Reducing Office Stress
February 15th, 2007I thought I’d start by saying thanks for checking out the JamCore Personal Training blog. As the anywhere/workplace workout partner for JamCore, I thought I’d jump right into the meat and potatoes of it and talk about something we can all relate to: Stress at Work.
The mind and the body work together in mysterious ways, work related stress affects our health in ways that scientists don’t even fully understand. Some of the stress factors that are known to include high cholesterol, high blood pressure, chronic headaches, fatigue, and panic attacks. The reality of it is that everyone responds to stress in different ways, depending on their environment and depending on their personality. Being the creative director for Vyant and DegreesInc, I am constantly hit with situations like tight deadlines, marketing and design challenges, client meetings, and time management decisions. Long story short, I have a LOT of experience with stress at work, and I’m sure we all have a story to tell.
Here are some ways to lower stress at work.
Posture:
If you are in an office punching a keyboard all day, posture and ergonomics are the first point to address. Is your chair, desk and computer setup for you? Checkout these tips for setting up your office and posture to reduce stress.
Short hourly breaks from computer work:
It has been shown in studies* that short 3-5 min breaks each hour from your computers will lower your stress and increase productivity. The break can mean a period of other work, not involving a computer, or a full break during where you do no work. Ideally, the alternate work should be as dissimilar from computer work as possible. Stretching will also help you lower stress and improve you performance.
So what kind of stress do you encounter at work? How do you deal with it? What do you think you could do better?
* As reported on PudMed.com a service of the National Library of Medicine
Henning RA, Jacques P, Kissel GV, Sullivan AB, Alteras-Webb SM.
Department of Psychology, University of Connecticut, Storrs 06269-1020, USA.
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