1. Discussion
Stress can be define as physical, mental, or emotional strain or tension, and a situation, occurrence, or factor causing this. The word “stress” actually comes from a Latin word meaning, “distress.” Stress affects everybody in the society. Today, more people suffer from stress than ever before. The pace of life is stressful in itself. People expect to manage the major life changes and crises without the network of support that previous generations relied upon. For some, stress may not be related to specific events, but may have developed in early childhood as an anxiety response to difficult situations. This response may have been carried into adult life as the characteristic way of dealing with difficulties. One in every four people seeks treatment for stress at some time in their lives. While some workplace stress is normal, excessive stress can interfere with employees’ productivity and impact employees’ physical and emotional health.
Signs of stress can be seen in people's behaviour, especially in changes in behaviour. Signs and symptoms of excessive job and workplace stress are feeling anxious, irritable, or depressed, loss of interest in work, problems sleeping, fatigue, trouble concentrating, muscle tension or headaches, stomach problems, and social withdrawal. Situations that are likely to cause stress are unpredictable or uncontrollable. Stress may be caused by time limited events, such as the pressures of examinations or work deadlines, or by ongoing situations, such as family demands, job insecurity, or long commuting journeys. There are several common causes stress in workplace. Some of them are fear of being laid off, more overtime due to staff cutbacks, pressure to perform to meet rising expectations but with no increase in job satisfaction and pressure to work at optimum levels all the time. High levels of stress in the workplace can lead to poor decision-making, an increase in mistakes which in turn may lead to more customer or client complaints and is likely to produce more stress, increased sickness and absence, high staff turnover and poor employee or work place relations.
It is important to tackle the causes of stress in the workplace as stress at work can lead to problems for the individual, working relationships and the overall working environment. These issues may include lowered self-esteem and poor concentration skills for the employee. The employer may suffer from increasing customer complaints, staff turnover and days lost to sickness.
This training will guide the staff to manage stress better. This training contain six modules which are the ice breaking session, defining stress, how to react to stress, exploring the sources of the stress, stress management strategies, and the closing which summarize about the training. The training does not attempt to eliminate stress altogether as people need a certain amount of stress in their lives in order to achieve their goals. Too much stress, however, can lead to fatigue, illness or unnecessary restrictions on people’s lives. Stress management training is empowering to the employees, enabling them to take a greater control of their own life and health, goals, relationships and performance at work. 2. Training management 3.1. Timeframe: 5 hours 30 minutes 3.2. Training Approaches 3.3.1. Participatory 3.3.2. Psycho educational 3.3. Methodologies 3.4.3. Group discussion and brainstorming 3.4.4. Small group activities 3.4.5. Self-assessment exercises 3.4.6. Experimental learning 3.4.7. Personal goal setting 3.4. Preparation and supplies required 3.5.8. Flip chart, flip chart stand 3.5.9. Flip chart markers 3.5.10. Extra pens/paper for participants 3.5.11. Tape (if needed to post flip chart pages on the wall) 3.5.12. Copies of pre- and post-test assessment forms for each participant 3.5.13. Copies of Appendices for facilitator reference 3.5.14. Copies of Appendices as handouts for participants 3.5.15. Flip chart pages prepared by facilitator with headings prior to training 3.5.16. Refreshments 3. Stress Management Training Schedules No. | Training modules | Duration | 1. | Introduction a. Welcome, introductions, review of objectives and agenda b. Ice breaking session c. Administer pre-test, establish ground rules | 60 minutes | 2. | What is stress? a. Definitions of stress b. Discussion of positive and negative aspects of stress | 30 minutes | 3. | How do we react to stress? a. Participant activity (pairs) on positive or negative stress | 30 minutes | 4. | Exploring the sources of stress a. Individual self-assessment activity, feedback b. Discussion of work-related stress c. Discussion of stress (mind, behaviour, body, spiritual, workplace) d. Introductory discussion on positive responses to workplace stress | 90 minutes | 5. | Lunch break | 30 minutes | 6. | Stress management strategies a. Introduction to stress management, learning new skills b. Basic stress management techniques c. Review of stress management tips (recognition, self-care) d. Discussion/reactions to self-care ideas | 60 minutes | 7. | Closing a. Recap, summary of learning from the day b. Brief group evaluation c. Revisiting participants’ training expectations d. Administer post-test e. Word of thanks, encouragement for self-care and stress management efforts | 30 minutes |

4. Training modules 5.5. Introduction
Welcome the participants. Introduce the facilitators to the participants. Facilitate the introduction of participant through the following ice breaker. The name of the ice breaking game is ‘fact or fiction’. The participants will be required to write three things about themselves on a piece of paper which may not be known to others in the group. Two are true and one is not. Taking turns, they go around the room and read out the three ‘facts’ about themselves and the rest of the group votes which are true and false.
This simple activity is fun, and helps the group members and facilitators get to know more about each other.
The facilitator will give an overview about the training. In this workshop, the participants will discuss stress-what it is, where it comes from and will also learn about strategies that can help the participants to better cope with stress in their personal and professional lives. Then briefly review the agenda for the day with participant. The participants then will be required to fill out a brief pre-training survey form. The participants are not allowed to use their phone during the training. 5.6. What is stress?
