September 14, 2007

A survey on stress in the office by Ceridian, one of the largest providers of human resource services in the world, reveals that while colleagues' annoying habits can stress them out, 58 per cent of UK office workers would not complain to their manager about it and two-thirds would not bring it to the attention of their HR department. A total of 1,004 employees were surveyed online.

The top three most stressful office worker habits are colleagues' excuses to avoid work at 21 per cent, tantrums and arguments in open spaces at 11 per cent, closely followed by gossiping and private conversations at nine per cent.

Doug Sawers, managing director of Ceridian in the UK, commented: "It would appear many employees are suffering in silence with their managers and HR departments unaware of internal stress triggers. Today's employers must be aware of potential stressors within the workplace and the impact of these on their employees. The CBI estimates the cost to British business of lost productivity through mental illness and stress to be £5bn, so this is a problem that ultimately affects the bottom line. Managers need to be properly trained to identify and correct negative behaviours to avoid undue employee stress and potential confrontation in the work place."

A rapidly growing trend to help employees deal effectively with work place stress is the deployment of stress management health coaching programmes. Earlier this year, Ceridian conducted a survey to determine the effectiveness of stress management programmes in the workplace. Of the 1,000 users of the Ceridian LifeWorks Stress Management programme surveyed across 20 different organisations in the USA, 52 per cent lowered their stress levels at work; 40 per cent said they improved their ability to cope with stress; and more than 70 per cent said they had less fatigue, headaches, insomnia, stomach aches and also had improved appetites.

Stress management is a key component of Ceridian's LifeWorks EAP in the UK, with particular focus on workplace stress in four main areas: job-related stress, work relationships, work changes and time management issues.

Research has identified a link between stress and absence. A Ceridian survey of 1,050 employees last year revealed respondents took a total of 8,918 unscheduled 'sick' days in the previous twelve months, an average of 8.5 days per employee. A quarter of the days taken off were down to work-related stress.

Of the 1,004 respondents participating in this latest online stress survey commissioned by Ceridian in the UK, 55 per cent worked in organisations employing over 500 people, 79 per cent worked over 30 hours per week and 53 per cent were male.