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OCCUPATIONAL STRESS – ITS CAUSES AND CONSEQUENCES FOR EMPLOYEES

Anna Gembalska-Kwiecien, E. Milewska

Abstract

The issue of stress is ever spreading far and wide, affecting representatives of various professions at all levels of an organization. There is no doubt that this phenomenon will not be without consequences on the life of every human being. Stress may not be treated exclusively as an individual problem for every human being. It also affects an organization, exposing it to costs associated with reduced productivity and motivation, and in particular with greater occurrence of mistakes and accidents. This is another ar-gument appealing to the fact that this issue cannot be underestimated if work safety has to be assured. When analyzing this topic, empirical studies were carried out in a selected industrial enterprise, which accounted for the larger part of research on stress at work. The research was conducted in form of questionnaire surveys, in which two question-naires were used, one evaluating the working conditions as perceived by the surveyed employees, and another one that helped to determine the real conditions prevailing at a particular workstation. Both questionnaires included questions on physical working conditions as well as the psychosocial environment. Based on the obtained data on objective stress, descriptions providing information on the basic positives and negatives taking place in the surveyed workplace were made. As the results of empirical research showed, the possibility of occurrence of health risks due to working under harmful conditions resulting from the parameters of production process and as a consequence of mistake made by the employee constitutes a serious problem. Also, the quality of physical working conditions in the opinion of the surveyed employees is not among the best, e.g. noise (though it does not exceed the limit values) that often accompanies employees in high levels for long working hours, as well as temperature that is not adequately adjusted to the prevailing weather conditions. In addition, frequent controls that, though necessary, may seem depressing to employees constitute another stressful parameter in the enterprise. However, in most cases, what should be emphasized is that the supervisors do not interfere in the manner in which the work is performed, thus contributing to increased satisfaction and sense of value among its subordinates. To counteract the phenomenon of monotony, the tasks in the surveyed enterprise are organized in such a way as to, in much as possible, minimize or eliminate repetitive activities. The above-mentioned work parameters translate into the stress level to which employees are burdened. The obtained results of the empirical research should contribute to better stress management, and also improve the effectiveness of the preventive measures aimed at counteracting the issue of stress in the workplace.

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