During this this session, the facilitator will ask the participants how they define stress. The input from the group on how they define stress will be listed and their answers will be recorded on the flip chart. Facilitator will then ask the participants whether they can think of times when stress has a positive effect. The participant’s responses about positive stress will be listed on a flip chart page. Facilitator will ask the participants when does stress has a negative effect on them. Participant thoughts will be listed on another flip chart page headed “negative stress.” The list of negative effects mentioned by participants will be discussed and see if they can observe any “groupings” of types of stress they mentioned. Discussion will be closed by observing that the participants can face negative stress on many different levels and sometimes they can ignore their stress because they feel overwhelmed by it or not know how to cope with their situation. 5.7. How do we react to stress?
Facilitator will introduce the activity. The participants are going to do an activity that will help them explore their experiences with both negative and positive stressors. The participants will be required to work in pair and discuss an example of positive stress and negative stress in their own experience. In this session, the participants will talk about stress and how it can have both positive and negative effects on them and their performance (personal and work), depending on how they perceive stress and how they react to it. Everyone experiences stress and responds to it in a unique way, depending on their personality and individual internal/external resources. 5.8. Exploring the sources of stress
In this session, the participants will be required to fill an individual self-assessment form regarding on their personal life events. There are three steps in the process of this activity which are completing the form, scoring the results, and analysing the results. The higher the number of the result, the higher the level of stress. The facilitator will then ask the participants how the workplace stress impacts them, what are some of the consequences they notice in themselves when it comes to workplace stress? Are there certain signs that they observe in themselves when they are stressed at work? Participants will have walk around the room, posting their thoughts on how stress affects them on these various levels. This exercise show them that there are many ways that stress can affect them in the workplace and on so many level. Facilitator will then ask the participants what are some of the positive ways they have found to manage stress? Participants are allow to share some of their ideas on positive ways to deal with stress in the workplace. The participants then will be required to do an activity which is called role play. Participants will be divided into groups. Each group will develop and act out a brief scenario in their facility. This scenario should include both positive and negative examples of managing stress. Facilitator will ask those who observed the role play: What types of stressors did the workers confront in this role play? How would you evaluate the health workers’ response to the stressful situations? What negative ways did you observe the health workers responding to the stress? What positive ways did you observe the health workers responding to the stress? 5.9. Stress management strategies
In this session, the facilitator will explain some key pointers on how to better cope with stress. Tip number one is recognizing warning signs of excessive stress. Self-awareness is the foundation of stress management. Feeling overwhelmed at work or in personal life is draining and can make you feel irritable, withdrawn and ineffective. Many of us feel stress so often that it begins to feel normal. The first step in better managing the stress is recognize it, so that it does not grow into bigger problems which will then affect your physical and emotional health. Become aware of stress by observing your muscles, insides and your breath. If you notice muscle tension or other internal signals such as headache, your body is telling you that you are under excessive stress. Another signal of stress is when you notice that your breathing becomes shallow, or when you forget to breathe. Tip number two is through self-care. Some of things that can be done to reduce stress is exercising, socializing and connect with others, take breaks, make healthy foods and drink choices, avoid drinking, smoking or taking pills or drugs to relax, practice healthy sleeping habits, enjoy cultural, spiritual and social activities, look for humour in daily activities, and create a balanced schedule. Facilitator will then ask the participants what do they think of the suggestions and what other strategies have they tried or what other ideas have they heard of that might help them cope with stress. 5.10. Closing
The facilitators and the participants will recap what they have gone throughout the training. In the stress management training the participants should have; a. Defined stress (both positive and negative). b. Talked about how we respond to stress on various levels (mind, behaviour, body, spiritually, in the workplace). c. Reviewed some very real workplace stressors and explored some ways we can better cope with them. d. Explored some basic stress management strategies (recognising that the first step in managing stress is to be aware of it), and ways to reduce stress by improving self-care.
Then there will be group evaluation. The group evaluation carried by asking for what participants viewed as positive or helpful aspects of the training and aspects they did not like or think could be improved. Facilitator will then distribute post-training questionnaire and ask each participant to complete it and return to you before departing. Before closing, the facilitator will encourage participants in their stress management efforts, acknowledging that learning to take care of ourselves is a journey that goes way beyond this training. 5. Benefits of managing workplace stress 6.11. Reduced absenteeism
Workplace anxiety causes a range of physical and emotional illness (including depression). It also suppresses our immune system so that it takes longer to recover from disease. This results in loss of work hours 6.12. Reduced staff turnover
Employees who aren’t coping with tension at work are more likely to leave. It costs tens of thousands of dollars to replace an employee that has been with the company for many years. According to research, staff turnover costs are 150% of their annual salary, and it takes 20 weeks on average for new employees to become fully productive. 6.13. Higher staff morale
Reducing stress in the workplace means your employees will be happier and feel more positive about the company. 6.14. Better customer service
Staff who aren’t tense will be more pleasant toward your customers and provide better customer service. 6.15. Better inter-staff relations
When people are uptight at work, tempers flare and relationships can sour, leading to less co-operative, less cohesive teams. 6.16. Higher productivity
All of the factors mentioned above, plus the fact that many people think more clearly when they’re not stressed (and therefore make better decisions), means that putting in place effective stress management strategies will increase productivity and improve your bottom line.