As our debunked Management Myth pointed out, workplace stress is a reality and managers can do something about it. In this PIA, you’ll assess how you control workplace stress.

Eliminating all stress at work isn’t going to happen and it shouldn’t. Stress is an unavoidable consequence of life. It also has a positive side—when it focuses concentration and creativity. But when it brings about anger, frustration, fear, sleeplessness, and the like, it needs to be addressed.

Many organizations have introduced stress-reduction interventions for employees. These include improved employee selection and placement, helping employees set realistic goals, training in time management, redesign of jobs, increased involvement of employees in decisions that affect them, expanded social support networks, improved organizational communications, and organizationally supported wellness programs. But what can you do, on your own, to reduce stress if your employer doesn’t provide such programs or if you need to take additional action? The following individual interventions have been suggested:

• Implement time-management techniques. Every person can improve his or her use of time. Time is a unique resource in that, if it’s wasted, it can never be replaced. While people talk about saving time, it can never actually be saved. And if it’s lost, it can’t be retrieved. The good news is that it’s a resource we all have in equal amounts. Everyone gets the same 24 hours a day, 7 days a week to use. When tasks seem to exceed the hours you have available, stress often results. But effective management of time can reduce stress. Time-management training can, for example, teach you how to prioritize tasks by importance and urgency, schedule activities according to those priorities, avoid confusing actions with accomplishments, and understand your productivity cycle so you can handle the most demanding tasks during the high part of your cycle when you are most alert and productive.

• Create personal goals. Goal setting is designed to help you better prioritize your activities and better manage how you direct your efforts. Goals become, in effect, a personal planning tool. For instance, setting long-term goals provides general direction; while short-term goals—such as weekly or daily “to do” lists—reduce the likelihood that important activities will be overlooked and help you to maximize the use of your time.

• Use physical exercise. A large body of evidence indicates that noncompetitive physical exercise can help you to release tension that builds up in stressful situations. These activities include aerobics, walking, jogging, swimming, and riding a bicycle. Physical exercise increases heart capacity, lowers the at-rest heart rate, provides a mental diversion from work pressures, and offers a means to “let off steam.”

• Practice relaxation training. You can teach yourself to reduce tension through meditation, deep-breathing exercises, and guided imaging. They work by taking your mind off the sources of stress, achieving a state of deep relaxation, and releasing body tension.

• Expand your social support network. Having friends, family, or work colleagues to talk to provides an outlet when stress levels become excessive. Expanding your social support network, therefore, can be a means for tension reduction. It provides you with someone to hear your problems and to offer a more objective perspective on the situation.58

Read through this scenario and follow the directions at the end of it:

Dana had become frustrated in her job at Taylor Books—a chain of 22 bookstores in Georgia and Florida. After nearly 13 years as director of marketing, she felt she needed new challenges. When she was offered the job as senior account supervisor for Dancer Advertising in Tampa, she jumped at the opportunity. Now, after four months on the job, she’s not so certain she made the right move.

At Taylor, she worked a basic 8-to-5 day. She was easily able to balance her work responsibilities with her personal responsibilities as a wife and mother of two children—ages 4 and 7. But her new job is very different. Clients call any time—day, night, and weekends—with demands. People in Dancer’s creative department are constantly asking for her input on projects. And Dana’s boss expects her not only to keep her current clients happy, but also to help secure new clients by preparing and participating in presentations and working up budgets. Last month alone, Dana calculated that she spent 67 hours in the office plus another 12 at home working on Dancer projects. Short on sleep, frazzled by the hectic pace, having no time for her family or chores, she’s lost five pounds and broken out in hives. Her doctor told her the hives were stress-induced and she needed to sort out her life.

Dana really likes her job as an account executive but feels the demands and pulls of the job are overwhelming. Yesterday she called her old boss at Taylor Books and inquired about coming back. His reply, “Dana, we’d love to have you back here but we filled your slot. We could find something for you in marketing but you wouldn’t be director and the pay would be at least a third less.”

If you were Dana, what would you do? Be specific.

Experiential Exercise

Creativity is highly prized in Western society cultures and in most organizational settings. However, most people don’t consider themselves to be creative. What about you? Would you describe yourself as creative? Like intelligence, it’s a trait that everyone possesses in some capacity. In this Experiential Exercise, you’re going to “exercise” your creativity. But we won’t force you to work on your own! You’ll be working with your assigned group. Here’s your assignment:

• Choose one of the two familiar consumer products shown here.

• Identify at least five different uses for these products other than the original use and write them down. Be as descriptive as you can.

• Choose your Top 3 uses and be prepared to share with your class.

• BE CREATIVE! (That should go without saying!) So, how about having fun with this!

• Write a paragraph describing your experience with your group doing this. Was it a struggle or fairly easy? How did you feel . . . stressed or comfortable? What did you learn about your comfort with being creative? What might you do to change your approach to being creative?