Anxiety and stress at work is very common. Research conducted by the Health and Safety Executive in 2019 discovered that 602 million people encountered illness due to anxiety and work-related stress. Having a little stress is normal, as it encourages you to perform well in your career, business, or personal life. However, having frequent stress or getting anxious frequently is harmful to you, as it influences your work productivity. Being too anxious makes it hard to do what you usually did.
What is the right stress level?
Stress or anxiety at a lower level is beneficial for you. It is hard to mention what amount/quantity of anxiety you should have. However, it is good until it starts hampering your daily activities and making you feel overwhelmed.
Common causes of workplace anxiety or stress
A lot of things at your business premises or workplace cause you get stressed. They can be meeting tight deadlines, performing well, no job satisfaction, lack of healthy atmosphere, managing staff, heavy workload, constant work, and lack of work organization. Further, they can include public speaking, meeting participation, job insecurity, no clarity on a job role, and a lack of organizational support.
What are the symptoms of work anxiety or stress?
Your work stress signs are visible through your physical, emotional, and behavioural responses. You have headaches, fatigue, high blood pressure, stomach problems, low libido, irritation, frustration, anxiousness, excessive drinking, and social withdrawal when you have work-related stress.
How to avoid work stress and improve your productivity
When it comes to how to avoid anxiety or stress at work, you have to work on all aspects, physical, psychological, social, and behavioural. Here are some practical tips for your help:
- Act instead of reaction
You should avoid reacting to a stressful situation. Instead of reacting to a condition at your work, you should act. You feel more stressed when you think that the situation is beyond your control. Here, you should work on how to have control over such a situation.
- Find out what you trigger
Everyone has a trigger point at which they are anxious or they get annoyed. You need to identify what makes you feel depressed. Suppose that being late in the office triggers your stress level. You should find out ways, like coming out from home a little earlier, to combat your triggers.
- Avoid distractions
In today’s world, people have interruptions from a lot of things. Some of you get disruptions from a lot of incoming calls while some of you have interruptions from talkative colleagues. You have to reduce your distractions to get rid of your stress and enhance your productivity.
- Have positive relation with colleagues
There is politics at almost every workplace. As a career-oriented person, you should avoid participating in office politics. In the work area, you should talk to your colleagues when you need their support or they need your help. Talk to them personally at lunch time or off working hours. With this, you have a healthy and positive relationship with your co-workers.
- Organize your work
Typically, most of you are stressed by seeing or knowing that you have to carry out a lot of work today. You are anxious, as you see the work as a whole. You can feel relaxed by diving that work in small parts and complete the same by doing one-by-one.
- Reward yourself
You need confidence to do better, and such confidence comes from appreciation or rewards. Start rewarding yourself after accomplishing a milestone. While rewarding, you can use personalized stickers with motivational quotes. To motivate yourself, have a look at these quotes when you feel low.
- Have faith in your job
No one has satisfaction from his/her work, as getting satisfied works as a barrier in the career growth. However, you should have faith in your work. Try to keep learning new techniques or skills in accomplishing your work. Your learning can take you to a new height in your job.
- Eat right and have a sound sleep
Eating unhealthy food items upset your stomach, and as a result, you are stressed due to your digestive issues. Having a poor sleep at night makes you feel sleepy during the day. This sleepiness hampers your work. To avoid work anxiety and perform well, you should eat easy to digest foods and have a sound sleep at night.
- Take short breaks
You are a human being, but not a machine. Avoid working as a machine or a computer. Take short breaks during your work, apart from your lunch hours and tea breaks. If possible, follow a 20-20 formula. Here, it means you should take a short break after every 20-minute.
Conclusion
You can add more ways to manage your work stress or anxiety. The best way to deal with it is to be aware of the root causes and avoid overreaction to a situation. As an employee, you should talk to your seniors about particular things and get their advice on how to manage the same while managing your work anxiety and improving your workflow.
