The Economic Crisis and Occupational Stress


Book Description

øThe global economic crisis of 2008 caused the collapse of the world�s financial institutions, large-scale unemployment, the devaluing of housing stocks leading to mortgage defaults and left many countries in debt, unable to meet their financial obliga




The Role of the Economic Crisis on Occupational Stress and Well Being


Book Description

Workers experience an increasingly uncertain future and many have been forced to search for jobs in a highly competitive market. In this volume, we call upon the field's leading researchers to examine how economic conditions relate to occupational stress and well being.




The Economic Crisis and Occupational Stress


Book Description

Stress studies are becoming more and more attention nowadays, the financial crisis and recession of 2008 around the world further contributed in increasing higher levels of stress among employees, particularly in the corporate context. Occupational stress is increasing due to globalisation and global economic crisis which is affecting almost all countries, all professions and all categories of workers, as well as families and societies. This Book, The Economic Crisis and Occupational Stress, is focused on showing the economic crisis impact on the behaviour of employees such as absenteeism and the missing hours from the schedule. Moreover, overload work as effect of the employee's fear of being fired led to a worrying change in their physical and psychological health and to a reduced work satisfaction. Stress in an organisation is very common in present day industries. In many job situations, high levels of stress are an integral and largely unavoidable component of the work. The need to cope with complexity, ambiguity, conflict and competing demands is a part of organisational life among individuals occupying different positions. Organisations are often unnecessarily stressful and have a negative impact on individuals physical and mental health. The organisations, to make themselves efficient in utilization of resources, have gone through entire restructuring, layoffs, downsizing, and mergers. This has resulted in unstable employee-employer relationship which has caused a great deal of stress among employees. There is no such thing as a stress-free job in the world. Many organisations want to reduce and prevent the employee stress because they observe that it is a major drain on corporate productivity. Nobody is free from stress and it is not harmful always. In small quantities, stress is good; it can motivate us and help us to become more productive, but too much stress or a strong response to stress can be harmful. In this book all experiences of jobs are discussed which affects human minds and bodies. The book also discusses the risk management at workplace, prevention of stress and instructions to stress management. A perceptive and exhaustive account of how the economic crisis has outspread globally is presented and the reflective psychological impact that this recession has had on the workplace examined. This book will be of important for students and researchers in the social sciences, organisational and social psychologists and practitioners of occupational health.




Research in Occupational Stress and Well being


Book Description

Focuses on processes related to recovery and unwinding from job stress. This book demonstrates that recovery research is a very promising approach for understanding the processes of job stress and relieve from job stress more fully.




From Organizational Welfare to Business Success: Higher Performance in Healthy Organizational Environments


Book Description

This e-book provides insight into the link between employee health and productivity/performance, with a focus on how individuals, groups, or organizations can intervene in this relationship to improve both well-being and performance-related outcomes. Given the continuous changes that organizations and employees face, such as the aging workforce and continued economic turbulence, it is not surprising that studies are increasingly finding that employee health is related to job conditions. The papers in this e-book emphasize that organizations make a critical difference when it comes to employees' health and well-being. In turn, healthy employees help their organizations to flourish. Such findings are in line with the recent emphasis by both the International Labour Organization (ILO) and the United Nations (UN) on the importance of work for individual well-being and the importance of individual well-being for productive and sustainable economic growth (see e.g., ILO, 1985; World Health Organisation, 2007; UN, 2015). Overall, the papers report findings from a cumulative sample of nearly 19,000 workers and perspectives from 68 authors. They suggest that performance cannot be successfully achieved at the cost of health and well-being, and provide various perspectives and tools to guide future research and practice.







Examining the Paradox of Occupational Stressors


Book Description

Examining the Paradox of Occupational Stressors: Building Resilience or Creating Depletion represents insightful, intriguing, and timely research into the paradox of experienced stress in the workplace.




Emerging and Re-Emerging Organizational Features, Work Transitions and Occupational Risk Factors: The Good, the Bad, the Right. An Interdisciplinary Perspective


Book Description

The labor market is evolving very rapidly in recent years, in Europe and worldwide. The fast and deep changes brought a brand-new context of challenges and occupational risks to the attention of stakeholders. The current global financial crisis has increased the economic pressures on companies and they in turn have intensified the effects on employees, particularly in terms of new competition contexts and a lot of stress and mental health issues. Concurrently, social, political, and environmental problems generate under-employment, over-qualification, over-education, low wages for skilled workers, and unmet demand for education. Consequently, both high skilled and low skilled immigrant workers are increasing. In addition, workplaces are continually changing in step with the introduction of new technologies, materials, and work processes, together with the changes in the labor market, the new forms of employment, and the new work organizations. These changes lead to new opportunities for employees and employers – but also to new risks or re-actualization of old organizational risks. According to the EU-OSHA, the key points that describe the evolution that is currently ongoing in the world of work are globalization, the technical innovation, and the aging population. On one hand, some older potential risks are reappearing in organizations: intensive fear and worries, organizational anxiety, boredom, physical violence, alienation, segregation, loneliness, and isolation. On the other hand, re-emerging perceived organizational features seem vital for organizations and more important today than ever. Central constructs in the study of organizational behavior and organizational health such as perceived organizational support, commitment in organizational context, socialization processes, change capacity of organizations, perceived organizational justice, ergonomics, and motivation, nowadays seem increasingly important and renewed.




Organizational Stress Around the World


Book Description

Stress is defined as a feeling experienced when a person perceives that demands exceed the personal and social resources the individual is able to mobilize. It can occur due to environmental issues, such as a looming work deadline, or psychological, for example, persistent worry about familial problems. While the acute response to life-threatening circumstances can be life-saving, research reveals that the body’s stress response is largely similar when it reacts to less threatening but chronically present stressors such as work overload, deadline pressures and family conflicts. It is proffered that chronic activation of stress response in the body can lead to several pathological changes such as elevated blood pressure, clogging of blood vessels, anxiety, depression, and addiction. Organizational Stress Around the World: Research and Practice aims to present a sound theoretical and empirical basis for understanding the evolving and changing nature of stress in contemporary organizations. It presents research that expands theory and practice by addressing real-world issues, across cultures and by providing multiple perspectives on organizational stress and research relevant to different occupational settings and cultures. Personal, occupational, organizational, and societal issues relevant to stress identification along with management techniques/approach to confront stress and its associated problems at individual and organizational level are also explored. It will be of value to researchers, academics, practitioners, and students interested in stress management research.




Managing People in Small and Medium Enterprises in Turbulent Contexts


Book Description

Managing People in Small and Medium Enterprises in Turbulent Contexts explores a range of human resource management (HRM) issues specific to small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). Based on a series of research studies and secondary sources of data, the book’s primary aim is to contextualise HRM issues in SMEs operating in a variety of national economic contexts that are (or have recently experienced) a turbulent situation. SMEs are the backbone of these economies. It is therefore critical that we study HR practices and concepts within such enterprises. The book covers HR practices in SMEs, such as recruitment and selection, training and development, performance evaluation and employee relations, by focusing on three types of turbulent economies: emerging market economies in Asia, the Pacific, Africa and Latin America; transition economies of Central and Eastern Europe; and crisis contexts in Southern Europe. Managing People in Small and Medium Enterprises in Turbulent Contexts is a useful resource for organisations, practitioners, academics and scholars in the fields of HRM, employee engagement, small and medium business management and other related disciplines.