Workplace Harassment And Stress: Causes, Effects And Strategies For Effective Management

Workplace Harassment

Workplace harassment together with stress is widespread issues where society needs to be educated on to help in putting an end to such issues. The causes of these issues are complex and multifaceted, and yet it can be managed or prevented from happening among organizations. Workplace harassment and stress puts unnecessary strain on the workers (Hsiao, 2014). Therefore, it is the responsibility of worker and organizations to offer a bully-free setting for their workers in their daily operations. Workers should have the right to feel safe in their work setting and be free from harassment and stress in their workplaces. Consequently, stress in places of work has become one of the increasingly popular contexts of discussion over the past decades. The issue has become the major concern among different organization leading to the creation of an impact on the management and operations of corporations (Mainiero & Jones, 2013). Therefore, this paper aims at offering a detailed discussion of workplace harassment and stress by focusing on their causes, effects and how their adverse effects can be managed within operations of organizations. 

It is the type of discrimination among workers that violates federal regulations. Workplace harassment is just an offensive and unwelcome conduct that can either be in actions, words, visual displays, or gestures. These conducts are always so severe or pervasive that it influences the terms as well as conditions of the employment of a given victim (McGregor, 2014). In the legal world, harassment in place of work is just a form of discrimination that is illegally only when based on an individual’s gender, race, age, religious belief, disability, or other traits. Harassment in most workplaces become unlawful when enduring the offensive conducts that become a prerequisite to continued employment. The other way that harassment becomes unlawful is when the conduct is pervasive or severe enough (Chernyaeva, 2013). The conduct can become severe where a reasonable individual would consider the workplace hostile, intimidating, or abusive. Besides, in the event when harassment by an administrator results in the obvious change in status or salary of a worker, such conduct would be termed to be unlawful workplace harassment (Ghumman, Ryan, & Park, 2015). There are various forms of harassment in places of work, but the most common one is sexual harassment. In most instances, sexual harassment refers to the unwanted or nonconsensual.

It is the emotional together with harmful physical responses that happen when the worker’s expertise, capabilities, resources, and needs do not match with the requirements of the job. Under these conditions, the worker always faces workplace stress (Kelloway, 2015). It happens under various circumstances, but the conditions can become tough to manage for different managers when the workers have the thought that they possess little concern of management of the organization or from their immediate administrators. Besides, workers can also face workplace stress when they have the least control over their duties as well as coming up with the demands along with the demands of the organization. In other occasions, the issue of workplace stress is misconceptualized with different challenges or pressures whereas the matter of stress is entirely varied from pressure. The concern makes it tough for workers and managers to deal with this issue (Taris, 2013). Therefore, stress remains to be the adaptive response mediated by the characteristics of an individual or an individual’s psychological process. These characteristics of individual results due to any external action, events, or action that places special psychological together with physical demands upon an individual. Other factors that lead to stress in the workplace are a strain which is a factor that tends to distort normal operations of the body, and it also induces body and mental tension. Therefore, workplace stress is much greater than just the fastidious situation (Kato, 2014). Stress refers to the responsive reaction of an individual to a specific situation. 

Workplace Stress

Major causes of harassment in the workplace are not limited to behaviors that are considered to include threat, intimidation, inappropriate statements, derogatory statements, malicious statement, unwelcome advances, physical advances, or verbal advances. All these behaviors foster the hostile working set for the individual on the receiving end of the harassing actions or words (Okubote, 2013). Presence of any uninvited comments, conducts, or behaviors regarding favors in terms of sex or sexual orientation remain to be the major causes of workplace harassment that do not only happen amongst co-workers of the differing gender, but it is not narrowed.

Workplace harassment whether it occurs in person or platforms of online sites, it is a concern that affects some business operations, both big and small enterprises. While the most known types of harassment are psychological and verbal, there are also more serious types that affect business operations, and they include physical and sexual harassment (Lockwood & Marda, 2014). All kinds of harassment in the workplace are illegal and do not just affect the productivity of workers, their comfort, alongside their safety at the place of work, but it puts the operations of an organization in legal jeopardy. For instance, verbal harassment in the workplace can be the ongoing battle of destruction that can threaten an individual’s career and health. It comprises of demeaning remarks, offensive gestures, and unreasonable criticism. It can comprise of slurs, insults, unwanted ‘jokes’ as well as hurtful comments. Additionally, psychological harassment in the workplace can mentally break down the victim leading to loss of self-esteem and deliberately undermining their jobs (McCarthy, 2018). Although physical harassment in places of work can vary in degree, they can be more severe gestures leading to damage to personal properties. These effects of harassment in place of work affect both mental and physical wellbeing of workers. It leads to time loss as most affected workers spend much of their time trying to gain necessary support and defend themselves from instances of harassment. 

