Is Work Killing You?

David Posen MD, Dr. David Posen

• Publisher: House of Anansi Press
• Year: 2013
• eBook ISBN: 9781770892767
• Topic: Personal Development
• Subtopic: Mental Health & Wellbeing

From the bestselling author of Authenticity and The Little Book of Stress Relief comes the definitive guide to treating — and eliminating — excessive stress in the workplace.

Dr. David Posen, a popular speaker and a leading expert on stress mastery, identifies the three biggest problems that contribute to burnout and low productivity: Volume, Velocity, and Abuse. He shares revealing anecdotes and offers clear descriptions of the biology of stress to illustrate how downsizing, economic uncertainty, and technology have made the workplace more toxic than ever. Most importantly, he offers practical advice and easy techniques for managing the harmful symptoms and side effects of stress.

Witty, engaging, and accessible, Is Work Killing You? touches on everything from meetings to tweeting, from fake work to face time, from deadlines to dead tired, and more. With this book, Dr. Posen gives us the tools to stop harming our most valuable resource — ourselves.

Section 1

Volume:

The Factors That Contribute to Overload and What can be done about it

The sheer volume of work, meetings, emails, and other electronic messages — not to mention voice mail, which is still with us — has employees reeling. In this section of the book, I’ll be looking more closely at workload, including the lunacy of long hours, the fallacy of face time, unnecessary or “fake” work, downsizing, and how income disparity is contributing to the volume problem and therefore to workplace stress. Some of the information in this section will be helpful to individual workers, including supervisors, managers, and executives. But much of it will pertain to the system as a whole: what companies and organizations need to do to fix the problems. The chapters that follow will identify certain workplace stressors, but will also offer strategies and suggested remedies. I’m convinced that there is much that can be done to address these issues, especially if employees and management work together to find solutions.

CHAPTER 1

WHAT TIPS US OVER:
THE CAUSES OF OVERLOAD

Malcolm Gladwell introduced the concept of “The Tipping Point” in his brilliant 2000 book. He was referencing societal phenomena like fads, trends, and product popularity, but it’s a useful metaphor for the stress people can withstand before that undefined moment when the pressure exceeds their tolerance and they become exhausted, collapse, or snap. It’s the proverbial straw that breaks the camel’s back. No matter how strong or capable people are, they all have a tipping point. Put ten people in a sauna and eventually they’ll all have to get out, some sooner than others. One of the most short-sighted — and frankly foolish — things an organization can do is to take competent, conscientious, committed, and caring employees and push them past their tipping point. It’s not only unkind and unhealthy for the employee, but it’s a stunning waste of talent and potential.

My definition of overload is when there’s too much to do and not enough time to do it. It’s become an epidemic in most workplaces. I created a diagram for my work-life balance seminars to illustrate the factors contributing to overload. When folks complain about having too much to do, I always ask, “Where is the pressure coming from?” I think of it as a pile of building blocks, each contributing to the pressure to do more. I call this diagram “What Tips Us Over?”

My intent is to show people how to improve their work-life balance by taking control of the things that they can control, i.e., that are within their sphere of control.

The bottom block is External Demands, the things people are asked or told to do and the standard of excellence expected from them.

Next up is Deadlines, which definitely add to the pressure, especially if they are tight and unrealistic.

Next is Peer Pressure and Corporate Culture. In his excellent book, Values Shift, John Izzo reported on a British study showing that 48 percent of people felt guilty when they left work on time. Every organization has a culture, which is loosely defined as “the way we do things around here.” Some are workaholic, macho, high-pressure places, and others are laid-back, informal, and relaxed. Corporate culture can include long hours, expectations to work on weekends and to be available by email or cellphone 24/7. It can also include the message “Saying no is not an option.” Peer pressure is slightly different. It often comes from the personalities in the organization and may not even reflect company policy. It may be a boss who pushes people hard, a co-worker who makes sarcastic remarks, someone who shames people in front of others, or even a manager who yells at employees.

The next block is Email, or any form of electronic communication, including Text, Instant Messenging (IM), etc. The advent of email really ramped things up and started tipping people over, and it’s only gotten worse over the years.

Notice that the bottom four blocks are external. We can’t control them, although we can influence them.

Then I added three more blocks to reflect the fact that we often add to the problem of overload. This was my main message: We also put pressure on ourselves. Here’s how:

Block number five represents Internal Demands. These are the things that we, as individuals, want to achieve in a day and the level or standard we want to meet. This includes work-related tasks, but also chores and activities in our personal and family lives.

