Work-based learning Assignment Sample

Work-based learning Assignment

Introduction

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This report is based on the concept of stress management at the workplace which is very important to maintain employee commitments to accomplish the targets easily. According to the given case study, ABC employees' morale and performance have been decreasing due to an increase in stress levels. It is necessary to find out the reason behind the stress of employees. If, not it will impact the commitment and level of productivity of employees.

In this report, the concept of stress management will be defined in detail to have a better understanding of the reader. Further, the detailed description of causes and symptoms, of the stress will be examined that may cause to decrease in motivation and level of performance of employees. In this report, the stress management strategies will be described to help the organization to increase the job satisfaction and commitment level of employees. Some suggestions will be made based on the identified factors and reasons for stress at the workplace.

Stress management- A concept

Stress is a worldwide component and employees from every profession have to face stress. In the corporate world, employees have been facing stress due to many reasons like higher roles and responsibilities, pressure from higher authorities, and so on. It has been identified that employees are finding issues with stress management that impact job performance and high turnover productivity (Kushwaha 2014). Stress management is a process of different strategies, tools, techniques, and methods that reduce stress and the negative impacts on an individual. It is important to manage stress at the workplace. If not it can hamper the productivity of employees as well as increase their mental stress which is not good for one's health. Stress management facilitates healthier employees and a healthy workplace culture that encourages creativity & productivity. The common sources of work stress include excessive workloads, low salaries, lack of social support, unclear performance expectations, and few growth opportunities. Stress management is vital for dealing with challenges and difficulties. It enables people to jump back from failures and problems. It is important because:

• Learning stress management can help a person to manage things effectively in the organization (Holman, Johnson and O'Connor, 2018).
• Stress affects the health of people. So, it has an impact on employees' productivity at the workplace. Stress management deals with this problem also.
• Stress management enables an individual to enhance performance within the organization.

Causes of stress

At the workplace, stress can be caused by many factors either big or small. Workplace stress is a rising difficulty that impacts not only the health of employees but also the efficiency of businesses (Mittal and Bhakar, 2018). There are several reasons in an organization that can cause stress which affects human well-being and organizational efficiency. This includes:

• Sometimes having tight deadlines to achieve the targets is the reason behind stress at the workplace.
• Long hours, job uncertainty, heavy workload, inadequate skills for the job, lack of compensation & reward, poor working environment, and fewer promotional opportunities are the factors that cause stress at the workplace.
• Harassment, poor relations with colleagues, crisis incidents, discrimination, over supervision, lack of proper resources and lack of equipment and support from managers, and poor management in the organization (Saadeh and Suifan, 2019).

Symptom of stress at workplace

From an organizational perspective, stress impacts the productivity and efficiency of employees. It is a critical symptom of stress that generally shows in an individual. There are several numbers of symptoms that show stress at the workplace such as headache, low productivity, low energy, lack of sleep or insomnia, and mood swings. Physical symptoms of stress at the workplace include sleeping difficulties dermatological disorder, fatigue, muscular tension, and headaches (Ali and Anwar, 2021). Some psychological symptoms consist of irritability, depression, pessimism, cognitive difficulties, and anxiety. Some behavioral symptoms include isolation, disinterest, irritation, impatience, aggression, an increase in absenteeism, and a decrease in work performance. All these are the symptoms of stress that affect the employee's well-being in an organization.

Steps to manage stress at the workplace

There are certain steps to manage stress at the workplace. But the productive way of managing stress consists of three steps, awareness, determining the source, and doing something constructive which can be used by ABC organization to improve performance and organizational productivity.

• Awareness: This is an important step that allows an individual to identify the reason behind stress at the workplace. It enables the organization to understand when there is a decrease in the performance & absenteeism of employees.
• Determining the basis: The organization can find out the reason for stress with the first stage. Then, the causes of distress with their consequences will be analyzed to solve them appropriately.
• Doing something productive: This process will help an organization as well as employees to find out the solutions to existing problems.

The above-mentioned three steps can help ABC to manage the stress at the workplace (Ramli 2019). But, other several strategies allow the organization to improve productivity and employees' commitment within the business. Some of the other strategies that would help the organization to manage the stress of employees include:

• Encourage open communication: Most of the employee's stress indeed comes from their reporting managers and boss. In the organization, it is important to encourage open communication so that employees can share their problems. It has been identified that employees have negative relationships with bosses that lead to sleep problems, high blood pressure, and so on (Kim 2020). To overcome the stress, the organization has to provide training that offers such subjects as emotional regulations to manage conflict. It will help employees to well communicate and be more aware of their stress levels.
• Offer paid time off: This is one of the important strategies that would help ABC organization relieve employees from their stress (Haque, Nair, and Kucukaltan, 2019). The organization, as well as employees, need to have paid time off policy within the company. It will also help to reduce stress and increase the motivational level of employees for work.
• Bring some changes into the organization: Changes in terms of other activities on occasions apart from the work. Several fun activities can bring ABC organization to reduce stress. This strategy builds a team that will play together. It means the group that plays together works better together.
• Flexible work schedules: ABC organization must give flexibility to the employees for their work. A flexible work schedule will help the organization to take care of employees. This strategy provides many advantages to the employees as well as the organization such as increased employee retention, increase employee loyalty, engagement and productivity. It also helps to reduce employee turnover and absenteeism (Mahfouz 2020).

