can be obvious, like caffeine, drinking alcohol, or smoking. Other times they can be less obvious.

Long-term problems, such as financial or work-related situations, may take some time to figure out is it a due date, a person, or the situation? This may take some extra support, through therapy or with friends.

When you do figure out your trigger, you should try to limit your exposure if you can. If you can’t limit it like if it’s due to a stressful work environment that you can’t currently change using other coping techniques may help.

Some general triggers:

• A stressful job or work environment
• Driving or traveling
• Genetics anxiety could run in your family
• Withdrawal from drugs or certain medications
• Side effects of certain medications
• Trauma
• Phobias, such as agoraphobia (fear of crowded or open spaces) and claustrophobia (fear of small spaces)
• Some chronic illnesses like heart disease, diabetes, or asthma
• Chronic pain
• Having another mental illness such as depression
• Caffeine

Adopt cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT)

CBT helps people learn different ways of thinking about and reacting to anxiety-causing situations. A therapist can help you develop ways to change negative thought patterns and behaviors before they spiral.

Do a daily or routine meditation

While this takes some practice to do successfully, mindful meditation, when done regularly, can eventually help you train your brain to dismiss anxious thoughts when they arise.

If sitting still and concentrating is difficult, try starting with yoga.

Try supplements or change your diet

Changing your diet or taking supplements is definitely a long-term strategy. Research shows certain supplements or nutrients can help anxiety reduction.

These include:

• Lemon balm
• Omega-3 fatty acids
• Ashwagandha
• Green tea
• Valerian root
• Kava kava
• Dark chocolate (in moderation)

However, it can take up to three months before your body is actually running on the nutrition these herbs and foods provide. If you’re taking other medications, make sure to discuss herbal remedies with your doctor.

Keep your body and mind healthy

Exercising regularly, eating balanced meals, getting enough sleep, and staying connected to people who care about you are great ways to stave off anxiety symptoms.

Ask your doctor about medications

If your anxiety is severe enough that your mental health practitioner believes you’d benefit from medication, there are a number of directions to go, depending on your symptoms. Discuss your concerns with your doctor.

Some of the stress reducing strategies from individual’s point of view are:

1. Knowledge About Stress. In the first stage, an individual should become knowledgeable about stress. He should know about the process and effects of stress. He must find out the major sources of his stress. He must anticipate stressful periods and plan accordingly in advance. He must be honest with himself and decide what he can cope with what he cannot.
2. Physiological Fitness. Exercise in any form can help people in coping with the stress. Non competitive physical exercise such as aerobics, walking, jogging, swimming, riding a bicycle, playing softball or tennis have been recommended by physicians as a way to deal with excessive stress levels. There is evidence to suggest that individuals who exercise are much less likely to suffer from certain types of stress related exercises. With proper exercise, diet control and non-smoking habits, blood pressure and cholesterol become controlled and the body becomes more resistant to pressures. People are more likely to get physically sick or emotionally depressed if they are over weight or poorly nourished.
3. Time Management. Most of the people are very poor in managing their time. They don’t know that what must be done and when it would be desirable to do so. The result of poor time management is feeling of work overload, skipped schedules and tension. A well organised person can often accomplish twice as much as the person who is poorly organised. Therefore, an individual must understand how to manage his time so that he can cope with tensions created by job demands. A few of the well known time management principles are :

• Preparing a daily list of activities to be attended to.
• Prioritizing activities by importance and urgency.
• Scheduling activities according to the priorities set.
• Knowing your daily schedule and handling the most demanding parts of a job when you are most alert and productive.

