CH 15; Stress & Counseling

7/29/2019 CH 15; Stress & Counseling

1/20

Page 1 of20

STRESS & COUNSELINGChapter 15


2/20

Page 2 of20

15. STRESS

(i) What do you understand by Job Stress ?

(ii) What are the Cause of Job Related Stress ?

(iii) State the Symptoms of Job related Stress

(iv) Briefly Describe the Approaches to Stress Management

(v) What are the Sources of Job Stress ?

15. COUNSELING

(i) Define Employee Counseling ?

(ii) Discuss the Type of Counseling is More Effective ?

(iii) Methods of Employee Counseling ?

(iv) Indentify the Characteristics of Counseling ?

(v) What are the Main Function of Employee Counselling ?

(vi) Explain the Managers Counseling Role ?


3/20

Page 3 of20

What do you Understand by Job Stress ?

Stress Defined

Stress is a persons adaptive response to a stimulus that places excessive

psychological or physical demands on that person.

Work Stress and Its Management Stress A dynamic condition inwhich an individual is confronted with an opportunity , constraint, ordemand related to what he or she desires and for which the outcomeis perceived to be both uncertain and important.

There are 4 main categories of stress, namely eustress, distress,

hyper stress and hypo stress. Negative stress can cause many

physical and psychological problems, whilst positive stress can be

very helpful for us. Heres how we differentiate between them.

Eustress:

this is a positive form of stress, which prepares your mind and body

for the imminent challenges that it has perceived. Eustress is a

natural physical reaction by your body which increases blood flow to

your muscles, resulting in a higher heart rate. Athletes before a

competition or perhaps a manager before a major presentation would

do well with eustress, allowing them to derive the inspiration and

strength that is needed.

Distress:

We are familiar with this word, and know that it is a negative form of

stress. This occurs when the mind and body is unable to cope with

changes, and usually occurs when there are deviations from the

norm. They can be categorized into acute stress and chronic stress.


4/20

Page 4 of20

Acute stress is intense, but does not last for long. On the other hand,

chronic stress persists over a long period of time. Trigger events for

distress can be a change in job scope or routine that the person is

unable to handle or cope with.

Hyper stress:

This is another form of negative stress that occurs when the individual

is unable to cope with the workload. Examples include highly stressful

jobs, which require longer working hours than the individual can

handle. If you suspect that you are suffering from hyper stress, you

are likely to have sudden emotional breakdowns over insignificant

issues, the proverbial straws that broke the camels back. It is

important for you to recognize that your body needs a break, or you

may end up with severe and chronic physical and psychological

reactions.

Hypo stress:

Lastly, hypo stress occurs when a person has nothing to do with his

time and feels constantly bored and unmotivated. This is due to an

insufficient amount of stress; hence some stress is inevitable andhelpful to us. Companies should avoid having workers who

experience hypo stress as this will cause productivity and

mindfulness to fall. If the job scope is boring and repetitive, it would

be a good idea to implement some form of job rotation so that there is

always something new to learn.


5/20

Page 5 of20

What are the Causes of Job Related Stress ?

Determinants of JobStress

Job CharacteristicsA major source of job stress is a persons role in the organization. A

role is simply the set of expectations that other people in the

organization have for an individual, For example, supervisors,

coworkers, customers and suppliers expect an employee to behave in

certain predictable ways. The expectations others have of an

employee arc sometimes unclear, in conflict, or too high for theemployee to meet within the time allotted, and he or she experiences

stress.

Role Ambiguity: When there is a lot of uncertainty surrounding job

definitions or job expectations, people experience role ambiguity. With the

recent increase in mergers and acquisitions among major organizations,

more and more employees arc experiencing job stress as a result of role

ambiguity. Role ambiguity is anxiety arousing among employees that leads

to job stress.

Role Conflict: Often employees discover that different groups of people in

an organization have widely varying expectations of them, and that they


6/20

Page 6 of20

cannot meet all those expectations. This inconsistency of expectations

associated with a role is called role conflict, which results in stress.

