Coping with Stress

Abstract

It will be the underlying tenet of this chapter that interventions to cope with stress can be of three rather different types: they can be retrospective either (i) to remedy population-wide stressors or (ii) to cope with individually-defined stress as it occurs, or prospective, (iii) to prevent stress. All three types should be based on company-specific diagnosis of the causes of stress, the characteristics of the individuals concerned, the company norms and values and any other factors that influence which specific coping strategies are appropriate and who should be the initiating actor(s). The first half of the chapter will be devoted to a consideration of these three types of intervention: we shall first consider ways of tackling stress ‘at the level of the individual’ (i.e. when it is triggered by a particular configuration of P: E elements at a particular point in time), then look at possible remedies for stressors that are known to have ill-effects for large sectors of the managerial population and finally go on to discuss the possible prevention of stress. In the second half we shall turn our attention to the chief of the company’s ‘stress reduction actors’ — the personnel officer.