Ten Ways to Reduce Stress at Work
Ten Ways to Reduce Stress at Work
1. De-clutter – Nothing is more draining than having an office that is cluttered. Find a way to organize your office. Just looking at your stuff all over the place is draining! Cleaning up is only a partial solution. It will come back. Find a system to put things away at the end of the day or each time you finish with it. Make it a habit.
2. Reframe – It is all in how you look at something. Language and attitude make the difference. Are you looking at something that is a problem that could be reframed into something positive? Example: You’ve been selected to work with a client who is known to be difficult. You can choose to be pleased or annoyed that you were selected. Like a politician put a positive spin on it!
3. Address beliefs – Pressure comes from within. Do you worry about an outcome of something you have done over which you have no control? When the work is completed and has left your desk do you worry that something negative will happen to it? Perhaps you have the belief that you must be perfect – no mistakes. Does anyone have that kind of a perfect record? Perry Mason maybe! Think about how many times you do the work without problems. Focus on that.
4. Under promise and Over deliver – Be sure to make promises you can deliver on. Deadlines are stressful when you know you may not meet them. Give a delivery date that you know you can meet and surprise the client by getting it done early. If you please the client initially by promising an early delivery then you will either have to stay late to get the work done or disappoint the client by delivering the work late..
5. Delegate properly – If you continue to do everything yourself you will be overwhelmed and stressed. Delegate tasks that are repetitious but don’t require your expertise to complete. Off load anything that doesn’t use your strengths. Leave breathing room in your day!
6. Strategic scheduling – Each day you choose what to work on. Plan your work so that you don’t have to rush to get work done. Your schedule dictates priorities. Be clear about your choices. Use this schedule to guard against over promising.
7. Power hour – Establish a period of time (one, two or three hours) when you work behind closed doors. Give instructions that you are to have no interruptions. Get your work done on time and without angst. Most people are less effective when they are interrupted constantly to answer questions from others, talk on the phone or answer email.
8. Systems support – Establish processes and ways of working that give structure to your day. Sometimes stress is caused by worrying about what has fallen through the cracks. Having established procedures to log in the work, schedule the work and then delivery of the work helps you to know what to do and when to do it. You are able to deliver your best work easily when you have systems inplace like an up to date calendar, easily accessible ways to clock your time, and clear and detailed work flows.
9. Quiet Time – Give yourself some private time to meditate, go for a walk or just day dream. Take a break from your work for 10 or 15 minutes to refresh yourself and reenergize.
10. Maintain a healthy lifestyle – Eating nutritious meals, exercising regularly and getting enough sleep (usually 7 or 8 hours a night) will keep you refreshed and ready to meet the day to day challenges of your work.
Ten Ways to Reduce Stress at Work - To learn more about this author, visit Alvah Parker's Website.
Like this article? Share it with your friends
Stress free living is probably impossible. It is wise however to manage the stress so that we can work more effectively. Need help reducing stress? Hire a coach! A coach can help you to identify the stressors in your life and then will help you select the appropriate solution. It takes practice and persistence to put these into action. It’s easy to slip back to old ways. Accountability is something a coach provides too.
1. De-clutter – Nothing is more draining than having an office that is cluttered. Find a way to organize your office. Just looking at your stuff all over the place is draining! Cleaning up is only a partial solution. It will come back. Find a system to put things away at the end of the day or each time you finish with it. Make it a habit.
2. Reframe – It is all in how you look at something. Language and attitude make the difference. Are you looking at something that is a problem that could be reframed into something positive? Example: You’ve been selected to work with a client who is known to be difficult. You can choose to be pleased or annoyed that you were selected. Like a politician put a positive spin on it!
3. Address beliefs – Pressure comes from within. Do you worry about an outcome of something you have done over which you have no control? When the work is completed and has left your desk do you worry that something negative will happen to it? Perhaps you have the belief that you must be perfect – no mistakes. Does anyone have that kind of a perfect record? Perry Mason maybe! Think about how many times you do the work without problems. Focus on that.
4. Under promise and Over deliver – Be sure to make promises you can deliver on. Deadlines are stressful when you know you may not meet them. Give a delivery date that you know you can meet and surprise the client by getting it done early. If you please the client initially by promising an early delivery then you will either have to stay late to get the work done or disappoint the client by delivering the work late..
5. Delegate properly – If you continue to do everything yourself you will be overwhelmed and stressed. Delegate tasks that are repetitious but don’t require your expertise to complete. Off load anything that doesn’t use your strengths. Leave breathing room in your day!
6. Strategic scheduling – Each day you choose what to work on. Plan your work so that you don’t have to rush to get work done. Your schedule dictates priorities. Be clear about your choices. Use this schedule to guard against over promising.
7. Power hour – Establish a period of time (one, two or three hours) when you work behind closed doors. Give instructions that you are to have no interruptions. Get your work done on time and without angst. Most people are less effective when they are interrupted constantly to answer questions from others, talk on the phone or answer email.
8. Systems support – Establish processes and ways of working that give structure to your day. Sometimes stress is caused by worrying about what has fallen through the cracks. Having established procedures to log in the work, schedule the work and then delivery of the work helps you to know what to do and when to do it. You are able to deliver your best work easily when you have systems inplace like an up to date calendar, easily accessible ways to clock your time, and clear and detailed work flows.