Role Overload: Role overload is a situation in which employees feel they

are being asked to do more than time or ability permits. Working under time

pressure is especially stressful.

Role Underload: Role Underload is the condition in which employees have

too little work to do or too little variety -in their work. For example,

salespeople in a store with no customer, standing around all day with nothing

to do, could be said to experience role underload. Ironically, role underload

leads to low self-esteem, increased frequency of nervous symptoms and

increased health problems.

Ethical Dilemmas: Ethical dilemmas such as whether or not one should

report the observed unethical behaviors of another person can cause extreme

levels of stress in individuals. This will be especially true for those who havestrong moral values of right and wrong and a deep sense of personal and

corporate social responsibility. Tensions arise because one might have to

contend against ones own colleagues who might be close friends, and may

fear of reprisal and other undesirable consequences.


7/20

Page 7 of20

State the Symptoms of Stress ?


8/20

Page 8 of20

Briefly describe the Approaches to Stress Management ?

Individuals and Organisational Approachesto Managing Stress

As we know thatstress has got a number of negative consequences for the individuals, that is why every individual should take personal responsibility for

reducing his or her stress level. There are a number of ways by which a person can either avoid stressful conditions, change them or learn to cope

with them. Stress can be managed by an individual, which will enable him to regain control over his life.

Some of the stress reducing strategies from individuals point of view are :

1. Knowledge About Stress. In the first stage, an individual should become knowledgeable about stress. He should know about the process and

effects of stress. He must find out the major sources of his stress. He must anticipate stressful periods and plan accordingly in advance. He must be

honest with himself and decide what he can cope with what he cannot.

2. Physiological Fitness. Excercise in any form can help people in coping with the stress. Non competitive physical excercise such as aerobics,

walking, jogging, swimming, riding a bicycle, playing softball or tennis have been recommended by physicians as a way to deal with excessive stress

levels. There is evidence to suggest that individuals who excercise are much less likely to suffer from certain types of stress related excercises. With

proper exercise, diet control and non-smoking habits, blood pressure and cholesterol become controlled and the body becomes more resistant to

pressures. People are more likely to get physically sick or emotionally depressed if they are over weight or poorly nourished.

3. Time Management. Most of the people are very poor in managing their time. They dont know that what must be done and when it would be

desirable to do so. The result of poor time management is feeling of work overload, skipped schedules and tension. A well organised person can

often accomplish twice as much as the person who is poorly organised. Therefore, an individual must understand how to manage his time so that he

can cope with tensions created by job demands. A few of the well known time management principles are :

Preparing a daily list of activities to be attended to.

Prioritizing activities by importance and urgency.

Scheduling activities according to the priorities set.

Knowing your daily schedule and handling the most demanding parts of a job when you are most alert and productive.
http://www.mbaknol.com/management-articles/consequences-of-stress/http://www.mbaknol.com/management-articles/consequences-of-stress/http://www.mbaknol.com/management-articles/consequences-of-stress/http://www.mbaknol.com/management-articles/consequences-of-stress/


9/20

Page 9 of20

4. Assertiveness.An individual should become assertive. He should not say Yes when he wants tosay No. He should start saying No to people or

managers who demand too much of his time. Being assertive is an important factor in reducing stress.

5. Social Support Network. Every person should have people to turn to, talk to and rely upon. Good friends become highly supportive during times of

stress and crisis. Social net work includes friends, family or work colleagues. Expanding your social support system can be a means for tension

reduction because friends are there when needed and provide support to get the person through stressful situations.

6. Readjust life Goals. Every individual must know what he really wants to do. This should relate to not only the major decisions of the life but to all

activities in our life. He must know what is important for him. Because of the severe competition in life to go ahead, most individuals set very high

standards and goals for themselves. These high expectations and limited resources to reach such expectations result in stress. Accordingly, every

person must readjust his goals and make sure he has the ability and resources to reach such goals. Perhaps the goals should be established after

the resources have been analysed.

