Effective Stress Management at Work

Unfortunately, stress has become a staple of modern living. It is one thing to experience a certain level of anxiety over a particular project but it’s another thing completely when your productivity levels have significantly reduced and you even feel sick due to stress.

Stress signals are flashing. Do you see them?

Stress management is the process of gaining control over excessive anxieties. Why is it important? Easy: stress has huge impacts upon your work performance, mood and overall behaviour. Becoming addicted to chain smoking or pills is not the viable solution.

Here are some questions you must ask yourself about effectively managing stress at work:

• • • What makes you stress out?
    • Do you feel emotionally or physically ill?
    • What do you do to cope with stress?

Main causes of work stress

The reasons for overwhelming stress are varied. It depends on how each person deals with everyday issues, one’s character, the social surroundings, economic status and extent of family support. People can become stressed out at work due to economic uncertainty, high rates of unemployment, tremendous demands and huge responsibilities.

On a smaller scale, a person can be stressed due to a tough boss, a nagging client, a delayed project, a difficult task or a team in discord. What are some strategies to deal with this effectively?

1. Regain control by staying organised.

Never overload your schedule. You must always organise your work, tasks, desk and thoughts. This will put you straight back on the right track. Don’t bother with trivial things. Concentrate on the highest leverage tasks, and only focus on one task at a time.

2. Take breaks.

Over-commitment can be good as long as it doesn’t make you sick. Taking a few minutes out to prepare a cup of tea, stretch, talk to someone or walk to the next office just to get a change of scenery is essential.

3. Love yourself.

Identify your strongest traits and gain in some of the areas where you may have lost self-confidence. Your skills and effort are what got you to where you are just now aren’t they? So give yourself some credit.

4. Focus on self-improvement.

Recognise your own mistakes and learn from them. Tomorrow is another day. Learn to express your thoughts, feelings, ideas and goals, and never be afraid to disagree. It can be done politely. Get things out of your system and start socialising more.

5. Take care of yourself outside of work.

If you eat healthy, exercise often, have a good support network and are peaceful in your private life, you will be able to deal with work stress faster. So, work on that!