3 Ways Employees Can Reduce Workplace Stress
October 28, 2022 | Business Storage
It’s been almost three years since a large percentage of America’s workforce started working from home due to COVID-19. Some workers were able to leave behind long commutes to the office and effectively reduce workplace stress. But for others working from home revealed a new set of challenges, especially for parents of school-aged children.
As companies transition and adjust to the hybrid work model—one that allows employees to have flexible schedules and locations—work-related stress will also change. It’s important for employers and employees to keep an open dialog.
It’s easy to forget that in just a few years, companies went from 100% in-person to 100% from home. So whether you’re transitioning to hybrid work for the first time or back at the office full-time, here are some ways you can take care of your mental and physical health every day.
Reinvent Your Work Environment
Whether you’ve been away from the office during the pandemic or working in the same home office, refreshing your workspace can have a very positive effect. Interior designers know that specific decorating choices can help reduce workplace stress by impacting how people feel in a space.
If your office is cluttered, it can lead to feeling disorganized and decreased efficiency. Even if you keep an organized, clean workspace, consider a redesign or ways to brighten it up. For example, adding plants can be calming, improve air quality, and be visually pleasing.
Other ways to relieve stress include adding colors that promote productivity. For example, green is thought to encourage concentration, and blue is believed to boost creativity, while red promotes productivity. Besides visual cues, don’t forget your sense of smell.
Essential oil diffusers are widely available and used for aromatherapy, which have been used for centuries to improve mental health. Lemon, eucalyptus, basil, and pine are great scents to help reawaken your senses during a midafternoon slump.
Balance Maximum Productivity and Creativity
Are you a morning person or a night owl? Figure out what time of the day is your most productive. Is it in the morning after an espresso or mid-day after hitting the gym? It’s important to realize that everyone has a time limit for being super focused and productive.
Productivity consultants like Alex Soojung-Kim Pang, founder of Silicon Valley consultancy Strategy and Rest, believe that we can focus hard on something for about five hours. After that, we need to switch tasks that require less brain power.
Creativity is an essential skill in today’s workplace because even though it can be hard to define, it helps people solve problems and think of new ideas and opportunities. So the question that innovative companies ask themselves is if it’s possible to be creative and productive at the same time.
If your best ideas happen when you’re daydreaming, set aside the time and space to be creative on either side of your most productive hours.
How Would You Describe Your Job at a Dinner Party?
This might seem like an odd question initially, but research has shown that language matters in mental health. In other words, you have a choice of what words and ways to describe yourself and what you do for work. Identifying and highlighting the positive aspects of your role at your company will create a brighter outlook and more positive feelings.
Other ways to answer this question is to share a success story, such as how you helped a client or your company achieve something great. Of course, success doesn’t always have to be about work, wealth, or fame either. So simply saying something like, “I work as a car mechanic and am an aspiring chef! I hosted a dinner party for 10 people last week who all claimed to love my cooking!” can demonstrate personal success.
In Summary
How we approach ways to reduce workplace stress as individual employees is more important than ever in a relatively new paradigm—hybrid work model. Taking care of our mental and physical health should be at the top of everyone’s daily to-do list.
When we successfully find ways to manage stress of any type, our productivity, creativity, and decision-making skills all improve.
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- State-of-the-art 24-hour security
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You’ll have one less thing to worry about knowing your business supplies, equipment, inventory, and records are stored in a secure and convenient location. Find a Metro Self Storage facility near you to explore your business storage solutions today!
