Keeping your job can be just as stressful as losing your job it seems. Personnel Today reported in March that employees increasingly seek help for anxiety, depression, stress and addiction-related issues. The Priory, the UK’s most famous rehab centre, has witnessed a 20% increase in inquiries over the last six months, while Capio Nightingale Hospital, London’s only independent mental-health hospital, has seen a 200% rise in treatment inquiries between July and September 2008. A survey by Coventry University and the Work Life Balance Centre found stress was rife among workers nationwide, with 62% of employees feeling their workload has increased in the past year, and almost one-third feeling ‘out of control’ in their jobs. This led to a rise in absenteeism in the past year, with 58% of the days lost being attributed to stress-related factors.
Last night I was infected with a computer virus. I just couldn’t stop surfing the net, writing blogs, sending e-mails. Until I really felt ill. Useful as they are, computers are also the biggest time-wasters, at least as far as I am concerned. So I’ve decided to set an alarm whenever I use the computer. Time’s up!
By the way: The word “computeritis” made it into the Oxford English Dictionary about a year ago: “the excessive use of computers; the fact of being detrimentally influenced by computers. Also: illness or disability attributed to the use of computers, esp. carpal tunnel syndrome.
A report in the FSB Business Network Magazine has drawn my attention to the huge number of people running their own business from home. There is also an increasing number of people in employment working partly or entirely from home. Working from home might seem like an easy option but can be extremely stressful in reality as you try to balance the demands of work, life and family.
- Mange your Time: It is essential to allocate blocks of time to work only. Pretend that you are actually at work somewhere else and don’t get distracted by chores like cleaning or shopping, private phone calls or a neighbour popping in for a chat. Identify and limit time-eaters like replying to private e-mails and internet browsing.
- Manage your Environment: Make sure you have a private space dedicated to work only. Keep it clutter-free. Make sure you are undisturbed during your working hours. Observe health and safety requirements.
- Manage your Finances: Take a professional attitude and make sure you have a business plan and control over your finances. Meet tax requirements and deadlines.
- Look after your Health: Establish a routine that includes regular and wholesome meals, breaks, exercise, and sufficient sleep. Don’t drink alcohol during working hours. Don’t indulge in coffee, tea, biscuits or fast food.
- Keep in Touch with Colleagues, Friends and Family: This is essential to avoid social isolation, and to maintain your mental and emotional well-being.
- Value Yourself: Now that you are your own boss, be a good boss: Acknowledge your hard work. Praise yourself for your achievements. Reward yourself.
- Get help: If you can afford it, invest in a cleaner, childminder, virtual assistant, accountant … it is worth it.
- Let go of Perfectionism: When there are not enough hours in a day, you’ve got to focus on the main priorities and learn to let go of less important tasks.
- Relax: Imagine doing nothing for 20 minutes each day. Not even watching TV, reading or listening to music. Make time for time, lie down comfortably, close your eyes and let your mind drift off somewhere nice.
Speaking in public surely is a stressful event for most people. On the BBC The Speaker website http://www.bbc.co.uk/speaker I came across a quote by Winston Churchill that makes the same point: The three hardest things to do are to climb a wall that is leaning towards you, to kiss a girl that is leaning away from you, and to speak in public. There is plenty of advice on how to improve your speaking and presenting skills on the internet and in print, but I think the most important thing is to be yourself. If you try to be somebody else it never works. Also, don’t try to make people like you as this will leave you self-conscious and vulnerable, instead focus on making people understand your message.
A lot of stress is is a result of putting ourselves down, not appreciating ourselves, not valuing ourselves.
It’s about time to change this:
The time will come
when, with elation,
you will greet yourself arriving
at your own door, in your own mirror,
and each will smile at the other’s welcome,
and say, sit here. Eat.
You will love again the stranger who was your self.
Give wine. Give bread. Give back your heart
to itself, to the stranger who has loved you
all your life, whom you ignored
for another, who knows you by heart.
Take down the love letters from the bookshelf,
the photographs, the desperate notes,
peel your own image from the mirror.
Sit. Feast on your life.
“Love after Love” by Derek Walcott
I received a newsletter from the British Psycholgical Society yesterday with an interesting item about our ability (or rather disability) to predict how we will feel in future situations (what we dread usually doesn’t leave us feeling so bad after all, and events we really look forward to often leave us cold). Researchers have shown that our predictive powers can be improved in a rather simple way: by finding out how one of our friends or relatives found the same experience. The trouble is we seem to have a mental block about this, believing that our own best guess will be more insightful than information on how another person found the experience.
What does this mean for stress management? When you feel anxious (stressed) about some event in the future, go and chat to a friend who has been through a similar experience. If you don’t know anybody,books, newspaper articles and internet posts may provide a helpful alternative.
If you sometimes wonder where your time is going, I can highly recommend keeping a time log for a week. I’ve done it recently, and it was a real eye opener. First of all, it made me think about what I am doing and why. You could call it an exercisee in mindfulness. I discovered that I have the tendency to hop from one activity to the next but when you keep a time log you can’t do this because you would have to run to your notebook and it would be rather tediious writing down 2 or 3 minute activities. It made me ask myself : Is it worth starting the activity? It also made me break down my various tasks and chores into bigger chunks so it enabled me to concentrate on one activity at a time and for a decent period of time. In addition, I quickly discovered the “time eaters”, activities such as e-mailing and using the internet, which can go on for ever unless you keep them at bay. As a result, I decided to allocate an hour to these activities, set an alarm, and finish when it goes off, no matter what. Last but not least, I realized that some activities use up much more time than I thought, little activities like tidying up the kitchen after breakfast or getting ready for appointments. Now I am able to allocate more time for these activities, allowing me to feel more in control and less in a rush.
How to keep a time log? It’s easy. Get a notebook and a pencil. Each time you start a new activity you write down the time (e.g. 7.00 getting up, 7.05 shower, 7.15 breakfast). After a week you may like to group certain activities together (e.g. getting ready in the morning). Do this for a week.
I went to the Health and Wellbeing at Work Conference http://www.healthatwork2009.co.uk in Birmingham this week. When walking from the train station to the NEC I noticed that I was the only person using the stairs. Surely, professionals in the health sector have heard of the benefits of walking? Especiall at the start of a day that involves a lot of sitting around in conference rooms. Later that day there was even a talk on promoting walking in the workplace. I wonder how many delegates used the stairs when walking back to the station.
With the headlines dominated today by the death of Ivan Cameron, I would like to point out two charities that might be useful for anybody going through a similar trauma:
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The Health and Safety Executive is launching today an update of their stress website www.hse.gov.uk/stress.
I’ve had a look, and I particularly liked the new sections for people involved in managing stress like HR, H&S, OH, and workers. It also has case studies and a new “Line Manager Competency Tool”, which is a self-test for line mangers to help them tackle stress issues within their team.
