Factors that affect work-life balance among women employee at Menara Telekom Malaysia Melaka / Nur Puspalela Reduan

Menara Telekom Malaysia Melaka has high numbers of women employees who’s holding managerial positions. Most of these women are already married. Married women usually face a problem regarding the way to balance their time with job at office and non-work for example time they need to spend with children and family. According to Milkovich (2011), work life balance is a program that helps employees better integrate their work and life responsibility including the time away from work, access to service to meet specific needs and flexible work arrangement. The problem occurs when women feel that they do not have the equivalent time for both responsibilities. Thus, the study hopes to investigate factors that have relationship with work-life balance. Employees who do not have work-life balance may face are many problems. The most common problem arises when employees do not have work life balance is stress. Stress is personal in that stress affects individuals in different ways. In similar situations or conditions some people cope, even thrive, on the pressure, whilst others find it difficult to cope and suffer negative stress as a result. It is also personal in the sense that the amount of control that the individual has, over their workplace conditions, events, and work-life balance, will influence the amount of negative stress that they suffer from. Those individuals with greater control will tolerate and manage stress levels, or avoid them altogether, more successfully. It is essential for a company such as Telekom Malaysia to ensure every single employee has work-life balance. A successful convergence between work and non-work aspect can be a win-win situation for employees and employers alike. The ability to achieve satisfying experiences in all life domains enhances the quality of personal relationships and a range of organisational outcomes. On the other hand, conflict between different roles has been linked to negative outcomes such as job dissatisfaction, psychological strain and substance abuse. Thus it is imperative for employees and companies to connect work-life issues with strategic business needs

Do Job Boredom and Distress Influence Self-Report Individual Work Performance? Case Study in an Indonesia Muslim Fashion Industry

A creative and innovative workforce is a key determinant of the sustainability of the fashion industry in a highly competitive market. Such characteristics have been linked to employees’ well-being. This study aimed at examining to what extent the employees’ boredom, stress, and work performance levels in a medium-scale Muslim fashion Industry. We employed a cross-sectional study design by administering a set of questionnaires consisting of the Dutch Boredom Scale; Depression, Anxiety, and Stress Scale; and Individual Work Performance in a total sampling of 75 female workers. The association between key variables and demographic factors was analyzed using non-parametric tests while the relationship between boredom, stress, and work performance was analyzed using the regression. Less-educated employees reported more stress and lower work performance while their boredom levels were similar, compared to their counterparts. Job boredom and stress were higher among newly hired employees but no significant difference in self-reported productivity between the two job experience groups was observed. There are also no differences in job boredom, stress, and work performance between sales and non-sales groups. Our regression model shows that job boredom and stress were significant predictors to work performance after controlling age, education, job experience, and type of occupations. These findings support the importance of improving employees’ well-being for better individual performance which may, in turn, lead to any tangible organizational outcomes. Regardless of the case study design, our study may provide insights for other industrial sectors and beyond the context of small and medium enterprises

Self-perceived stress reactivity is an indicator of psychosocial impairment at the workplace

BACKGROUND: Work related stress is associated with a range of debilitating health outcomes. However, no unanimously accepted assessment tool exists for the early identification of individuals suffering from chronic job stress. The psychological concept of self-perceived stress reactivity refers to the individual disposition of a person to answer stressors with immediate as well as long lasting stress reactions, and it could be a valid indicator of current as well as prospective adverse health outcomes. The aim of this study was to determine the extent to which perceived stress reactivity correlates with various parameters of psychosocial health, cardiovascular risk factors, and parameters of chronic stress and job stress in a sample of middle-aged industrial employees in a so-called "sandwich-position". METHODS: In this cross-sectional study, a total of 174 industrial employees were assessed for psychosocial and biological stress parameters. Differences between groups with high and low stress reactivity were analysed. Logistic regression models were applied to identify which parameters allow to predict perceived high versus low stress reactivity. RESULTS: In our sample various parameters of psychosocial stress like chronic stress and effort-reward imbalance were significantly increased in comparison to the normal population. Compared to employees with perceived low stress reactivity, those with perceived high stress reactivity showed poorer results in health-related complaints, depression, anxiety, sports behaviour, chronic stress, and effort-reward imbalance. The educational status of employees with perceived low stress reactivity is higher. Education, cardiovascular complaints, chronic stress, and effort-reward imbalance were moderate predictors for perceived stress reactivity. However, no relationship was found between stress reactivity and cardiovascular risk factors in our sample. CONCLUSIONS: Job stress is a major burden in a relevant subgroup of industrial employees in a middle management position. Self-perceived stress reactivity seems to be an appropriate concept to identify employees who experience psychosocial stress and associated psychological problems at the workplace

