Page 29 - Council Journal Autumn 2019

FEATURE Stress is Contagious Stress is Contagious, So is Calm
Stress doesn’t feel good to have, nor does it feel good to be around. Eighty percent of regular workers say they feel stress during their day. In many companies, stress feels baked into the work culture, everyone know about it and acknolwedges it most of us don’t know how to counteract it.
Like any contagion, stress spreads. We literally catch the stress of others. Simply watching someone else tense
While the damage that stress causes us individually is accepted, few consider the negative impact of their stress on others. This is amplified, especially if you’re a manager. In fact, a leader’s stress is felt acutely as it can impact the emotion of an entire team.
When people talk about what stresses them, they tend to describe generalities like “my job” or “unrealistic deadlines” or “the new boss.” We don’t typically dive deeply into the triggers, because we’d rather not go there. However, we can’t solve what we don’t truly understand.
up can trigger the release of the stress hormone cortisol in us. Common situations for most employees include:
Know what stresses you
• When another colleague gets stressed, they try to avoid them
• They read stress on the faces of
People avoid stressed-out colleagues for their own protection. If people don’t want to be around you, if they don’t find you collaborative or rewarding to work with, you will be far less effective. After all, who wouldn’t prefer to collaborate with people who seem sturdy and resilient? Let’s have a look at some practical steps you can to identify and deal with stress.
Try this: keep a stress journal for one month. At the end of each day, jot down when you felt stressed, including details about the specific situation and what was happening at the time. Reflect on these questions: What conditions caused me to feel stressed today? What about the situation felt important at the time?
others and use this as an excuse
to avoid them
• When one manager gets wound
up with stress, it has the same
effect on those around them. • They are concerned about the
health of colleagues due to stress.
Council Journal 29