How can you measure something which you can’t actually see?

It’s the age-old question.

It’s impossible to measure something which cannot be counted, cannot be visualised, and can only be felt. 

The problem is, workplace stress needs to be monitored in order to ensure that it isn’t increasing to dangerous levels throughout an organisation. 

How to monitor stress levels in the workplace is something more and more businesses are trying to work out, and whilst there is no hard and fast route towards obtaining reliable statistics, there are several ways you can at least get a picture of the workplace stress prevalence in your office, and how those sitting at their executive chairs are really feeling on a day to day basis. 

How to Monitor Stress Levels in The Workplace 

First things first, do you place targets and heavy deadlines on your employees? Do you consider these to be realistic, and do you find that they’re often met or missed?

That is the first question to ask yourself. If you do this, you need to assess whether these targets and deadlines are realistic. If not, you’re causing work stress from the get-go. 

Whilst targets can be a good thing, and they can also be motivating to a degree, they need to be realistic and proportionate in order to avoid negative effects. If you don’t have deadlines or targets, you need to look towards other possible causes of stress in the workplace, such as management quality, whether you have a regular amount of change going on, and whether the workload is evenly distributed across the office desks. 

Aside from assessing the situation within your workplace, you could look towards the following initiatives too. 

Implement an Annual Employee Satisfaction Survey 

By having an annual survey, you’re able to ask your employees important questions about their working situation and receive honest answers. It’s important to ensure anonymity if you want to receive honesty back, as many employees may be worried about saying something negative about the management or their working situation. 

In this survey, ask questions about workplace stress and find out whether your employees regularly feel stressed or overwhelmed, to what degree, and how often. You can then collate the results and find out an overall picture of how much work stress is evident in your office space. 

Have an Open Door Policy 

Do your employees often approach management with problems or do they find it hard to talk to supervisors and managers about things which may be bothering them? Open your doors and make it clear to employees that they’re welcome to approach managers with any problems, at any time, without judgement. 

Whilst you need to maintain confidentiality around the boardroom tables whenever an issue is mentioned, you can monitor trends, especially if they’re related to the common causes of stress in the workplace. 

Monitor Absenteeism Levels

It’s likely that your workplace collects statistics on employee absenteeism, so look if there are any patterns or trends you can identify. How many employees are actually going off sick and naming stress as the reason? Is depression and anxiety high up on the list?

If employees are just having regular odd days off sick, what is the reason for calling in? Can you see patterns again, or can you put two and two together and find stress to be the reason?

Look at Productivity Levels

A little like absenteeism, you’ll no doubt keep productivity records. How do these change compared to when a large scale project is being completed in the office? For instance, perhaps everyone is collaborating around the office tables and everyone is super-busy trying to achieve a heavy deadline as a result. Do you notice productivity rises or drops? If you implement targets, are these regularly met or missed?

Ensure Managers Know Their Staff

One of the best ways to reduce workplace stress and use stress management interventions in the workplace really comes down to managers knowing their staff well. Do they seem lacking in energy or are they making uncharacteristic mistakes? Can you tell that something just isn’t right? This is a good way to notice signs and symptoms of stress before they become bigger issues than they are at the moment. 

Once you learn how to monitor stress levels in the workplace you can intervene and stop a major issue occurring. Put into place stress management training for your staff, think about booths so they can work quietly when they need downtime, and perhaps talk to them about things like mindfulness, which can help with stress too. 

By being more work stress aware, we can conquer the problem.