9. Quiet Time – Give yourself some private time to meditate, go for a walk or just day dream. Take a break from your work for 10 or 15 minutes to refresh yourself and reenergize.
10. Maintain a healthy lifestyle – Eating nutritious meals, exercising regularly and getting enough sleep (usually 7 or 8 hours a night) will keep you refreshed and ready to meet the day to day challenges of your work.
Ten Ways to Reduce Stress at Work - To learn more about this author, visit Alvah Parker's Website.
Like this article? Share it with your friends
 | |
 |
Very relevant articles. Informative!
Commented on Ten Ways to Reduce Stress at Work. |
| |
Leave Your Feedback |
 | |
| |||
Dave KurlanDave Kurlan is the founder and CEO of Objective Management Group, Inc., the industry leader in sales assessments and sales force evaluations, and the CEO of David Kurlan & Associates, Inc., a consulting firm specializing in sales force development. Dave has been a top rated speaker at Inc. Magazine's Conference on Growing the Company, the Sales & Marketing Management Conference and the Gazelles Sales & Marketing Summit. He has been featured on radio and TV, including World Business Review with General Norman Schwarzkopf, in Inc. Magazine, Selling Power Magazine, Sales & Marketing Management Magazine and Incentive Magazine. He is the author of Mindless Selling and Baseline Selling – How to Become a Sales Superstar by Using What You Already Know about the Game of Baseball. He created and wrote STAR, a proprietary recruiting process for hiring great salespeople, and he writes Understanding the Sales Force, a popular business Blog and is a contributing author to The Death of 20th Century Selling and 101 Great Ways to Improve Your Life, Volume 2. - Visit Dave Kurlan's Website |
|||
Joe DagerJoe Dager is President of Business901, a progressive coaching company providing no-nonsense direction in areas such as Lean Six Sigma Marketing and organized referral marketing. What others say: In the past 20 years, Joe and I have collaborated on many difficult issues. Joe’s ability to combine his expertise with “out of the box” thinking is unsurpassed. He has always delivered quickly, cost effectively and with ingenuity. A brilliant mind that is always a pleasure to work with.” - James R. If you want to learn more about Business901, start a conversation with us. We can be found @ Web/Blog: Business901.com Web/Blog: FundingYourNonprofit.com LinkedIn Profile Follow me on Twitter - Visit Joe Dager's Website |
|||
Stephanie RobeyStephanie Robey is President and CoFounder of Pivot Positive, LLC - an Internet marketing business focused on helping people start work at home ventures. Previously, she was employed at The Search Agency with over 20 years experience in graphic design and 10 years experience in online marketing. She was responsible for launching the Conversion Path Optimization (CPO) unit where she and her team have conducted hundreds of optimization tests for online companies across multiple verticals. She is a successful entrepreneur having started and sold 2 companies and remains on the board of directors of the third, PhotoSpin.com Stephanie began her career in the direct marketing realm creating and producing direct mail for many of the major cable television companies and directly attributes her understanding of Internet marketing to those early offline experiences. Stephanie is a graduate of San Diego State University with a BFA in Graphic Arts and also holds an Executive MBA from the Graziadio School of Business and Management at Pepperdine University. Read Steph's Blog Meet Steph and Dave Sign up for our Free 7-Day BootCamp: Self Employed & Rich - Visit Stephanie Robey's Website |
|||
|
To learn more about the Evan Elite Author Program please contact us. | |||
 | |
|  |
Subscribe to Alvah's articles
 | |
|
|  |
 | |
|
| |
 | |||||||
|
 | ||
|
||
 |
||
 |
||
|
| ||
 |
| Have you written articles that would be of value to entrepreneurs? Become an expert on our site by publishing them! Expose yourself to a wide audience, drive more traffic to your website and get more sales! Click Here for details. |
|
|
 |
| Modeling the Masters: Learn the true secrets behind Walt Disney's business success factors & grow your company! Video produced by Phanta Media |
|
|
 |
"Learn straight from Evan how you can Make a Full Time Income (And More) from a Website"
Click Here To Learn More |
|
|
|
|
Get advice & tips from famous business owners, new articles by entrepreneur experts, my latest website updates, & special sneak peaks at what's to come!
|
|
|
 Find & Keep Profitable Clients 9 Questions From New Marketers Workplace Violence Selling Shovels Take the Lead |
|
 | ||
 |
The Top 10 Guy Kawasaki Posts
Best Posts for Entrepreneurs | |
 |
Top 50 Marketing Blogs
Top Blogs To Watch In 2008 | |
| ||
 | ||||
| ||||
|
| ||||
| ||||
|
|
|
|
|
||||||||||||
|
Email us your ideas on how to make our website more valuable! Thank you Sharon from Toronto Salsa Lessons / Classes for your suggestions to make the newsletter look like the website and profile younger entrepreneurs like Jennifer Lopez and Sean Combs!
|
|
|
| ||||||||||||
| ||||||||||||
|
|
||||||||||||