Stress management of enterprise employees

Stress is a physical or mental physiological response when people adapt to the stimulation caused by the surrounding environment, which may have a positive or negative impact on people's psychological and physical health. The productivity loss of enterprises caused by excessive employee pressure, such as frequent absenteeism, absent-mindedness and decreased creativity, exceeds $654.38+050 billion every year in the United States alone.

In order to prevent and reduce the negative impact of stress on employees and organizations and give full play to its positive role, many enterprise managers have begun to pay attention to the stress management of employees. Implementing proper stress management in enterprises can effectively reduce the excessive psychological pressure of employees, maintain moderate and optimal pressure, and make employees improve their work efficiency, thus improving the performance of the whole organization and increasing profits.

The main body of stress management is individual employees and human resources departments. Pressure acts on employees first, and employees with different personalities will have different reactions to the same pressure. Related research has proved this point. Some employees are prone to frustration, anxiety and irritability after encountering pressure, and they can't extricate themselves for a long time. Moreover, some employees can face the pressure correctly, and although they feel uncomfortable, they can adjust their mood quickly. This shows that employees with different personalities have different abilities to adjust and adapt to stress. The main body of stress management also includes the competent department of enterprise human resources or enterprise managers. In the current people-oriented management era, managers have the responsibility to help employees control their own pressure, let employees work happily, have the highest performance, and achieve the "win-win" effect.

Cause or source

In order to manage stress effectively, it requires managers to find out exactly where the stress of employees comes from, so as to take positive and targeted measures accordingly.

The causes or sources of stress can be roughly divided into three aspects: work pressure, family pressure and life pressure.

1) working pressure. Working pressure refers to the pressure generated during working. Its origin may be varied. Such as the working environment (including the physical environment and organizational environment of the workplace, etc.). ), the number and difficulty of assigned tasks, the length of time required to complete the work, the influence of employees' interpersonal relationships, changes in new jobs, etc. , may be the cause of employee work stress. Work stress should be the focus of human resource managers in enterprises.

2) Family pressure and social pressure. Every employee has his own personal family life, and whether the family life is happy and harmonious has a great influence on employees. These family pressures may come from parents, spouses, children and relatives.

There is also some social pressure. Including social macro environment (such as economic environment, industry situation, employment market, etc.). ) and the microenvironment around employees. For example, the professional skills required by the IT industry in the workplace are changing with each passing day, the competition pressure in the workplace is high, and the elimination rate of professional talents is high, which has caused great social pressure to IT practitioners. The social status and income of employees also pose social pressure on them. For example, when an employee's own income is lower than that of other social classes or other employees in the same industry, it may also cause pressure on him.

Although these family pressures and social pressures have nothing to do with work, as enterprise managers, they should also be paid attention to and minimize the interference of employees. Only in this way can employees devote themselves to their work.

stress relieving

In the specific management of the above-mentioned stress, it is necessary to make a concrete and comprehensive analysis of each employee with different personality and the source of stress. Employees with strong ability to control and adapt to pressure have strong psychological endurance and can handle and relieve pressure well. When employees with weak psychological adjustment ability encounter pressure, they may not be able to control the pressure in time. At this time, enterprise managers need more help and care for such employees.

Stress management can be divided into three ways: catharsis, consultation and guidance.

As a way to release pressure, catharsis should have a good effect. There are many ways to vent, such as shouting in places where no one is around, or strenuous exercise and singing. Research shows that exercise and housework are very beneficial to relieve stress.

Psychological counseling is to talk with professional psychologists or relatives and friends about their depression and nervousness. Talking to your friends or parents is almost everyone's experience. In fact, whether the person you talk to can solve the problem for yourself or not, talking is a good way to adjust the pressure. What is better here is psychological counseling to communicate with professionals. Psychological counseling is a process in which professional psychological counselors communicate with employees through language, writing and other media to adjust their psychology or emotions. Psychological counseling can help employees to change their views, feelings and emotions in dealing with stress, solve psychological problems, adjust their mentality, correctly face and handle stress, maintain physical and mental health, and improve work efficiency and quality of life.

Guidance means that managers or others help employees to change their mentality and behavior, so that employees can cope with stress correctly. For example, redefining development goals and cultivating employees' hobbies are all good guiding methods. Employees set correct and appropriate goals, which can be achieved through their own efforts, and the related pressure will naturally disappear. If employees have a variety of hobbies, it is easy to divert attention when they are under great pressure, devote themselves wholeheartedly to hobbies, cultivate their sentiments and protect their physical and mental health, and their mentality will be peaceful, and the pressure will naturally be alleviated until it disappears.

