This document discusses stress, its causes and impacts, and approaches to managing it. It defines stress and related terms, and describes four approaches to understanding stress: the homeostatic, cognitive appraisal, person-environment fit, and psychoanalytic approaches. It identifies sources of stress at work and in nonwork domains, and discusses the benefits and costs of stress. It also outlines individual differences in stress responses, gender-related stressors, preventative stress management strategies, and actions managers can take to support employee well-being and reduce distress.

1. Stress and Well-Being
at Work

2. What is Stress?
Stress – the unconscious preparation to
fight or flee that a person experiences
when faced with any demand
Stressor – the person or event that triggers
the stress response
Distress – the adverse psychological,
physical, behavioral, and organizational
consequences that may arise as a result
of stressful events
Strain – distress

3. What is Homeostasis?
Homeostasis – a steady state of bodily
functioning and equilibrium

4. 4 Stress Approaches:
Homeostatic/Medical Approach
Homeostasis
+
External environmental
demand
=
Fight
Flight

5. 4 Stress Approaches:
Cognitive Appraisal Approach
• Individuals differ in their appraisal of
events and people
• What is stressful for one person is not
for another
• Perception and cognitive appraisal
determines what is stressful

6. 4 Stress Approaches:
Cognitive Appraisal Approach
Problem-focused coping
emphasizes managing
the stressor
Emotion-focused coping
emphasizes managing
your response

7. 4 Stress Approaches:
Person–Environment Fit Approach
• No undue stress
Good person-environment fit: a person’s
skills and abilities match a clearly
defined, consistent set of role
expectations
• Stress, strain, and depression
occur when role expectations are
confusing and/or conflicting, or when the
person’s skills and abilities do not meet
the demands of the social role

8. 4 Stress Approaches:
Psychoanalytic Approach
Ego Ideal – the
Self-Image – how a
embodiment of a
person sees oneself,
person’s perfect self
both positively &
(imaginable)
negatively
= the difference
between ego ideal and
self-image

9. Sources of Stress at Work
Work Demands
Task Demands Role Demands
Change & uncertainty Role conflict:
Lack of control • Interrole
Career progress • Intrarole
New technologies • Person–role
Work overload/underload Role ambiguity
Interpersonal Demands Physical Demands
Abrasive personalities Extreme environments
Sexual harassment Strenuous activities
Leadership styles Hazardous substances

10. Stress Sources at Work
Nonwork Demands
Family Demands Personal Demands
Marital expectations Religious activities
Child-rearing/day care Self-improvement
arrangements tasks
Parental care Traumatic events

11. Stress Benefits and Costs
Benefits of Healthy, Normal Stress (Eustress)
Performance Health
Increased arousal Cardiovascular
Bursts of physical strength efficiency
Enhanced focus in an
emergency
Costs of Distress
Individual Organizational
Psychological disorders Participation problems
Medical illnesses Performance
Behavioral problems decrements
Compensation awards

12. Positive Stress
• Stress response itself is neutral
• Some stressful activities (aerobic
exercise, etc.) can enhance a person’s
ability to manage stressful demands or
situations
• Stress can provide a needed energy
boost

13. Negative Stress
Negative stress results from
– a prolonged activation of the stress
response
– mismanagement of the energy induced
by the response
– unique personal vulnerabilities

14. Individual Distress
Beh
avi o
s (sub ral pro
al illnes es,
Medic se, strok viole stance a blems
a
(hea rt dise ackaches) nce, b
acci use,
ches, b dent
heada s)
Work-related psychological disorders
(depression, burnout,
psychosomatic disorders)

15. Organizational Distress
Participative Problems – a cost
associated with absenteeism, tardiness,
strikes and work stoppages, and turnover
Performance Decrement – a cost resulting
from poor quality or low quantity of
production, grievances, and unscheduled
machine downtime and repair

16. Individual differences
Dealing with Stress
Achilles’ heel
phenomenon –
a person breaks down
at his or her weakest
point
e
iseas
Heart D s
Headache
Backach
Dep es
ress
ion

17. Are There
Gender-Related Stressors?
Sexual harassment
Early age fatal health problems
Long term disabling health problems
Violence

18. Type A Behavior Patterns
Type A Behavior Patterns – a
complex of personality and
behavior characteristics
– sense of time urgency
“hurry sickness”
– quest for numbers (of
achievements)
– status insecurity
– aggression & hostility
expressed in response to
frustration & conflict

19. Personality Hardiness
Personality Hardiness – a personality
resistant to distress and characterized by
– challenge (versus threat)
– commitment (versus alienation)
– control (versus powerlessness)
Transformational Coping – a way of
managing stressful events by changing
them into subjectively less stressful
events (versus regressive coping –
passive avoidance of events by
decreasing interaction with the
environment)

20. Self-Reliance
Self-Reliance – a healthy, secure,
interdependent pattern of behavior related to
how people form and maintain supportive
attachments with others (social relation ship)
Counterdependence – an unhealthy,
insecure pattern of behavior that leads to
separation in relationships with other people
Become rigid,denial of need of people
Overdependence – an unhealthy, insecure
pattern of behavior that leads to preoccupied
attempts to achieve security through
relationships., cling to other people.

21. Preventative Stress
Management
Preventative Stress Management – an
organizational philosophy that holds that
people & organizations should take joint
responsibility for promoting health and
preventing distress and strain

22. Preventative Stress
Management
Primary Prevention – designed to reduce,
modify, or eliminate the demand or
stressor causing stress
Secondary Prevention – designed to alter
or modify the individual’s or the
organization’s response to a demand or
stressor
Tertiary Prevention – designed to heal
individual or organizational symptoms of
distress and strain (healing , therapy)

23. Organizational Stress
Prevention
• Focuses on people’s work
demands
• Focuses on ways to reduce distress
at work
• Most organizational prevention is
primary
– job redesign
– goal setting
– role negotiation
– social support systems

24. Individual Preventive
Stress Management
Primary Prevention
Learned optimism: Alters the person’s internal self-talk and
reduces depression
Time management: Improves planning and prioritizes activities
Leisure time activities: Balance work and non-work activities
Secondary Prevention
Physical exercise: Improves cardiovascular function and muscular
flexibility
Relaxation training: Lowers all indicators of the stress response
Diet: Lowers the risk of cardiovascular disease and
improves overall physical health
Tertiary Prevention
Opening up: Releases internalized traumas and emotional
tensions
Professional help: Provides information, emotional support, and
therapeutic guidance

25. What Can Managers Do?
• Learn how to create healthy stress
without distress
• Help employees adjust to new
technologies
• Be sensitive to early signs of distress
• Be aware of gender, personality, and
behavioral differences
• Use principles and methods of preventive
stress management