7. Relaxation Techniques. Every individual must teach himself to reduce tension through relaxation techniques such as Yoga, mediation, hypnosis and

biofeedback. 15-20 minutes a day of deep relaxation releases tension and provides a person with pronounced sense of peacefulness. Deep

relaxation conditions will bring significant changes in heart rate, blood pressure and other physiological factors. Yoga is probably the most effective

remedy for stress. Studies have revealed that Yoga has cured several stress related diseases.

8. Plan your life in Advance. So many times, people create situations which induce stress because they either did not plan or did a bad job of

planning. The traditional Indian attitude of whatever will be, will be a way of accepting the unexpected difficulties in li fe. This attitude may be

relevant in those situations over which we do not have any control like death in the family, but for other events in life, it is better to plan in advance,

so that we can confront them with confidence when they occur.

Individuals may design their own strategies to reduce stress, but it is a must for the organisations to develop programmes that will help the

employees in reducing their stress. This will lead to less employee turnover, absenteeism and as a result productivity will improve.

Some of the measures which organisations can take are :

1. Selection and Placement. Individuals differ in their response to stress situations. We know that Type A individuals are more prone to stress. On the

other hand, in the organisations there are certain jobs which are more stressful as compared to other jobs. While doing the selection and placement

of the employees, these factors must be kept in mind. The individuals who are more prone to stress should not be put on jobs which are stressful.

The individuals who are less prone to stress may adapt better to high stress jobs and perform those jobs more effectively.

2. Goal Setting. Based on extensive amount of research it has been concluded that individuals perform better when they have specific and

challenging goals and they receive feedback on how well they are progressing towards those goals. Goal setting can reduce stress as well as

provide motivation. It will result in less employee frustration, role ambiguity and stress.

3. Improved Communication. Sometimes due to lack of effective communication from the superiors, the employees do not know what they have to do

and how they have to do it. This result in role ambiguity. Similarly, when two or more persons have contradicting role demands from an employee, it

leads to role conflict if there is lack of proper communication. Effective communication with employees reduces the uncertainty by lessening role

ambiguity and role conflict.

4. Redesigning Jobs. Organisations should redesign the jobs in such a way as to give employees more responsibility, more meaningful work, more

autonomy and increased feed back. This will help reduce the stress caused by monotony, routine work, work overload or underload and role

ambiguity. Job redesigning enhances motivation, reduces the stress among the employees and enhances Qualityof work life.

5. Participative Decision Making. If the organisations give the employees participation in those decisions that directly affect them and their job

performance, it can increase employee control and reduce the role stress. The main reason of role stress is that employees feel uncertain about their

goals, expectations and how they will be evaluated. These uncertainties can be reduced by the management by giving the employees a right to

participate in the decision making.

6. Building Teamwork. The management should try to create such work environment in which there is no provision for interpersonal conflict or inter

group conflict. Such conflicts are the causes of stress, such should be prevented from building or eliminated if they develop. Accordingly such team

work should be developed that groups and the members are mutually supportive and productive. Members of the group should consider themselves

as members of the same family and seek social support from each other.

7. Personal Wellness Programmes. These personal wellness programmes focus on the employees total physical and mental condition. Organisations

can provide facilities at their premises for physical fitness such as gyms, swimming pools, tennis courts etc. as well as psychological counselling.

They should hold seminars or workshops to make the employees understand nature and sources of stress and the possible ways to reduce it. These

workshops should help those individuals who are already under stress. Moreover, a supervisor can impact personal wellness of his subordinates

through positive example, encouragement and by practising the basic concepts and techniques of human resource management.


10/20

Page 10 of20

What are the Sources of Job Stress ?


11/20

Page 11 of20

Task Demands Stressors associated with the specific job a person

performs. Some occupations are by nature more stressfulthan others.

Physical Demands Stressors associated with the jobs physical setting, such

as the adequacy of temperature and lighting.

Role Demands Stressors associated with the role a person is expected to

play. Role ambiguity arises when a role is unclear.

Role conflict occurs when the messages and cuesconstituting a role are clear but contradictory ormutually exclusive.

Role overload occurs when expectations for the roleexceed the individuals capacity.

