To deal with stress among employees, managers must understand the relationship between the amount of stress felt by a worker and the worker’s performance. This relationship is shown in Figure  11.5. Note that extremely high and extremely low levels of stress tend to have negative effects on production. Also note that although increasing stress tends to bolster worker performance up to a point (Point A in the figure), when the level of stress increases beyond that point, worker performance will begin to deteriorate.

In sum, a certain amount of stress among employees is generally considered to be advantageous for an organization because it tends to increase production. However, employees experiencing too much or too little stress is generally disadvantageous for the organization because it tends to decrease production.

Once managers understand the impact of stress on performance, they must identify where stress exists within the organization.³⁷ After areas of stress have been pinpointed, managers must then determine whether the stress is at an appropriate level or is too high or too low. Because most stress-related organizational problems result from too much stress rather than too little, the remainder of this section focuses on how to relieve undesirably high levels of stress.

Managers often find it difficult to identify the people in the organization who are experiencing detrimentally high levels of stress. This difficulty comes about partly because people respond to high stress levels in different ways and partly because physiological reactions to stress—such as high blood pressure, a pounding heart, and gastrointestinal disorders—are hard, if not impossible, for managers to observe and monitor.

Nevertheless, managers can learn to recognize several observable signs of undesirably high stress levels:³⁸

• Constant fatigue

• Low energy

• Moodiness

• Increased aggression

• Excessive use of alcohol

• Temper outbursts

• Compulsive eating

• High levels of anxiety

• Chronic worrying

A manager who observes one or more of these signs in employees should investigate to determine whether those exhibiting the signs are indeed under too much stress. If so, the manager should try to help those employees handle their stress or should attempt to reduce stressors in the organization.³⁹

A stressor is an environmental demand that causes people to feel stress. Stressors are common in situations where individuals are confronted by circumstances in which their usual behaviors are inappropriate or insufficient and where negative consequences are associated with the failure to deal properly with the situation. Organizational change characterized by continual layoffs or firings is an obvious stressor, but many other factors related to organizational policies, structure, physical conditions, and processes can also act as stressors.⁴⁰

A recent study identified workplace bullying as a stressor in the work lives of doctors in India and Malaysia. Workplace bullying refers to individuals being isolated or excluded socially and having their work efforts devalued. According to study results, workplace bullying is frequently experienced by junior doctors and leads to reduced job satisfaction, depression and anxiety, sickness, and absence. Although this stressor may lead to positive outcomes, such as doctors feeling challenged and thereby increasing their productivity, this stressor might also lead to undesirable consequences like doctors having low morale and poor work performance, which can negatively affect patient care. Because workplace bullying is generally seen as having a negative effect on doctors, countries such as England, Sweden, Norway, and Finland have implemented programs to eliminate workplace bullying.

Stress is seldom significantly reduced until the stressors causing it have been coped with satisfactorily or withdrawn from the environment. For example, if too much organizational change is causing undesirably high levels of stress, management may be able to reduce that stress by improving organizational training aimed at preparing workers to deal with job demands resulting from the change. Management might also choose to reduce such stress by refraining from making further organizational changes for a while.⁴¹

Management can also adopt several strategies to help prevent the initial development of unwanted stressors in their organizations. Four such strategies follow:⁴²

1. Create an organizational climate that is supportive of individuals—Organizations commonly evolve into large bureaucracies with formal, inflexible, impersonal climates. This environment leads to considerable job stress. Making the organizational environment less formal and more supportive of employee needs will help prevent the development of unwanted organizational stressors.

2. The implementation of stress management courses—Recent research has demonstrated that employees who participated in a stress management course were less depressed than employees who did not participate in the stress management course.⁴³ The stress management course involved a group session in which educational materials about coping strategies and stress prevention were presented. An additional part of the stress management course involved teaching employees about the benefits of relaxation. Those employees who participated in the stress management course demonstrated a significant reduction in their depressive symptoms. Clearly, the implementation of a stress management course would be beneficial for the workplace.

3. Make jobs interesting—Routine jobs that do not allow employees some degree of freedom often result in undesirable employee stress. A management focus on making jobs as interesting as possible should help prevent the development of stressors related to routine, boring jobs.

4. Design and operate career counseling programs—Employees often experience considerable stress when they do not know what their next career step might be or when they might realistically be able to take it. If management can show employees that next step and when it can realistically be achieved, it will discourage unwanted organizational stressors in this area.

IBM is an example of a company that for many years has focused on career planning for its employees as a vehicle for reducing employee stress.⁴⁴ IBM has a corporation-wide program to encourage supervisors to annually conduct voluntary career planning sessions with employees that result in one-page career action plans. Thus, IBM employees have a clear idea of where their careers are headed.