Benefits to managing stress

It is essential for protecting an individual mental & physical health. The above-mentioned techniques facilitate ABC Company to have benefits of stress management at the workplace. This includes:

• Reduced employee turnover: Stress management will enable ABC Company to have less employee turnover. The stress management techniques will impact employees' health positively which turns out to minimize employee turnover with its related expenses.
• Greater job satisfaction: According to research, stress has been caused high dissatisfaction from the job because of work pressure, tight deadlines, and so on. But the employees who have the skills to manage stress at the workplace are more likely satisfied with their job. So, it will increase the level of job satisfaction for all the employees (Naseem 2018).
• Better physical health: Stress management helps the employees to overcome their health & physical problems. It has been identified that stress management at the workplace leads to better health results.

Recommendations

With the overall discussion on the stress of employees in the company ABC, some suggestions should be followed by the organization to improve the level of productivity in the business.

• Appropriate strategies should be applied: It is recommended to ABC Company apply appropriate stress management strategies that can help the organization to motivate employees. The strategies should be applied in terms of providing flexible working hours; relationships with peers, allocating responsibilities as per the employee's skills, reducing work pressure, and better managing the performance of employees. These strategies will help ABC organization to improve the productivity level in the business which leads to an increase in job satisfaction.
• Must provide a friendly environment: An organization needs to have friendly work culture because it helps to reduce stress. The top managers of an organization should give attention to their subordinates regarding work-related queries and other activities that may help them to maintain things properly (Patel et al, 2019). This will increase the motivation of employees and improve their commitment to work. Environmental friendly culture at the workplace generally automatically decreases the level of stress among employees which is very helpful for an organization.
• Must involve employees in the decision-making process: It is recommended to ABC organization to involve employees in the organization's decision-making process. It will enable the company to increase motivation to work hard to achieve success while lowering the stress level. The organization must reward and compensate the employees for their best efforts which also leads to a decrease in employee turnover rate.

Conclusion

It has been concluded that stress management techniques play a critical role to help employees to relieve stress within the organization. It has been identified that there are several reasons for stress at the workplace such as Long hours, job uncertainty, heavy workload, inadequate skills for the job, lack of compensation & reward, poor working environment, and fewer promotional opportunities. It has been analyzed that the mentioned causes are the reasons for stress at the workplace which is important to manage. It has also been identified that the organization can find out the people who are suffering from stress which include irritability, depression, pessimism, cognitive difficulties, isolation, disinterest, irritation, impatience, aggression, an increase in absenteeism, and anxiety. It has been found out with this report that there are several techniques with which ABC organization can improve the performance of employees while removing stress. These strategies include flexible work schedules, offering paid time off, bringing changes into the organization like fun activities, and encouraging communication. It has been analyzed that these strategies will help the company to have certain benefits to manage stress such as better physical & mental health, greater job satisfaction, reduce employee turnover and absenteeism. Some recommendations have been identified that must be used by the organization in terms of stress management like must have a friendly environment, involving employees in the decision-making process, and proper strategies should be applied.

References

Ali, B.J. and Anwar, G., 2021. An Empirical Study of Employees’ Motivation and its Influence Job Satisfaction. Ali, BJ, & Anwar, G.(2021). An Empirical Study of Employees’ Motivation and its Influence Job Satisfaction. International Journal of Engineering, Business and Management, 5(2), pp.21-30.

Haque, A.U., Nair, S.L.S. and Kucukaltan, B., 2019. Management and administrative insight for the universities: High stress, low satisfaction and no commitment. Polish Journal of Management Studies, 20.

Holman, D., Johnson, S. and O'Connor, E., 2018. Stress management interventions: Improving subjective psychological well-being in the workplace. In Handbook of well-being. DEF Publishers.

Kim, J.S., 2020. Emotional labor strategies, stress, and burnout among hospital nurses: a path analysis. Journal of Nursing Scholarship, 52(1), pp.105-112.

Kushwaha, S., 2014. Stress management at workplace. Global Journal of Finance and Management, 6(5), pp.469-472.

Mahfouz, J., 2020. Principals and stress: Few coping strategies for abundant stressors. Educational Management Administration & Leadership, 48(3), pp.440-458.

Mittal, M. and Bhakar, S.S., 2018. Examining the impact of role overload on job stress, job satisfaction and job performance-a study among married working women in banking sector. International Journal of Management Studies, 2(7), pp.1-11.

Naseem, K., 2018. Job stress, happiness and life satisfaction: The moderating role of emotional intelligence empirical study in telecommunication sector Pakistan. Journal of Social Sciences and Humanity Studies, 4(1), pp.7-14.

Patel, R.S., Sekhri, S., Bhimanadham, N.N., Imran, S. and Hossain, S., 2019. A review on strategies to manage physician burnout. Cureus, 11(6).

Ramli, A.H., 2019. Manage of job stress and measure employee performance in health services. Business and Entrepreneurial Review, 18(1), pp.53-64.

Saadeh, I.M. and Suifan, T.S., 2019. Job stress and organizational commitment in hospitals: The mediating role of perceived organizational support. International Journal of Organizational Analysis.