The next block is Stress-Prone Personality Traits. People who have these traits get overloaded because they’re trying to do too much. They include workaholics (always working), overachievers (always striving to do more and better), perfectionists, Type A personalities (competitive, driven, always in a hurry, and often multi-taskers), caretakers (always looking after other people’s needs), and pleasers (can’t say no or set boundaries). Did you see yourself on this list? Did you see yourself more than once? It’s not unusual for people to have several of these characteristics.

The top block is Beliefs. Beliefs are premises and assumptions that we hold about how the world works, how people are supposed to behave, what we’re capable of, etc. Any statement that includes words like “should,” “must,” “need to,” or “have to” usually reflects a belief. Anything from “I have to make my bed every day” to “I have to respond to every email on the day I receive it” are beliefs that can lead to overload. Beliefs are very powerful for two reasons. One is that we hold our beliefs to be “The Truth,” so they become “The Truth” for us. The other is that most of them are subconscious — we’re not even aware of them. Beliefs run our lives in more ways than we realize.

You’ll notice that the bottom three blocks in the diagram (External Demands, Deadlines, and Peer Pressure) are lined up perfectly, sitting one on top of the other. The pressures represented by those three blocks have been around for decades. But the top four blocks in the diagram are starting to shift out of line, representing additional factors that have led to imbalance and instability. And as the blocks get higher, they tip over even more.

However, I have started to rethink the diagram.

When I designed the diagram, my intention was to show people what they can control (the top three blocks) and what they can’t (the bottom four). My first message was that the top three blocks are tipping the average person over. My second message was: If you want to reduce your overload, start with the top three blocks because those are things you can do something about. My third message was that if you take more control of the top three blocks, you’ll be better able to handle the bottom four. And my last message was that as the bottom four blocks increase in speed and intensity, it’s even more important to take control of the top three blocks to keep from tipping over completely.

Over time, I’ve shifted my focus to the work environment itself. I’m beginning to think that workplace demands have become so excessive that they are tipping people over. It’s starting to look like this to me:

Even for people who reduce their internal demands, modify their stress-prone personality traits, and change their belief systems, the workplace is pushing so relentlessly that the self-care strategies are no longer sufficient to keep people from tipping over. We’ve reached a point where it’s not only up to individuals to resolve the overload issue. Bosses and organizations need to take more responsibility and acknowledge the role they’re playing in pushing employees to the limit.

Thus, the problem of overload is a shared one. Some people will overload themselves no matter what, but companies and organizations need to start owning up to the pressures they’re creating. The net result of all this pressure is that people are working longer and harder than ever. The workload seems to have no limit.

But before we leave the topic of where the overload is coming from, let’s look at how all this happened.

A History Lesson: From Need to Greed

Once upon a time there was a recession. The economy slowed down, people were spending less money, companies were struggling to get business, and fear was in the air.

One day a group of owners and other senior executives (we’ll call them Power Brokers and the Corporate Brain Trust) got together in their fancy corner office and tried to figure out what to do.

Mr. Worry said, “We’re in a real pickle here and something needs to be done. Our sales are down, our revenues are dwindling, and our profits are shrinking. We basically have two choices: get more business or cut our expenses.”

Miss Thrifty said, “We’ve been trying to get more sales, but the economy’s lousy and people aren’t ordering our products. The only solution is to reduce our overhead.”

Mr. Confused chimed in, “But how are we going to do that?”

Then Mr. Clever came up with a brainwave. “I know. Why don’t we get rid of some workers so we don’t have to pay as much money in salaries?” Everyone agreed that was an excellent way to save some bucks.

But then Ms. Doubtful asked, “Yeah, but how are we going to get the work done if we don’t have enough workers?”

Mr. Clever came up with another brainwave: “We’ll just get everybody who’s left to work harder.”

Mr. Skeptical spoke up. “But what if they don’t want to do that? And even if they do, we just have to pay them more out of the money that we’re trying to save.”

Then Mr. Clever became Mr. Brilliant. “Not necessarily. First of all, they won’t have much choice. They’ll be afraid of losing their jobs so they probably won’t complain. And who says we have to pay them more money? We’ll just tell them that we all have to tighten our belts and work a little harder to keep the company going. I think they’ll probably swallow it.”

And that’s exactly what happened.

In the mid-1990s, a lot of companies were focused on cost-­cutting. And the...

Table of contents

• OPENERS
• CONTENTS
• PREFACE
• INTRODUCTION
• SECTION 1
• SECTION 2
• SECTION 3
• CONCLUSION
• ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
• APPENDICES
• RESOURCES
• ILLUSTRATION CREDITS
• INDEX
• ABOUT THE AUTHOR