4. Assertiveness. An individual should become assertive. He should not say ‘Yes’ when he wants to say ‘No’. He should start saying No to people or managers who demand too much of his time. Being assertive is an important factor in reducing stress.
5. Social Support Network. Every person should have people to turn to, talk to and rely upon. Good friends become highly supportive during times of stress and crisis. Social net work includes friends, family or work colleagues. Expanding your social support system can be a means for tension reduction because friends are there when needed and provide support to get the person through stressful situations.
6. Readjust life Goals. Every individual must know what he really wants to do. This should relate to not only the major decisions of the life but to all activities in our life. He must know what is important for him. Because of the severe competition in life to go ahead, most individuals set very high standards and goals for themselves. These high expectations and limited resources to reach such expectations result in stress. Accordingly, every person must readjust his goals and make sure he has the ability and resources to reach such goals. Perhaps the goals should be established after the resources have been analysed.
7. Relaxation Techniques. Every individual must teach himself to reduce tension through relaxation techniques such as Yoga, mediation, hypnosis and biofeedback. 15-20 minutes a day of deep relaxation releases tension and provides a person with pronounced sense of peacefulness. Deep relaxation conditions will bring significant changes in heart rate, blood pressure and other physiological factors. Yoga is probably the most effective remedy for stress. Studies have revealed that Yoga has cured several stress related diseases.
8. Plan your life in Advance. So many times, people create situations which induce stress because they either did not plan or did a bad job of planning. The traditional Indian attitude of “whatever will be, will be” a way of accepting the unexpected difficulties in life. This attitude may be relevant in those situations over which we do not have any control like death in the family, but for other events in life, it is better to plan in advance, so that we can confront them with confidence when they occur.

Individuals may design their own strategies to reduce stress, but it is a must for the organisations to develop programmes that will help the employees in reducing their stress. This will lead to less employee turnover, absenteeism and as a result productivity will improve.

Some of the measures which organisations can take are:

1. Selection and Placement. Individuals differ in their response to stress situations. We know that ‘Type A’ individuals are more prone to stress. On the other hand, in the organisations there are certain jobs which are more stressful as compared to other jobs. While doing the selection and placement of the employees, these factors must be kept in mind. The individuals who are more prone to stress should not be put on jobs which are stressful. The individuals who are less prone to stress may adapt better to high stress jobs and perform those jobs more effectively.
2. Goal Setting. Based on extensive amount of research it has been concluded that individuals perform better when they have specific and challenging goals and they receive feedback on how well they are progressing towards those goals. Goal setting can reduce stress as well as provide motivation. It will result in less employee frustration, role ambiguity and stress.
3. Improved Communication. Sometimes due to lack of effective communication from the superiors, the employees do not know what they have to do and how they have to do it. This result in role ambiguity. Similarly, when two or more persons have contradicting role demands from an employee, it leads to role conflict if there is lack of proper communication. Effective communication with employees reduces the uncertainty by lessening role ambiguity and role conflict.
4. Redesigning Jobs. Organisations should redesign the jobs in such a way as to give employees more responsibility, more meaningful work, more autonomy and increased feed back. This will help reduce the stress caused by monotony, routine work, work overload or underload and role ambiguity. Job redesigning enhances motivation, reduces the stress among the employees and enhances “Quality of work life“.
5. Participative Decision Making. If the organisations give the employees participation in those decisions that directly affect them and their job performance, it can increase employee control and reduce the role stress. The main reason of role stress is that employees feel uncertain about their goals, expectations and how they will be evaluated. These uncertainties can be reduced by the management by giving the employees a right to participate in the decision making.
6. Building Teamwork. The management should try to create such work environment in which there is no provision for interpersonal conflict or inter group conflict. Such conflicts are the causes of stress, such should be prevented from building or eliminated if they develop. Accordingly such team work should be developed that groups and the members are mutually supportive and productive. Members of the group should consider themselves as members of the same family and seek social support from each other.
7. Personal Wellness Programmes. These personal wellness programmes focus on the employees total physical and mental condition. Organisations can provide facilities at their premises for physical fitness such as gyms, swimming pools, tennis courts etc. as well as psychological counselling. They should hold seminars or workshops to make the employees understand nature and sources of stress and the possible ways to reduce it. These workshops should help those individuals who are already under stress. Moreover, a supervisor can impact personal wellness of his subordinates through positive example, encouragement and by practising the basic concepts and techniques of human resource management.

To get ahead in your career, deliver your projects successfully and to get a promotion or a pay rise, you must learn to consistently focus on the activities that add the most benefit to your projects and your clients. The better you are at maintaining focus and managing your time, the more you will achieve, and the easier it will be for you to leave the office on time. Not only do effective time management skills allow you to get better results at work, but it also help you withstand stress and live a more fulfilling life outside of work.

The following strategies will help you get the right things done in less time.

