The attached article (unfortunately in German) is about stress in the working world and how companies can and should help their employees cope with it. Especially after the suicide of the Swisscom-CEO Casten Schloter, out of stress reasons, this topic came into the centre of attention.
There are programms like the "health index" where employees fill out surveys, giving their employers and insight what workrelated stress they have. There are other attempts to solve the "stress problem". Volkswagen for example does not let any emails through to the Smartphones after working hours in order to prevent stress.
What do you think? Does the more and more interconnected workingworld cause more stress? Should one always answer the emails of a superior immediately, even at night? Also, what do you think can companies do to help people reduce the stress? Should there be a consultant, should every firm do it like Volkswagen, or is there also another approach?
http://www.zeit.de/2013/41/arbeitsplatz-druck-stress-schweiz
Yes, I think our interconnected working world causes more stress than in the past, stress at work is getting common! Especially finding a low-stress job nowadays may be difficult or impossible for many people. A company can help to reduce stress to a certain extent like in the case of Volkswagen, but in the end the crucial point is that the person concerned recognizes its personal limits early enough and starts to work against those factors which may risk health or psyche. Stress management strategies like ‘Make time for fun and relaxation’ or ‘Accept things you can’t change’ do exist in theory, if they are applicable in the end is another question, this depends strongly on the involved person and on the working environment.
AntwortenLöschenBelow you can find a link to another current case which attracted international attention. You might have heard about the one intern who suddenly died due to long working hours. There was quite a big discussion going on in the British media about working conditions at Bank of America or other global players. Have a look!
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/slavery-in-the-city-death-of-21yearold-intern-moritz-erhardt-at-merrill-lynch-sparks-furore-over-long-hours-and-macho-culture-at-banks-8775917.html
Hi Hella,
AntwortenLöschenI think this is a very interesting topic. Nowadays many companies expect their employees to be available anytime, anywhere. This becomes even more important as globalization enables us to do business with people from all over the world, which also includes different time zones. So do employees always need to be available? Is there no excuse for not being online on saturdays, sundays, during the night?
I believe that it is not the right approach for companies to have this policy. Even if 99% of the time employees are not needed during the night or on weekends, only the knowledge that they have to be available and are not allowed to miss something work related will decrease their potential to recharge their batteries tremendously. Having to worry about your blackberry when you are passing saturday afternoon in the nature with your family makes it impossible NOT to think about work and the tasks you need to get done on Monday morning.
In the long run, I am convinced that a 24/7 availability for employees not only decreases their personal wellbeing but will also deteriorate their efficiency at work. Burn out and general sick days will increase. In my opinion companies should respect and value their employees' downtime. It is important not to see this time as a loss for the company but as a time period that is vital for the creativity and effectiveness of every single person.
In order to respond to the growing demands of a globalized world, I think organizations should think about installing a 24/7 hotline where business partners can call for urgent request. The staff answering will be paid regular working time for this, they are not investing their free time for possible request. I believe that this is an investment into the employees physical and psychological health and therefore increasing the employee satisfaction. By increasing this factor, staff turnover will decrease and I believe this will in the end be beneficial for the company. Another advantage is that in case there is an urgent request, it will be answered by a trained person who is actually at work instead of a dad who is actually playing with his kid at the moment, in fact not prepared to answer any work related questions.
Regarding answering the telephone in the night - I have a nice story: I'm not sure whether you heard about the rockfall on the Felbertauern tunnel (connecting Lienz/Tirol with Mittersill/Salzburg) earlier this year. So huge falling rocks would destroy the whole tunnel (I added a link with a Picture below) in the middle of the night. Street authorities recognized the damage still during that very night and called immediately 3 major construction companies (it was about 2 or 3 in the morning). One would answer the phone and snatched the million euro deal. In this case, answering the phone during the night truely payed off. In other cases, superiors shouldn't go as far as to demand their subordinates during the night.
AntwortenLöschenhttps://www.google.at/search?q=felbertauern+tunnel&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ei=UOVnUsygLcbOtAaqrYHACw&sqi=2&ved=0CAcQ_AUoAQ&biw=1366&bih=768#facrc=_&imgrc=JD7mxtwn7OfzOM%3A%3BfBYXacYwc-LfrM%3Bhttp%253A%252F%252Fimages.derstandard.at%252F2013%252F05%252F15%252F1363910917654-felbertauern.jpg%3Bhttp%253A%252F%252Fderstandard.at%252F1363711056291%252FFelssturz-auf-Felbertauernstrasse-Offenbar-keine-Verschuetteten%3B850%3B638)
Hi there, very interesting thread and again, sorry for commenting that late! Anyway, here some of my thoughts: First of all, I agree with above saying that at the end it is our responsibility to say stop at the right time, like to simply switch off the smart device, or even quit the job, etc. I also think it is the responsibility od the individual to find means to cope with stress, e.g. exercise, etc. At the end of the day stress is different for everyone so there is no general solution! I also do not believe a CEO committing suicide due to stress factors, suicide usually involves other mental health aspects such as depressions, Now I do understand that for the media it is much more flashy to relate it to work stress, than to admit (also to his family) that he has developed depression.
AntwortenLöschenI do believe most of the stress usually comes from situations where we are made responsible for something but do not have authority to change anything (that does happen in many organizations), now whe that is the case we are really in trouble ;) and should think very hard about consequences, since exercise on the long run ain't be sufficient!