Occupational stress in IT jobs

THE ARTICLE entitled ``Death by overwork'' by Ms. Visa Ravindran The Hindu, Aug. 6, 2000 reminded me of an exhibit on the table of one of my colleagues: ``Hard work may not kill a person; but why take risk?''

Ms. Ravindran has rightly pointed out that excessive stress may prove to be fatal in the days of globalisation when everyone is in a hurry to meet the target. While government jobs are the safest in this respect, private sector IT jobs constitute high- risk jobs. This is basically because IT employees are the best paid anywhere now.

This means that IT employees will be exposed to long working hours or rigid targets, both of which would subject them to enormous stress. In IT jobs, the foreign customers are always in a hurry, and want the products to be supplied as quickly as possible before their competitors catch up.

During the past decade, researchers have done considerable work on stress-related issues, particularly on the impact of stress on health. It is well known that prolonged stress can lead to problems such as ulcers and arthritis, in addition to heart disease.

Needless to say, prolonged stress is something one should minimise to the extent possible, as total avoidance is not realistic in the present-day organisational life. It is generally recognised that low levels of stress can enhance job performance and lead to increased productivity.

Any job involving targets (such as sales targets) will be associated with at least mild stress and it will be an exercise in futility if one tries to avoid such stress. Journalists are subject to mild levels of stress when they need to race against time, considering the competition in a liberalised atmosphere. However, whereas the performance of a task is influenced by stress, it may drop sharply if the stress-level rises too high. The dysfunctional effects of excessive stress in IT jobs have not been studied so far and may present major problems to HRD managers of the New Economy.

Job stress is a consequence of two key ingredients: high level of job demands and little control over one's work. It cannot be afforded as it will affect both employee health and company profits. Stress is a general term applied to the pressures people feel in life. No one is immune to it and is inevitable in many jobs. The severity varies from person to person because of individual differences. It affects employees at all levels of the organisation. The typical symptoms of stress are: inability to relax, sleeplessness, digestive problems, emotional instability, tension, nervousness, chronic worry, high blood pressure, feelings of hopelessness, indulgence in excessive smoking and/or drinking. What one has to do to handle stress, be it temporary or long-term, mild or severe, be it caused by work-place trauma or lack of resilience, every employee has to make sure that he is not vulnerable to its effects. One cannot allow stress or frustration to affect one’s job performance.

In the context of IT personnel, it may be pointed out that they become victims of stress on account of the time limit imposed by the company on live projects, targets to be met in respect of software solutions which may well be beyond their ability. The latter is because, when young IT professionals take up a job, they claim to have knowledge of IT languages and programmes, which they are yet to learn with a reasonable degree of confidence.

When actually on the job, they are confronted by their inadequacies and find it difficult to cope with the realities. Another cause of stress may be the demands made on their time. Many service engineers have been forced to do servicing of computers in relatively far-off places and at odd hours. Sometimes, they are required to attend to several service-calls spread across a city in a short span of time. This can be very stressful even for tolerant, young and energetic people. Several IT jobs can be both mentally and physically taxing. This often leads to burn-outs and high employee turnover.

All these are in addition to the fact that an IT professional has to keep pace with a rapid rate of obsolescence in technology, which itself is a cause for stress. IT employees also have to fear that they may not be useful after ten years in the industry, as it is presumed that the most productive period for an IT professional is perhaps the first ten years. The IT professional on his part, adds to his woes by constantly changing jobs in an attempt to find the best job from the point of view of money as well as job-satisfaction.

Certain behavioural problems resulting from stress may generate little sympathy either from the peer group or from the bosses; so, one needs to assess the level of stress that one can handle without getting into serious problems. As the impact of stress on mental health has not been adequately investigated, the employee himself needs to make a careful assessment from time to time and adapt corrective measures. It is now known that, in the Knowledge Industry, high levels of stress is generally accompanied by anger, anxiety, depression, nervousness, irritability, tension and boredom. In extreme cases, they may result in aggressive actions such as sabotage of software, hostility and unnecessary complaints. Managers under extreme stress tend to procrastinate and continue to put things off and not take timely decisions. Such things are frowned upon in the IT industries. When the bosses discover these, the managers start hating their jobs and wait for an opportunity to quit.

Some suggestions

Supportive management, sympathetic counseling and such management practices help to reduce frustration and cope with or overcome stress. Organisations are just as worried about stress as are individuals. They have three broad options to choose from when attempting to manage stress: prevent or control it, escape or run away from it, learn to adapt to it or cope with it. Organisations seek to reduce or eliminate stress by improving communication, through better participation by employees, and by redesigning jobs to be more fulfilling. Employees try to escape stress by taking alternative employment, voluntary early retirement or requesting job transfers. Coping with stress requires cooperative efforts by employees and management which include relaxation efforts, bio-feedback, and personal welfare programmes.

The best way to manage stress is to learn to relax, take interest in something outside the job, like for example, listening to music, playing an instrument, going for picnics with loved ones or taking long walks. The best way, undoubtedly is meditation and practice of yoga. Doing exercise and aerobics early in the morning will also help to cope with stress. Worshipping at a temple, chanting prayers and slokhas, or just sitting around at the place of worship enjoying the serenity of the place, participating in community prayers and social gatherings help in keeping the mind fresh and balanced.

Hema Natarajan

(The author can be contacted at: hemanat@md4.vsnl.net.in)

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