1. Start your day with a clear focus.

The first work-related activity of your day should be to determine what you want to achieve that day and what you absolutely must accomplish. Come clear on this purpose before you check your email and start responding to queries and resolve issues. Setting a clear focus for your day might require as little as five minutes, but can save you several hours of wasted time and effort.

2. Have a dynamic task list.

Capture the tasks and activities you must do on a list and update it regularly during the day. Revisit this list frequently and add new items as soon as they appear. Make sure your list gives you a quick overview of everything that’s urgent and important, and remember to include strategic and relationship-building activities as well as operational tasks.

3. Focus on high-value activities.

Before you start something new, identify the activity that would have the most positive effect on your project, your team, and your client if you were to deal with it right now. Resist the temptation to clear smaller, unimportant items first. Start with what is most important.

• To help you assess which activities to focus on first, ask the following:
• What does my client or my team need most from me right now?
• What will cause the most trouble if it doesn’t get done?
• What is the biggest contribution I can make right now?
• Which strategic tasks do I need to deal with today to help us work smarter tomorrow?

4. Minimize interruptions.

The more uninterrupted time you get during the day to work on important tasks, the more effective you’ll be. Identify the activities that tend to disrupt your work, and find a solution. Basically, one of the most essential time management skills is to not get distracted. For example, avoid checking emails and answering the phone when you’re in the middle of something important. Once you have broken your flow, it can be difficult to reestablish it. Instead, discipline yourself to work on a task single-mindedly until it’s complete.

5. Stop procrastinating.

If you have difficulties staying focused or tend to procrastinate, you may benefit from creating an external commitment for (deadline) yourself. For instance, schedule a meeting in two days’ time where you’ll be presenting your work and by which time your actions will have to be completed. It’s also very effective to complete the most unpleasant tasks early in the day and to allow yourself small rewards once you’ve completed them.

6. Limit multi-tasking.

Many of us multi-task and believe we’re effective when we do so, but evidence suggests that we can’t effectively focus on more than one thing at a time. In order to stop multi-tasking, try these tips: Plan your day in blocks and set specific time aside for meetings, returning calls and for doing detailed planning and analysis work at your desk. Whenever you find yourself multitasking, stop and sit quietly for a minute.

7. Review your day.

Spend 5-10 minutes reviewing your task list every day before you leave the office. Give yourself a pat on the back if you achieved what you wanted. If you think your day’s effort fell short, decide what you’ll do differently tomorrow in order to accomplish what you need to. Leave the office in high spirits determined to pick up the thread the next day.

8. Say “no” and delegate

Everybody has their limits. We simply cannot do everything people want us to. It will lead to burnout and work anxiety. That’s why it’s so important to be assertive and say “no” when people want to assign you additional tasks.

Remember, there is nothing wrong with refusing to do things you’re not able to do. As well as with delegating tasks. Especially if there is someone, who can do the work better than you.

9. Focus and block distractions

Notifications, pop up messages, e-mails, colleagues constantly talking to you. It all pulls your attention away from work.

There are many ways to stay focused. You can put your phone away, turn off social media notifications or block distracting websites. But the best way is to concentrate and do what you have to do. It’s worth to limit your presence in social media to the minimum because it takes a lot of your time and doesn’t bring much value into your life.

10. Goals

Set goals and you will exactly know which direction you’re heading to. Goals are part of the organization process but they are extremely important in time management.

11. Stop multitasking

Often see job offers which set multitasking as one of the key skills of the candidate. But it’s better to throw such offer right to the bin. The truth is, multitasking damages our brain.

It seems that juggling several tasks at one is a great time management technique. In fact, it dramatically decreases productivity. The study conducted at Stanford University has shown that “When they’re [multitaskers] in situations where there are multiple sources of information coming from the external world or emerging out of memory, they’re not able to filter out what’s not relevant to their current goal. That failure to filter means they’re slowed down by that irrelevant information.”

12. Allocate your time

Do you know how much time you spend on particular tasks? Gotcha! You’re probably among the majority of people who have no idea how their daily work looks like in terms of work hours.

13. Create a morning routine

What’s the first thing you do when you wake up? If it’s making a bed, you’re on the right track. But if it’s checking social media, you’re doing it wrong.

Having your own morning routine will unquestionably power you up for the rest of the day. It’s the first thing you do in the morning that determines the outcomes you will achieve during the day. Try from making your bed, then have a healthy breakfast, and leave social media for the end of the day.