Interpersonal Demands Stressors associated with group pressures, leadership, and

personality conflicts.

Behavioral Consequences The behavioral consequences of stress, such as alcohol

abuse, may harm the person under stress or others.Psychological Consequences

Psychological consequences relate to a persons mentalhealth and well-being.

Medical Consequences Medical consequences affect a persons physical well-

being. Heart disease and stroke, among other illnesses, havebeen linked to stress.

Performance One clear organizational consequence of too much stress

is a decline in performance.Withdrawal

The most significant forms of withdrawal behavior are

absenteeism and quitting.Attitudes


12/20

Page 12 of20

Stress can have a negative effect on job satisfaction,morale, organizational commitment, and motivation toperform at high levels.

Burnout

Is the general feeling of exhaustion that develops when anindividual simultaneously experiences too much pressureand has too few sources of satisfaction.


13/20

Page 13 of20

Define Employee Counseling ?

Counselling is a process of helping people to learn how to solve certain

interpersonal, emotional and decision problems.

Counseling is discussion with and employee of a problem that usually has

emotional content in order to help the employee cote with it better.

The term counseling refers to the help given by a superior to his subordinate

in improving the latters performance.


14/20

Page 14 of20

Discuss the Type of Counseling is More Effective ?

Types of Employee Counseling

In attempting to help an employee who has a problem, a variety ofcounseling

approaches are used. All of these counseling approaches, however, depend on

active listening. Sometimes the mere furnishing of information or advice may be

the solution to what at first appeared to be a knotty problem. More frequently,

however, the problem cannot be solved easily because of frustrations or

conflicts that are accompanied by strong feelings such as fear, confusion, or

hostility. A manager, therefore, needs to learn to use whatever approachappears to be suitable at the time. Flexibility is a key component of theemployee

counselingprocess.

1. Directive Counseling: It is full counseling. It is the process of listening to an

employees problem, deciding with the employee what should be done and telling and

motivating the employee to do it. This type of counseling mostly does the function of

advice, reassurance and communication. It may also perform other functions of

counseling.

2. Non-directive Counseling: In non-directive counseling, the employee is permitted to

have maximum freedom in determining the course of the interview. It is the process of

skillfully listening and encouraging a counselee to explain troublesome problems,

understand them and determine appropriate solutions6. Fundamentally, the approach is

to listen, with understanding and without criticism or appraisal, to the problem as it is

described by the employee. The employee is encouraged, through the managers

attitude and reaction to what is said or not said, to express feelings without fear of

shame, embarrassment, or reprisal. The free expression that is encouraged in the non-

directive approach tends to reduce tensions and frustrations. The employee who has had

an opportunity to release pent-up feelings is usually in a better position to view the

problem more objectively and with a problem-solving attitude.

3. Participative Counseling: Both directive and non-directive methods suffer fromlimitations. While the former is often not accepted by independent employees, the latter
http://www.mbaknol.com/human-resource-management/employee-counseling/http://www.mbaknol.com/human-resource-management/employee-counseling/http://www.mbaknol.com/human-resource-management/employee-counseling/http://www.mbaknol.com/human-resource-management/employee-counseling/http://www.mbaknol.com/human-resource-management/employee-counseling/http://www.mbaknol.com/human-resource-management/employee-counseling/


15/20

Page 15 of20

needs professionals to operate and hence is costly. Hence, the counseling used in most

situations is in between these two. This middle path is known as participative

counseling. Participative is a counselor-counselee relationship that establishes a

cooperative exchange of ideas to help solve an employees problems. It is neither

wholly counsellor-centred nor wholly counselee-centred. Counselor and counselee

mutually apply their different knowledge, perceptions, skills, perspectives and values to

problem into the problems and find solutions.


16/20

Page 16 of20

Methods of Employee Counseling ?

