For a number of specialties, occupational stress is considered a daily norm, so scientists are just beginning to study this issue in detail. Emotional stress affects not only working capacity: immunity decreases, chronic diseases worsen, so it is important to learn how to resist it.
What is professional stress?
In some aspects, experts even consider this overstrain useful. It helps to get out of the comfort zone, which positively affects the development of working skills, deepening knowledge and solving problems that we have not previously encountered. The ability to cope with their emotions is often even indicated in the list of requirements for a candidate for a particular position: it is perceived as part of the work of journalists, investigators or doctors.
The concept of occupational stress begins where work ceases to bring pleasure. A healthy enthusiasm for one's business always brings pleasant fatigue, but that has nothing to do with irritation and malaise. The increased duration of the working day, the tight deadlines and the uncertainty of the boss's demands increase anxiety and block attempts by the nervous system to recover. When professional stress forces you to move away from the comfort zone, and not just get out of it, it starts to cause damage to physical health.
Causes of Occupational Stress
Even a balanced person in a restless and distracted can turn professional stress, the causes of which can be very different. The reason for the development of chronic "office" depression can be:
- The regular need to bear serious responsibility . It depresses and instills a sense of fear for the decisions made.
- Blurred boundaries of job responsibilities . Psychological discomfort bears a position with a floating list of responsibilities, since their volume can not be predicted in advance.
- Zeal and perfectionism chef . The bosses, bullying the bar for employees, often do not count with banal fatigue or inattention.
- Routine . People with a creative character can not survive long at work, implying the daily execution of the same set of manipulations. It does not allow to show creativity and turns a labor day into hard labor.
- Low salary . It is proved that professionals who consider wages worthy have high motivation. They do not need convulsive search for work-outs or ways of saving, and therefore less likely to become victims of occupational stress.
Types of occupational stress
This disease, like any other, has its own variety. Each of them follows from the reasons for its appearance, having a psychological background. Stress in professional activity is divided into the following types:
- Informational nature . Regular search and processing of large amounts of information tires the brain and nervous system
- Communicative nature . It occurs in employees who have subordinates and colleagues with manipulative skills.
- Emotional nature . The disease manifests itself against the background of constant conflicts in the team.
Effects of occupational stress
It can not pass without a trace for other systems of the body and accumulated professional stress. The first signal that apathy, depression and anxiety affect health - tension in the muscles and headaches. At an early stage with them you can cope with the help of relaxing massage, yoga and soothing herbal infusions. Running professional stress causes problems with the digestive tract: colitis, intestinal distress and nausea. Trying to cope with them, workaholics can get caught in a relaxing trap of alcohol and other bad habits.
Gender peculiarities of occupational stress
Several psychological studies have proven gender differences in the manifestations of occupational stress. Girls, though, have an increased stress-resistance in any area of life, but they experience deeper every failure of life. The female sex is more sensitive to any comments on the work, partly perceiving them on a personal account. It is more difficult for women to draw an internal line between criticism for motivation and a good attitude in general: they can perceive a minor amendment as a deterioration in mutual understanding with the leader.
Money and professional stress
From the level of payment depends on both material and moral well-being. Debts, bonded loans and sudden dismissal - all this can cause the strongest emotional tension. Professional psychology considers psychology to be explainable when an employee does not like the social status or attitude of the chef. Compensate for depression and dissatisfaction with life is only worthy pay, so in specializations that involve not stable payments, and earnings in the form of interest from the employer's income, there is always a high turnover of staff.
Overcoming professional stress
Stress in the professional life of any of the above types can be suppressed by building a positive, trusting relationship with the team. Suppress the emotional experience associated with working responsibilities will help the following rules:
- Subordination in communication with colleagues (refusal from an excessively close relationship with superiors and subordinates will exclude feelings of guilt and responsibilities to them).
- Discussion of current problems (issues should be resolved as they arrive and subject to maximum sincerity in relation to colleagues).
- Flexibility in difficult situations (stress resistance needs to be trained every time, as there is a desire to quit your job).
- Choosing an interesting hobby (work should not take up all the thoughts of a person, so in the evenings it's just necessary to engage in creativity).
- Help the psychologist (regular visits to a competent specialist will help to get out of professional stress with minimal losses).
Occupations with a high level of stress
There are professions related to stress and the labor market, employers have long indicated stress resistance as one of the professional skills. Foreign publications annually make ratings of specialties that require applicants for the post of "iron nerves". Traditionally they include the profession of fireman, journalist, military, doctor of any specialization, lawyer, pilot, stewardess, event organizer and taxi driver.
Professional stress should not be afraid: it has both negative and positive sides. It is important to be able to keep it under vigilant control so that it does not begin to cause harm to health and cause serious psychological discomfort. Every aggravation should be perceived as the next step on the career ladder, developing leadership qualities and self-control.