STRESS MANAGEMENT
SPECIAL The Definitive Guide to Cope with Work Stress (Simple and Effective)
PART I
Workplace stress is a modern
epidemic. More than one-third of American workers experience chronic work
stress. This is estimated to cost American businesses up to $300 billion a year
in lost work hours and medical bills. (IN USA)
Clearly, if you’re suffering from work stress
– you’re far from alone. But, work stress isn’t inevitable.
In this article, I identify the root cause of your stress and
suggest the most suitable ways to cope with it so you can become a happy and
productive worker again.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Where does work stress come from
Certain factors tend to go hand-in-hand with work-related stress. The
causes of stress include:
- Too much work – you find
yourself saying: “There are not enough hours in the day!”
- The job is too easy, not challenging or
inspiring –
this is where boredom (which is stressful) sets in.
- Pressure from co-workers or lack of social
support –
colleagues are not helpful or only care about their own tasks.
- Little praise and lots of criticism – this is where a lousy
manager uses constant criticism to ‘try’ to motivate you.
- Very demanding or competitive working
culture –
sales departments often fit this category.
- Not having enough control over job-related
decisions –
this is when people try to micro-manage you.
- High expectations on yourself or seeking
perfection –
while it’s good to do your best, being a perfectionist can be a powerful
stress generator.
- Low salary – if you work hard but
receive slim financial rewards, you may start to feel downhearted,
frustrated and stressed.
The negative effects of stress on your mind and body
Chronic stress is bad news for your health. These are some health
symptoms of stress:
If stress hormones are triggered in your body for extended periods, they
can lead to increased physical aging. This is because stress makes your cells
look and act older – and this is reflected in your physical appearance.
In addition to the negative effects on your body, stress also has a
significant influence on your brain – negatively impacting your daily
performance.
How to cope with work stress
You don’t need to be a victim of work stress. Here’s how to manage
stress in the workplace:
1. Set aside some time for planning
If work has become too much for you, and
you’re constantly falling behind… stop! Instead of trying and failing to catch
up, you’d be much better off spending some time thinking about your goals and
how your prioritize your tasks.
Learn how to set clear goals with this
step-by-step guide:
For most people, creating goals is easy!
The execution and application is the struggle. As Diana Scharf Hunt says,
“Goals are just dreams with a deadline!” Everyone has dreams, but successful
people turn them into goals that they accomplish. In order to ensure you reach
the finish line with your goals achieved, here are 10 steps to help you move
from dreamer to doer.
We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, therefore, is not an act but a
habit. – Aristotle
SMART goals have been utilized for years,
because they work. Make sure your goals are:
Specific:
A specific goal will usually answer the five
Ws (What, Why, Who, Where, and Which). Writing specific objectives fleshes out
your goal so you can easily identify what you want to accomplish.
Measurable:
If your goal isn’t measurable, there will be
no way to know if you’re making progress. You need to address the question,
“How will I know when this is accomplished?”
Attainable:
Your goal must be something that you can
realistically attain. I would love to fly like a bird by jumping off a cliff
with no parachute, but gravity would have the last word in that interaction.
However, learning to jump off a cliff with a hang glider is more realistic.
Relevant:
If your goal doesn’t mean anything to you,
then it isn’t worth pursuing. Tie your goals to your deeper values to give them
more meaning. Make sure you are behind the goal 100% so you stay motivated to
achieve it.
Time Bound:
You need to have a deadline. Otherwise it’s
just a dream that never becomes reality. Putting down a deadline makes you more
committed to bringing it to fruition.
b. Write your goals down and display them!
“I hear and I forget; I see and I remember; I write and I
understand.” – Chinese Proverb
A large portion of your goal is already
accomplished as soon as you write it down. A studyshowed that among people who wrote down their goals with actionable
commitments that they put into weekly progress reports and shared with friends,
76% accomplished them. This is in comparison to a control group who were just
asked to think about their goals. In this group, only 43% accomplished their
objectives. Writing down your goals makes them real; they are tangible words on
paper, not an ethereal dream in your mind.
c. Break big goals into smaller ones!
