Chapter 11

1. Chapter 11 Managing Stress and Employee Job Satisfaction

2. General Adaptation Syndrome • “Fight or flight” response is based on classifications made by Dr. Hans Selye regarding a person’s response to stress • Involves three stages: • Alarm Stage • Resistance Stage • Exhaustion

3. Three Stages • Alarm Stage: muscles tense, respiration rate increases, blood pressure and heart rate increase • Resisting Stage: causes poor decision making and physical illness

4. Three Stages (cont.) • Exhaustion: when a person cannot sustain resistance indefinitely, and may cause illnesses such as ulcers or headaches

5. General Adaptation Syndrome (cont.) • The General Adaptation Syndrome viewpoint suggests that people can only take so much stress before a serious, debilitating condition results

6. Benefits of Stress • To maximize performance, low levels of stress are preferable to stimulate individuals to work harder and accomplish more • Eustress: term for “good” stress, level of stress that is productive

7. Causes of Stress • Personal Factors • Interpersonal Factors • Organizational Factors

8. Personal Factors • Type A personalities: impatient, competitive, aggressive, always feel like they’re under pressure, do lots of things at once, and have a hard time relaxing • Type B personalities: more mild-mannered, in less of a hurry, and far less competitive

9. Personal Factors (cont.) • Type A men are twice as prone to heart disease and fatal heart attacks as type B individuals

10. Personal Factors (cont.) • Type A’s are predisposed to be managers, yet their climb through the ranks may be made at the expense of the company because a type A’s job performance in upper level management is not as good as a type B’s

11. Personal Factors (cont.) • It’s very hard for someone who is a type A to change their behavior and adopt a type B style due to the deeply ingrained patterns of behavior

12. Personal Factors (cont.) • Changes in one’s life also produce stress, e.g., death of a spouse, or getting fired • Demographic attributes: Men, whites, and individuals with high income levels report relatively less stress in their lives. • Job attributes of women and minorities may be responsible for higher stress levels

13. Interpersonal Factors • Negative emotion at work: employee jealousy and employee envy • Employee jealousy: thoughts, emotions,and behaviors that result from loss of self-esteem and loss of outcomes associated with a working relationship

14. Interpersonal Factors (cont.) • Employee envy: thoughts, emotions, and behaviors that result from loss of self-esteem in response to another individual obtaining outcomes desired by self • Studies show: • Males have greater workplace envy • Females have greater workplace jealousy

15. Interpersonal Factors (cont.) • Greater jealousy and envy result in lower job satisfaction and intentions to quit • Envy and jealousy are stress inducers because they arise from the perception of threats in the work environment

16. Interpersonal Factors (cont.) • Workplace Romance: Positive personal emotions • Observers of romantic relationships fear favoritism might occur, or charges of sexual harassment may occur when it turns sour • As more women are in workforce and longer work hours occur, the likelihood of workplace romance increases

17. Interpersonal Factors (cont.) • Known to stimulate gossip and potential fear of exploitation

18. Organizational Factors • Responsibility, particularly for other people, is a common organizational cause of stress • Working conditions: • Assembly lines and piece-rate systems are stressful due to employee’s lack of control and pressures to produce

19. Organizational Factors (cont.) • Work that is not intrinsically rewarding also creates stress • Emotional labor: an “occupational mask” donned by employees who must always display a positive demeanor to customers, for example, flight attendants

20. Organizational Factors (cont.) • Role conflict: when two or more sets of demands are made on an employee so that compliance with one set of demands makes it more difficult to comply with another • Role ambiguity: the absence of clarity regarding how to perform one’s job

21. Organizational Factors (cont.) • Role overload: when too many activities are expected of an employee, given the time available and ability level of employee • Shift work: involves 20% of the U.S. workforce, and it causes loss of sleep, appetite, depleted social interaction, etc.

22. Reactions to Stress • Physical problems: • Ivancevich and Matteson have developed a model for estimating the annual costs associated with replacing employees lost to heart disease; it is based on: • Number of employees • Employees in age range of 45 to 65 • Estimated deaths due to heart disease per year, [.6% of total number of employees]

23. Reactions to Stress (cont.) • Estimated premature retirement due to heart disease • Company’s annual personnel losses • Annual replacement costs: cost of hiring and training • Alcoholism and drug abuse: affects between 6 and 10 percent of all employees; both are linked to higher levels of stress

24. Reactions to Stress (cont.) • Absenteeism, turnover, and dissatisfaction are correlated with stress levels • Workplace violence: violence and sabotage may result from stress • Involves fairly petty expressions of aggressive behavior

25. Reactions to Stress (cont.) • Characterized as: covert, verbal, involving brief displays of intense anger • Mass Psychogenic Illness • Five common symptoms: • Headaches • Dizziness • Nausea • Abdominal cramps • Cough

26. Reactions to Stress (cont.) • Burnout: a reaction to prolonged and energy-depleting difficulties • Primary symptom is feeling drained or used up • Typically affects people who are highly conscientious and work in helping professions • Employees may feel that they are not being properly rewarded • Frustrations lead to apathy and feelings of failure, with physical symptoms of high blood pressure, ulcers, mental symptoms such as depression

27. Coping with Stress • Flight or fight • Exercise • Social support • Job redesign • Relaxation techniques

28. Coping with Stress (cont.) • Time management • Time logs • Structuring time • Saying no • Making “to do” lists

29. Job Satisfaction • Refers to one’s thinking, feeling, and action tendencies toward work • Managers realize that an organization’s performance should be measured in human dimensions as well as financial

30. Job Satisfaction (cont.) • Reasons why concern about job is so important to managers: • Moral obligation to make job personally rewarding • Physical and mental well-being correlated with job satisfaction • Affects company’s ability to attract and retain qualified workers

31. Job Satisfaction (cont.) • Low levels of job satisfaction are related to: • Turnover • Absenteeism • Union-organizing activity • Filing of grievances

32. Sources of Job Satisfaction • Variables consistently correlated with job satisfaction include job level, length of service, and race • Intrinsic sources: come from within individual, self-administered, e.g., autonomy, sense of challenge, feelings of recognition

33. Sources of Job Satisfaction (cont.) • Extrinsic sources: come from outside the individual from the external environment, e.g., working conditions, job security, opportunities to interact with co-workers • Dual purpose sources: relate to both intrinsic and extrinsic sources, e.g., high salary, rapid career progress

34. Sources of Job Satisfaction (cont.) • Expectations often influence satisfaction • New employees have particularly high expectations • Job-orientation programs that present a realistic point of view

35. Sources of Job Satisfaction (cont.) • Dispositional Influences • Individuals may be predisposed to feel good or bad about their employment situation, regardless of actual specifics of situation • Negative affectivity: describes the predisposition to feel dissatisfied with one’s job or life

36. Consequences of Job Dissatisfaction • Withdrawal behaviors • Absenteeism • Tardiness • Turnover • Union activity • Hostile Actions

37. Job Satisfaction and Productivity • Most people believe, intuitively, that people who are satisfied with their jobs are more productive • Research does not support the above statement

38. Job Satisfaction and Productivity (cont.) • Factors that influence productivity include: informal work norms, task interdependence, and machine pacing of production process • The extent to which satisfaction and performance are positively correlated indicates the degree to which an organization is “healthy”