A widely accepted definition of stress, attributed to psychologist and professor Richard Lazarus, is, “a condition or feeling experienced when a person perceives that demands exceed the personal and social resources the individual is able to mobilize.”

This means that we experience stress if we believe that we don’t have the time, resources, or knowledge to handle a situation. In short, we experience stress when we feel “out of control.”

This also means that different people handle stress differently, in different situations: you’ll handle stress better if you’re confident in your abilities, if you can change the situation to take control, and if you feel that you have the help and support needed to do a good job.

Signs of Stress

Everyone reacts to stress differently. However, some common signs and symptoms of the fight or flight response include:

• Frequent headaches.
• Cold or sweaty hands and feet.
• Frequent heartburn, stomach pain, or nausea.
• Panic attacks.
• Excessive sleeping, or insomnia.
• Persistent difficulty concentrating.
• Obsessive or compulsive behaviors.
• Social withdrawal or isolation.
• Constant fatigue.
• Irritability and angry episodes.
• Significant weight gain or loss.
• Consistent feelings of being overwhelmed or overloaded.

1. Action-Oriented Approaches

With action-oriented approaches, you take action to change the stressful situations.

Managing Your Time

Your workload can cause stress, if you don’t manage your time well. This can be a key source of stress for very many people.

Take our time management quiz to identify where you can improve, and make sure that you use time management tools such as To-Do Lists, Action Programs, and Eisenhower’s Urgent/Important Principle to manage your priorities.

Then use Job Analysis to think about what’s most important in your role, so that you can prioritize your work more effectively. This helps you reduce stress, because you get the greatest return from your efforts, and you minimize the time you spend on low-value activities.

Also, avoid multitasking, only check email at certain times, and don’t use electronic devices for a while before going to bed, so that you use this time to “switch off” fully.

2. Emotion-Oriented Approaches

Emotion-oriented approaches are useful when the stress you’re experiencing comes from the way that you perceive a situation. (It can be annoying for people to say this, but a lot of stress comes from overly-negative thinking.)

To change how you think about stressful situations:

• Use Cognitive Restructuring, the ABC Technique, and Thought Awareness, Rational Thinking, and Positive Thinking
• to change the way that you perceive stressful events.
• Take our positive thinking quiz
• To learn how to think more positively.
• Use Affirmations and Imagery to overcome short-term negative thinking, so that you feel more positive about stressful situations.

3. Acceptance-Oriented Approaches

Acceptance-oriented approaches apply to situations where you have no power to change what happens, and where situations are genuinely bad.

To build your defenses against stress:

• Use techniques like meditation and physical relaxation to calm yourself when you feel stressed.
• Take advantage of your support network, this could include your friends and family, as well as people at work and professional providers, such as counselors or family doctors.
• Get enough exercise and sleep, and learn how to make the most of your down time, so that you can recover from stressful events.
• Learn how to cope with change and build resilience, so that you can overcome setbacks.

Anxiety is an emotion characterized by an unpleasant state of inner turmoil, often accompanied by nervous behavior such as pacing back and forth, somatic complaints, and rumination. It is the subjectively unpleasant feelings of dread over anticipated events. Anxiety is a feeling of uneasiness and worry, usually generalized and unfocused as an overreaction to a situation that is only subjectively seen as menacing. It is often accompanied by muscular tension, restlessness, fatigue and problems in concentration. Anxiety is closely related to fear, which is a response to a real or perceived immediate threat; anxiety involves the expectation of future threat. People facing anxiety may withdraw from situations which have provoked anxiety in the past.

Anxiety disorders differ from developmentally normative fear or anxiety by being excessive or persisting beyond developmentally appropriate periods. They differ from transient fear or anxiety, often stress-induced, by being persistent (e.g., typically lasting 6 months or more), although the criterion for duration is intended as a general guide with allowance for some degree of flexibility and is sometimes of shorter duration in children.

Symptoms

Anxiety can be experienced with long, drawn-out daily symptoms that reduce quality of life, known as chronic (or generalized) anxiety, or it can be experienced in short spurts with sporadic, stressful panic attacks, known as acute anxiety. Symptoms of anxiety can range in number, intensity, and frequency, depending on the person. While almost everyone has experienced anxiety at some point in their lives, most do not develop long-term problems with anxiety.