Break them down into manageable weekly and
daily actionable bites. If you don’t, you can sometimes lose motivation if the
goal seems far away or too big to accomplish.
d. Make an action plan and follow it!
“If you fail to plan, you are planning to fail!” – Benjamin Franklin
The best gift you can give yourself is a well
thought-out action plan. Take time to organize all of your smaller daily and
weekly goals in one place so you can easily check your progress or send it to
others to hold you accountable.
e. Do your goals as early in the day as possible!
“The sun has not caught me in bed in fifty years.” – Thomas Jefferson
If you study successful people, you will find
that most of the time they do more before the sun rises than the rest of the
world does in a day. Get your goals done first thing in the morning to feel
like you’ve started your day right. That way, you will always find time to do
them.
f. Tell others your goals to keep you accountable!
“Accountability breeds response-ability.” – Steven R. Covey
When you know someone is going to check your
progress, it lights a fire under you to follow through. Find a good friend or
mentor who will take on the role of motivator and occasional butt-kicker. You
will come to value this service immensely when you see your efficiency and
effectiveness improve.
g. Make sure your goals excite you!
“If you want to live a happy life, tie it to a goal, not to people or
things.” – Albert Einstein
Your goals should be a source of joy in your
life. They should be one of the main reasons you get out of bed in the morning.
If your goals don’t excite you, then you need to re-evaluate them.
h. Use positive language in your goals!
“The major reason for setting a goal is for what it makes of you to
accomplish it. What it makes of you will always be the far greater value than
what you get.” – Jim Rohn
Setting and accomplishing your goals changes
you. You become a positive person who is more excited about life. Make sure
your goals reflect this. Don’t say, “My goal is not to mess up today.” Instead
your goal could say, “My goal is to excel today in my career by doing X, Y, and
Z.” Do you see the language difference? No one can get passionate about going
through the day trying to avoid something negative. Instead, turn it around so
you spend your day chasing and catching success.
i. Set goals in multiple life areas!
“The greatest danger for most of us is not that our aim is too high and
we miss it, but that it is too low and we reach it.” – Michelangelo
Don’t just reserve your goals for your
career. You should challenge yourself to set fitness goals, finance goals,
family goals, relationships goals, educational goals, spiritual goals, health
goals, and adventure goals. Every area of your life that you value should have
a goal to help you improve upon it.
j. Set performance vs. outcome goals!
“The ultimate reason for setting goals is to entice you to become the
person it takes to achieve them.” – Jim Rohn
Many things are outside your control. For
example, you may have an adventure goal to climb Mount Everest. You follow an
action plan and train daily. You reach the moment when you are ready to ascend
the mountain’s icy slopes with your team. Suddenly, a huge storm turns you
back. The weather was out of your sphere of influence. You met all of your
performance goals. Just because the outcome didn’t happen this time does not
mean you failed. You were prepared. Life just happened and you weren’t able to
climb the mountain – this time. However, regardless of the outcome, you became
the person who could climb your mountain should life open the door. That’s the
deeper endeavor. When you set your goals, don’t say, “My goal is to climb Mt.
Everest by January 2014.” Instead, say, “My goal is to be completely prepared
to climb Mt. Everest by January 2014, and to do all that is within my power to
reach the top.” The first goal is only attainable if everything works in your
favor. The second goal is completely attainable, as it depends solely on you.
“In the long run, men hit only what they aim
at. Therefore, they had better aim at something high.” – Henry David Thoreau
So what are you aiming for? If your answer is
nothing, then you probably won’t like what you get out of this life. Instead of
simply drifting along reacting to what life brings you, take proactive steps to
go out and create the future you want. While we can’t control everything that
happens to us, we can control ourselves by following goals that bring out our
passion for life.
For instance, if your initial goal is just to
get on top of your work (probably for the first time in months), then take 10 minutes to think clearly and deeply about
how you can achieve this. Most likely, you’ll be able to come up with tasks
that you need to complete to reach your goal. And once your goal and tasks are
clear in your mind, you’ll be ready for the second step.
Leon Ho
ARTICLE
CONTINUES IN PART II 
No comments:
Post a Comment