SURVIVING THE DAILY BATTLE IN THE WORKPLACE

Is it possible to survive in the current working environment with the demands being created by employers?  

An employer uses its employees for the benefit of the company, it’s as simple as that. If the employer didn’t have use of its employees the company wouldn’t survive. The employer provides reward in terms of a wage or salary in return for using the employee. But are the demands placed on some employees too high?

What are you worth to your employer? What would your employer do if you weren’t available due to the stress placed upon you while in their employ?

Lost workdays

Companies talk about lost workdays from stress. What creates the stress that causes people to seek the advice of General Practitioners? Questions about the effects of stress on an individual’s health are now common in the work place, and are often the topic for conversation in the pub, at the coffee machine or at a company social event. Team leaders need to identify an individual’s strengths and weaknesses prior to recruiting individuals for their team or organisation. It is not until this is done will we start to reduce the stress levels of our workforce. Spending time identifying individual talents creates more effective results.

The requirements of our employers are that people must fit into the company ethos and be a team player. To fit into the team people must do the following:

Be adaptable

Develop our social skills

Define a clear sense of purpose for the position

Be an effective communicator

Participate in staff events

Proactively build relations within the team

To go that ‘extra mile’

 

Recruiting individuals to work together in group harmony and calling them a team does not, in my opinion, create a team.

The other fundamentals that should be considered include:

The team/company structure.

The management of individuals’ capabilities and personalities.

Aligning individuals strengths to company strategy.

Awareness of shared behavioural traits and awareness of development needs.

Decision making ability.

Ability to take responsibility.

And possibly more importantly, recognition of team members responsibilities where an individual can identify himself or herself as a member of a team.

When team members identify themselves as members, they will generally work with each other to share opinions and ideas to the benefit of the team. This creates a supportive working environment which will reduce the stress levels of the individual, the team and organisation.

Results based

As the unit develops into one of a supportive network each member is able to develop their own skills to the benefit of the team. Thereby producing more effective results. Each of us is unique in terms of our abilities, our strengths, our weaknesses and what we can bring to the team. When empowered to use these abilities to the full extent and to recognise our weaknesses, both the team and the organisation benefit.

This is not new thinking, positivity deserves consideration.

When roles are clearly defined people have more clarity in relation to their position within the organisation. It is through joint and structured efforts that higher performance is achieved. People might even score higher in their annual performance review!

The use of the terminology ‘Fire-fighting’ is common in today’s workplace. It seems that every meeting I attend someone will use the phrase ‘fire- fighting’. This could be significantly reduced through more effective management by individuals and organisations. Rather than fire-fighting would it not make sense to use fire-prevention?

Taken for granted

Companies can take employees for granted, they can assume that employees have a clear understanding of what the expectations are. Personal needs can be jeopardised. Family and personal relationships can be sacrificed. People take on too much in fear of the possible outcome if they say no. Being asked to do something within an unrealistic timeframe or without adequate resources causes stress and pressure. People must become more assertive. The next time a stressful situation arises, say to your employer… ‘Yes, I will gladly take on the task, but do you realise it will not be possible without additional resources or an extension of time to complete the project effectively and accurately. What is the employers’ reaction? If the employer is unwilling to accept this, you are in the wrong company. Start to take steps to change jobs.

There must be effective communication between both parties, otherwise stress cannot be managed effectively.  One major contributor to stress is misunderstanding. In a business environment individuals have ongoing opportunities to give information, discuss problems, receive feedback and ideas from others, and report on the status of his or her work.

People suffering high levels of stress will tend to withdraw and eventually they will become isolated. The employer may see this as ‘not being a team player’ or ‘they don’t fit’, where what this person is in need of is support, and clearer clarification of their position, role and indeed the joint goal. If employers in conjunction with employees don’t support each other, they will both expend too much energy counteracting symptoms of stress.

What employees need to do to ease the stress load on themselves is:

Establish a structure for understanding their career requirements, passing on power to others for carrying out the plan.

Design policies and procedures to direct themselves and create methods or systems to supervise their operations.

Establish detailed steps and timetables for achieving results and resources to make the plan happen, organising time more efficiently.

Create the potential of consistency, producing key results. What can be done within the timeframe and budget?

Strengthen themselves to overcome biased, overbearing and supply barriers by allocating adequate resources to make the plan happen. And as a result promote solidity within themselves.

Motivate and inspire themselves by creating the potential of producing consistent results.

Energise themselves to overcome change by satisfying basic, often unfulfilled needs.

Communicate to all those whose cooperation may be needed so as to create an environment and group that understands the visions and strategies and accepts their responsibility.

Develop their vision of the future, the distant future, and the strategies for producing the smaller changes needed to achieve the goal, step by step.

Create the potential of producing useful change.

Monitoring results in detail, identifying variation from the plan, then organise themselves to solve these problems.

In short people must take responsibility to organise themselves, whereby they can plan within the allocated resources. Generate stability within their own role by establishing direction to motivate themselves to change what they are capable and willing to change to resolve issues to take complete control. Do you not owe it to yourself to take control of your own career and live to reduce your stress levels? It is not enough for important tasks and skills to be learned, it is critical that they become automatic and continuous.

If there are any issues or areas that you specifically want Greg to deal with you can contact him at greg@Q1etc.com .  He can also be contacted directly on 01 678 7852.