Anxiety may cause psychiatric and physiological symptoms.

The risk of anxiety leading to depression could possibly even lead to an individual harming themselves, which is why there are many 24-hour suicide prevention hotlines.

The behavioral effects of anxiety may include withdrawal from situations which have provoked anxiety or negative feelings in the past. Other effects may include changes in sleeping patterns, changes in habits, increase or decrease in food intake, and increased motor tension (such as foot tapping).

The emotional effects of anxiety may include “feelings of apprehension or dread, trouble concentrating, feeling tense or jumpy, anticipating the worst, irritability, restlessness, watching (and waiting) for signs (and occurrences) of danger, and, feeling like your mind’s gone blank” as well as “nightmares/bad dreams, obsessions about sensations, déjà vu, a trapped-in-your-mind feeling, and feeling like everything is scary.

The physiological symptoms of anxiety may include:

• Neurological, as headache, paresthesias, fasciculations, vertigo, or presyncope.
• Digestive, as abdominal pain, nausea, diarrhea, indigestion, dry mouth, or bolus.
• Respiratory, as shortness of breath or sighing breathing.
• Cardiac, as palpitations, tachycardia, or chest pain.
• Muscular, as fatigue, tremors, or tetany.
• Cutaneous, as perspiration, or itchy skin.
• Uro-genital, as frequent urination, urinary urgency, dyspareunia, or impotence, chronic pelvic pain syndrome. Stress hormones released in an anxious state have an impact on bowel function and can manifest physical symptoms that may contribute to or exacerbate IBS.

Types

There are various types of anxiety. Existential anxiety can occur when a person faces angst, an existential crisis, or nihilistic feelings. People can also face mathematical anxiety, somatic anxiety, stage fright, or test anxiety. Social anxiety refers to a fear of rejection and negative evaluation by other people.

Existential

The philosopher Søren Kierkegaard, in The Concept of Anxiety (1844), described anxiety or dread associated with the “dizziness of freedom” and suggested the possibility for positive resolution of anxiety through the self-conscious exercise of responsibility and choosing. In Art and Artist (1932), the psychologist Otto Rank wrote that the psychological trauma of birth was the pre-eminent human symbol of existential anxiety and encompasses the creative person’s simultaneous fear of and desire for separation, individuation, and differentiation.

The theologian Paul Tillich characterized existential anxiety as “the state in which a being is aware of its possible nonbeing” and he listed three categories for the nonbeing and resulting anxiety: ontic (fate and death), moral (guilt and condemnation), and spiritual (emptiness and meaninglessness). According to Tillich, the last of these three types of existential anxiety, i.e. spiritual anxiety, is predominant in modern times while the others were predominant in earlier periods. Tillich argues that this anxiety can be accepted as part of the human condition or it can be resisted but with negative consequences. In its pathological form, spiritual anxiety may tend to “drive the person toward the creation of certitude in systems of meaning which are supported by tradition and authority” even though such “undoubted certitude is not built on the rock of reality”.

According to Viktor Frankl, the author of Man’s Search for Meaning, when a person is faced with extreme mortal dangers, the most basic of all human wishes is to find a meaning of life to combat the “trauma of nonbeing” as death is near.

Depending on the source of the threat, psychoanalytic theory distinguishes the following types of anxiety:

• Realistic
• Neurotic
• Moral

Risk factors

A marble bust of the Roman Emperor Decius from the Capitoline Museum. This portrait “conveys an impression of anxiety and weariness, as of a man shouldering heavy [state] responsibilities”.

Anxiety disorders are partly genetic, with twin studies suggesting 30-40% genetic influence on individual differences in anxiety. Environmental factors are also important. Twin studies show that individual-specific environments have a large influence on anxiety, whereas shared environmental influences (environments that affect twins in the same way) operate during childhood but decline through adolescence Specific measured ‘environments’ that have been associated with anxiety include child abuse, family history of mental health disorders, and poverty. Anxiety is also associated with drug use, including alcohol, caffeine, and benzodiazepines (which are often prescribed to treat anxiety).

Prevention

The above risk factors give natural avenues for prevention. A 2017 review found that psychological or educational interventions have a small yet statistically significant benefit for the prevention of anxiety in varied population types.