Dealing with Stress in Business

Working with Corporate Stress

By John Plester, Clinical Hypnotherapist and Corporate Coach

This week featured a number of articles in the press linking stress to diabetes and other health conditions such as heart disease, colds, gut disorders and skin complaints.

Research published in the journal Psychosomatic Medicine found that those under extreme pressure at work were 45% more likely to develop the condition compared to those under minimal pressure.

The theory is that the stress hormone cortisol may alter the body's senstitivity to insulin. How someone reacts to stress can determine how prone they are to diabetes as some people take longer to deal with stress which results in an increase in pulse rate, blood pressure and the release of stress hormones. In other words how people think and maintain the stress response can directly affect their health.

It does not matter where you are on the corporate ladder you may still be affected by stress at work. Here we have a look at how corporate hypnotherapy will help with these common issues.

Is corporate stress having an effect on you? You are not alone.

It makes no difference if you are sweeping the floor or the CEO of a multinational you could still be affected by stress at work. In fact, around 39% of UK work related illnesses in 2013/2014 were linked to stress, anxiety or depressive disorders (1).

Are you towards the top of the tree, finding yourself affected by challenging staff, achieving targets or the challenging business conditions? Or maybe you are closer to the 'front line', struggling under the bureaucracy and tiers of management from managers who seem out of touch with the real world?

Even though employees would rarely admit to suffering stress for fear of being regarded as weak, the sad fact is that stress underpins the great majority of employee absenteeism. Co-workers may also be suspicious that a person who is absent is simply 'making it up', which can then make it a whole lot more difficult for the absent employee to come back, building the stress and anxiousness and contributing to the overall problem.

The responsibility for coping with workplace stress sits mainly on the shoulders of the organisation however; the member of staff is also responsible for seeking help when needed.

Such are the pressures of the modern workplace that many people are likely to carry on until they reach the point of breakdown. They could find they struggle to make decisions, feel tired and fatigued and start to feel withdrawn and panicky at the slightest addition of any pressure or strain put upon them. Their work then begins to suffer as they struggle to meet work deadlines, and they simply don't perform at their best in high pressure situations, and as a result they and the business they work for suffer.

This is where hypnosis could help. Traditionally modern medicine and therapy tackle the symptoms that they are encountering where as hypnotherapy will look for and deal with any underlying cause that is creating and supporting the stress.

Very often, our response to a particular scenario is influenced by our past memories, so our reaction may be stronger than is desirable to the circumstances.

Hypnotherapy not only enables a person to learn how to fully relax, but to also find the root of the actual problem and more importantly, contend with that problem. And the great news is that not only can this transform your working life, it can have a favourable influence on your home and personal life too.

Minimizing stress and absenteeism is a win-win for companies and staff alike, as productivity increases when we're relaxed and happy.

I have worked with individuals at various levels from both the public and private sector within Norfolk over the last 25 years. Most companies send their employees to work with me to deal with a personal problem that is affecting their work performance. Sometimes I work with performance problems such as public speaking, time management and stress management. I work with a combination of hypnotherapy and NLP coaching which together work very effectively in business.

(1. http://www.hse.gov.uk/statistics/causdis/stress/index.htm )

John Plester is a Clinical Hypnotherapist at Norwich Hypnotherapy Practice in Norfolk who has vast experience working in the corporate sector.