Methods of Employee Counseling

Effectiveness of counselling largely depends on the methods and techniques as

well as the skills used by the counsellor. Methods and techniques of counceling

change from person to person and from situation to situation. Normally

employee counseling involves the following methods:

1. Desensitization: According to Desensitization, once an animal has been shocked in a

particular situation, it will continue to avoid it indefinitely. This is quite true in respect

of human beings also. Once an individual is shocked in a particular situation, he gives

himself no chance for the situation to recur. This method can be used to overcome

avoidance reactions, so as to improve the emotional weak spots. If an employee is once

shocked by the behavior, approach or action of his superior, he would continue to avoid

that superior. It is difficult for such superiors to be effective counselors, unless suchsuperiors prove otherwise through their behavior or action on the contrary. Similarly,

once an employee is shocked by a particular situation, he can be brought back to that

situation only if he will be convinced through desensitization that the shock will not to

take place further. Counselor can make use of desensitization in such situations.

2. Catharsis: Discharge of emotional tensions can be called catharsis. Emotional tensions

can be discharged by talking them out or by relieving of the painful experience which

engendered them. It is an important technique as a means of reducing the tensions

associated with anxiety, fear, hostility, or guilt. Catharsis helps to gain insight into the

ways an emotional trauma has been affecting the behavior.

3. Insight: With the help of insight one may find that he has devalued himself

unnecessarily, or his aspirations were unrealistic, or that his childish interpretation of an

event was inaccurate. Then he can overcome his weakness.

4. Developing the new patterns: Developing new patterns becomes very often necessary

when other methods to deal with weak spots remain ineffective. In order to develop


17/20

Page 17 of20

new, more satisfying emotional reactions, the individual needs to expose himself to

situations where he can experience positive feelings. The manager who deals with such

individuals may motivate or instigate them to put themselves into such situations, so

that their self-confidence may increase.


18/20

Page 18 of20

Identify the characteristics of Counseling ?

Characteristics of Employee Counseling

1. Counseling is an exchange of ideas and feelings between two people.

2. It tries to improve organizational performance by helping the employees to cope with

the problems.

3. It makes organization be more human and considerate with peoples problems.

4. Counseling may be performed by both professionals and non-professionals.

5. Counseling is usually confidential in order to have free talk and discussions.

6. It involves both job and personal problems.


19/20

Page 19 of20

What are the Main Function of Employee Counseling ?

Functions of Employee Counseling

The general objective of counseling is to help employees to improve theirmental health and develop in self-confidence, understanding, self-control and

ability to work effectively. This objective can be achieved by performing various

counseling functions. They are:

1. Advice: One of the important functions of counseling is offering advice to the

counselee. The counselor has to understand the problem of the counselee completely,

before offering advice and suggesting a course of action.

2. Reassurance: In order to give courage to face a problem confidently, counseling

provides employees with reassurance. Normally reassurance is not acceptable to the

counselee. However, it is useful in some situations.

3. Communication: Counseling will improve both upward and downward communication

abilities of the counselees.

4. Release of Emotional Tension: Releasing emotional tension is an important function of

counseling. People feel emotional release from their frustration after counseling.

Release of tension may not solve the entire problem, but run over mental blocks to the

solution.

5. Clarified Thinking: Release of tension and thereby removal of mental blocks to the

solution through counseling allows the counselee to think freely and objectively. Thus,

clarified thinking tends to be the result of emotional release.

6. Reorientation: Reorientation is not just emotional release or clear thinking, but it

involves a change in the counselees psychic self through a change in the basic goals

and values.


20/20

Page 20 of 20

Explain the Managers Counseling Role ?

Line Managers role in Counseling

Listen to problems/Address Issues Provide Feedback and help counselee to see a different view point Investigate problems/matters Avoid word of mouth and see the root cause with evidence Suggest/Recommend solutions Observe behavior and clarify expectations Determine right course of action and reach conclusion Draft plan of action and follow up

The Basic Role of Manager are1.Goal Setting : Letting staff know what they are supposed to do2.Coaching : Making sure staff know how to do their jobs3.Monitoring : Keeping tabs on Staff Performance4.Feedback : Letting staff know how they are doing5.Positive Reinforcement : Rewarding Good Performance

CH 15; Stress & Counseling

Documents

Transcript of CH 15; Stress & Counseling