Stress management method

Enterprise leaders and human resources managers should fully care about, pay attention to, investigate and analyze the stressors experienced by employees and their types, formulate and implement various stress reduction plans from the organizational level, and effectively manage and reduce the stress of employees.

Good working environment and conditions

Reduce or eliminate the pressure brought by bad working conditions to employees.

First of all, leaders or managers strive to create an efficient working environment and strictly control interruptions. For example, pay attention to noise, light, comfort, cleanliness, decoration and so on. Providing employees with a refreshing and pleasing workspace is conducive to realizing employees' adaptation to the working environment, improving employees' sense of security and comfort and reducing stress.

Secondly, we must ensure that employees have good tools and equipment to do a good job. Such as updating outdated computers, photocopiers and fax machines.

Encourage employees in corporate culture

Encourage and help employees to improve their mental health care ability, learn to relieve stress and relax themselves from the corporate culture atmosphere.

Enterprises provide employees with information and knowledge of stress management. Enterprises can order periodicals and magazines about maintaining mental health and hygiene for employees to read for free. This can also reflect the real concern of enterprises for the growth and health of employees, and make employees feel concerned and respected, which will also become an effective incentive means to motivate employees to improve their performance and thus improve the performance of the whole organization.

Enterprises can set up publicity columns to popularize employees' mental health knowledge. Enterprises with conditions can also offer stress management courses or invite experts to give lectures and reports regularly. Can inform employees of serious consequences and costs such as stress (such as illness, work-related death, accidental injury, medical expenses, potential income loss caused by productivity decline, etc.). ); Early warning signs of stress (physiological symptoms, emotional symptoms, behavioral symptoms, mental symptoms); Self-regulation methods of stress (such as healthy diet, regular exercise, learning to relax and have a good sleep, cultivating personal hobbies, etc.). ) ... let employees build a dam of "psychological immunity" and enhance their psychological "earthquake resistance" ability.

Provide medical care or health plan.

Provide medical care or health plan for employees and encourage employees to develop a good and healthy lifestyle. For example, some enterprises have set up special health rooms to provide employees with all kinds of exercise and relaxation equipment for free use, and full-time health instructors supervise exercise plans and activities. Some famous American companies also provide funds for people with fitness habits to encourage fitness. Through fitness and exercise, not only the physical health of employees is maintained (this is the basis of mental health), but also the pressure of employees can be released and vented to a great extent.

Enterprises can hire senior professionals as psychological counselors to provide psychological counseling for employees under pressure free of charge, so that employees can reach an understanding: "See a doctor if you are uncomfortable, and see a psychologist if you are uncomfortable." Psychological consultation is a very effective scientific method to provide mental support and psychological consultation for employees, help them improve their social adaptability, relieve psychological pressure and maintain mental health.

Strengthen process management

Organizing systems and procedures helps to reduce the pressure on employees and strengthen process management.

In the recruitment of human resources: pay attention to the characteristics of human resources, choose human resources that meet the post requirements (personality requirements, ability requirements, etc.), and strive to avoid the phenomenon of psychological stress caused by incompetence after taking up the post.

In the allocation of human resources: strive for the best allocation of people and things, and clarify the roles, responsibilities and tasks of employees in this position. It can reduce the psychological pressure caused by role ambiguity and role conflict.

In terms of human resources training: first, employees can be trained to improve their skills in handling work (such as writing official documents or reports, work reports, new skills, etc.). ), make their work easier and reduce stress; Second, staff time management training (prioritizing and planning time according to the urgency and importance of each task) can be carried out to eliminate time stressors; Third, it can train employees' communication skills, eliminate interpersonal stressors, and so on.

Career planning: help employees to improve their thinking, abandon unrealistic high expectations and establish realistic and objective SMART development goals: S-specific (concrete and suitable for them), M-measurable (measurable), A-achieved (achievable), R-reality (practical) and T-time-based.

Get out of the misunderstanding of stress management and correctly understand stress.

Psychological research shows that stress is a neutral objective existence, and it will not harm people. What hurts people is our cognition and attitude towards stress. Many times, because of cognitive bias, managers' stress management will go into a misunderstanding. There are three common cognitive misunderstandings about stress.

The first misunderstanding is that you are too worried and bear too much unnecessary pressure. According to psychologists, 40% of stressful events will never happen, such as the end of the world; 30% of worries are the result of past decisions and cannot be changed; 12% of the criticism is made by others because of inferiority; 10% worry is related to health, and the more worried, the more serious it is; Only 8% is reasonable.

The second misunderstanding is that those small pressures that do not have negative impact will not cause harm to themselves. In fact, if you are under constant pressure for a long time, even if these pressures are subtle, they will cause long-term harm to people.