There is a great concern that requires business leaders to understand some of the precursors to workplace stress. Through the process of understanding what can create stress within their workforce, not only will it aid them to perform better management of risk, they are probably to also come across as a more understanding as well as an empathetic manager. Some of the common causes of stress in places of work consist of the culture of an organization, trauma, and presence of little change in management, bad practices of management, and demands from the authority or clients (McVicar, Munn?Giddings, & Seebohm, 2013). Other causes comprise of working environment that does not suit the needs of workers, bad relationships among workers, lack of required resources for operations, conflicts on assigned roles, and poor ergonomics among other factors.

Causes of Harassment and Stress in the Workplace

Stress in most places of work is derived from various sources that impact activities of organizations and individual workers in different ways. Stress affect operations of the organization as it can result in the negative influence of performance of duties among people as it makes these workers to be discriminated, harassed, anxious, and operate for long durations. Some of the impacts of workplace stress on workers and organization consist of poor time management, the presence of strained relationships, disorders of wellbeing, lack of proper focus, and quarrels among families. Most individuals according to study by Tentcher (2017) are affected by stress in the workplace due to the pressure on achieving deadlines of operations even after they return home after work. It is clear that workplace stress is the major factor that results to increase in cases of the rate of mortality rate that is comparable to some of the massive causes of demise among people in society (Gillespie, Bresler, Gates, & Succop, 2013). Therefore, workplace stress results in poor time management among individuals. It also leads to strained relationships, lack of proper concentration on and off duties among individuals. Stress in most workplaces normally results in headache, fatigue, anxiety, restlessness, and depression that low morale of workers.

For effective handling case of harassment in the workplace, there is the need for the business managers to prepare appropriate guidelines on issues that relate to harassment and stress of workplace. The organization can focus on having guidelines that describe various instances of harassment and their impacts on workers so that each employee regardless of the posts that they hold can follow and understand such requirements (Drabek & Merecz, 2013). Additionally, taking every complain made by worker serious and doing follow up can help in reducing cases of harassment in the organization. Management needs to ensure that workers stay unstressed and active with the harassment that they get from their coworkers or managers. The process of performing an extensive survey and debate on the matter of harassment is crucial in the operations of companies (McGregor, 2014). It helps in assisting the organization in filling the legal loopholes that might exist in their operations. Presence of effective employment policy in every organization that ensures well-planned paths of career based on merit help in decreasing the vulnerability of individuals and harassment by people that abuse their authority and power. 

The constant process of consulting workers is an efficient way can help in managing cases of stress. Most workers will be ready to tell their employers what is stressing their operations and necessary guidelines can be taken to correct the situation. Different suggestions taken from workers must be considered and make changes accordingly (Chung, 2018). The idea can help in ensuring that every element that is affecting their operations is dealt with appropriately. The proper definition of the job description can be a vital aspect in managing instances of stress in the workplace. Definition of job descriptions can allow workers to focus on working while conveying their skills and understanding that are required in a specific job (Taris, 2016). Creation of better systems of communication y the management can also help in managing cases of workplace stress. The availability of appropriate training, selection, and development of staff for various operations can improve the output of workers leading to minimization of cases of stress in their operations. However, management of the company must note that it is right to hire the right individuals for the right job (Drabek & Merecz, 2013). Management of various organizations needs to maintain a reasonable level of socializing in the organization and teamwork should be considered as a way of encouraging peaceful coexistence among workers. All these activities are essential in ensuring that instances of workplace stress are eliminated or minimized in the operations of an organization.

Effects of Harassment and Stress in the Workplace

Conclusion

From the above presentation, it is evident that the issue of workplace harassment and stress is not a new concern because several types of research have in the past been conducted in this subject. However, there are lots of organizations in which the concerns have not received deserving attention.  Issues of harassment and stress in the workplace are seen to be a sensitive issue that affects the operations of most organizations and workers. It is clear from this work that different organizations have the mandate of playing proactive function, offering behavioral support and discuss these aspects as the section of their routine operations. The workers in every organization must focus on nurturing an inclusive, respectful, alongside supporting setting in the workplace to create the congenial working setting. 

References

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