The third misunderstanding is that all stress must be eliminated. This misunderstanding is manifested in two aspects. First, as mentioned above, not all the stress can be eliminated, only some of it can be eliminated. Secondly, not all stress is bad. Stress is a double-edged sword, which has both negative and positive aspects. Moderate stress can make us more alert to the surrounding environment, help us deepen our understanding of ourselves, help us set more realistic goals, and enhance our self-confidence and sense of accomplishment.

Control the source of stress and effectively prevent it from the root.

Most popular stress management methods wait until the stress develops to a certain extent and psychological, physiological and behavioral symptoms appear before taking measures to adjust it. In fact, our managers can effectively prevent stress from the root by reasonably controlling the source of stress.

As mentioned earlier, some pressures that managers feel can be eliminated by controlling the sources of stress. For example, managers know that employees' morale is low because of unfair training opportunities. Those who can increase training opportunities or allocate training opportunities by voting can improve staff morale and reduce the pressure brought by organizational atmosphere. For example, we can improve the pressure caused by poor planning by strengthening time management.

Effectively use resources and rationally decompose pressure.

Managers usually don't fight alone in stress management, and the team they lead can be used as a resource. Management positions are the hub of many work pressures. The pressure from the superior managers and the outside world is exerted on the managers here, some of which will be digested by the managers and the other part will be transmitted to the subordinates. Different managers will have different ratios of stress digestion and conduction.

Some managers passively accept the pressure from superiors and the outside world, and then don't pass it on, but take all the pressure in their own hands and digest it themselves, such as leaders who don't trust their subordinates to do everything themselves. Some managers pass on all the pressure from superiors and the outside world to subordinates without filtering, such as completely ignoring the digestive ability of subordinates and pushing tasks to subordinates. These two modes of transmission are very inappropriate. The former will make you tired and stressed, but things may not be done best. The latter seems to have no pressure on themselves, but when subordinates can't bear it and their work efficiency is greatly reduced, it will cause self-biting. The correct way is to fully consider the pressure tolerance of yourself and your subordinates, transfer the pressure reasonably and moderately, and let your subordinates become their own decompression resources.

Establish a good support system

Chatting is a cheap and effective way to relieve stress. The objects of conversation can be leaders, colleagues, friends and family ... but managers are limited to some inconvenient reasons, and the objects of conversation cannot be as selective as ordinary employees. Stress management experts have found that among all the people related to managers, two people are the most important decompression support resources for professionals, that is, their immediate superiors and spouses. The superior can help them control their stressors, while the spouse can give them emotional understanding and comfort.

Therefore, it is very important for managers to effectively establish their own support system and win the support of their immediate superiors and spouses.

Organize and implement employee assistance plans to help managers manage stress.

Some domestic enterprises have begun to try to introduce an employee assistance program (EAP) as an overall solution to help employees cope with occupational mental health problems, including stress. In enterprises that have implemented EAP, managers can use this spiritual welfare to effectively manage their own stress. The experience of domestic enterprises that have successfully implemented EAP shows that EAP has shown great power in systematic diagnosis, targeted intervention and effective prevention of work stress, and has a remarkable effect on managers' psychological stress management.

Self-decompression skills of managers

Meditation and Relaxation If managers feel stressed, they might as well do 10 minutes of meditation and relaxation during breaks every day. Prepare soothing music in advance, if it is best to have relaxation instructions, do it in a comfortable posture, and relax every part of your body from your fingertips with the music. In the process of meditation and relaxation, it is not necessary to pay too much attention to technology, but more to experience the feeling of relaxation. Stick to 10 minutes every day, and you will feel the effect after two weeks.

Respiratory decompression managers can decompress by adjusting their breathing when they feel stressed. Taking a deep breath for 5 minutes can slow down your pounding heart, calm down your anxious mood, and calm down your trembling and twitching muscles ... Take a deep breath before dealing with work, so that the stress is relieved and your thinking is clearer, and there may be unexpected ways to deal with it.

Sweating and decompression Some managers will choose to sweat in the gym to relieve stress, which is a good way to relieve stress. Of course, managers can also choose to climb mountains in the suburbs on weekends and relax in nature.

Exercise decompression, dynamic and static coordination, moderate relaxation and proper exercise are conducive to eliminating fatigue, stimulating vitality, regulating brain function, exercising, eliminating stress, stimulating vitality and awakening the brain. Suitable exercise methods include swimming, aerobic jogging, skipping rope, aerobic exercise, walking and playing table tennis. You can easily decompress by arranging exercise for about half an hour every day.

In addition, relaxation training, yoga, meditation, hypnosis, imagination and other ways can also play a role in reducing the reaction caused by stress.