Burnout and Poor Health Resulting from Resource Loss: A Longitudinal Examination of Loss Spirals

The annual cost of work stress is estimated at $187 billion, a cost to both organizations and employees. In light of this figure, research on stress and its’ impact on health and productivity has resulted in a number of models of work stress. Conservation of Resources theory is one such model. Conservation of Resources theory identifies patterns of movement for resources and the associated stress outcomes, however one such pattern, loss spirals, is undertested in organizational research as there are methodological challenges that must be overcome to effectively test for loss spirals (Hobfoll, 1989; Zapf, Dormann & Frese, 1996). This study sought to fill this gap in the literature by examining the resource loss process and the impact of loss spirals on health and burnout for employees. Specifically, three forms of resources were utilized in this study, perceived income adequacy, perceived organizational support and job autonomy. These resources were pooled to represent how an individual has multiple resources impacting them at one time. This study modeled loss spirals across three waves of data collection based on the practices described by Salanova (2010). With this, resources were measured over time and were hypothesized to become increasingly low while paired with an increased presence of negative health outcomes and burnout. However, results did not demonstrate a loss spiral, but did show a negative relationship between resources and outcomes (burnout and negative health). While not all hypotheses were supported, this dissertation provides additional support for the movement patterns of resources described in Conservation of Resources theory

Promoting recovery in daily life: study protocol for a randomized controlled trial

Background Work-related stress shows steadily increasing prevalence rates and has tangible consequences for individual workers, their organizations, and society as a whole. One mechanism that may help offset the negative outcomes of work-related stress on employees’ well-being is recovery. Recovery refers to the experience of unwinding from one's job when not at work. However, employees who experience high levels of work-related stress and are thus particularly in need of recovery tend to struggle to switch-off. Due to the detrimental effects of this prolonged and sustained mental representation of job stressors, interventions promoting recovery may contribute to improvements in employees' mental health. Methods In this randomized, waitlist controlled trial, we will investigate the effectiveness of two 6-week online training programs (cognitive behavioral and mindfulness-based). The sample will include employees working at least part-time during regular work hours. Besides the pre-post-follow-up assessments, the trial will include measurement bursts with the goal of examining the underlying mechanisms. We expect that both interventions will reduce work-related perseverative thinking (PT) compared with the waitlist control groups (primary outcome). Also, we expect that both interventions will result in similar improvements, but the underlying mechanisms will differ (process outcomes). In the cognitive-behavioral intervention group, we expect that the main mechanism responsible for lower PT levels will be an increase in recovery experiences across time. In the mindfulness-based group, we expect that the main mechanism responsible for lower PT levels will be an increase in facets of mindfulness across time. Discussion In the present study, we will investigate mechanisms underlying assumed changes in work-related PT in great detail. Besides evaluating the overall effectiveness of the two interventions in terms of pre-post-follow-up changes, we will look at the underlying processes at different levels—that is, within days, within weeks, across weeks, and between individuals. Accordingly, our study will offer a fine-grained approach to investigating potential determinants, mediators, and moderators of the processes that may, in the end, be responsible for work-related strain. From a public health perspective, if effective, the online training programs may offer valuable, low-threshold, and low-intensity interventions for a broad range of occupations

The relationship of work stress and employee deviance: a study on employee in Syarikat Air Johor Holdings Sdn. Bhd. (SAJH) / Noor Adzlin Sarlan and Zulinda Mohamad Nasir

Work stress has always been an interesting topic to be observed by both academicians and practitioners. The outcomes of work stress leads to employee deviance or counterproductive behavior at workplace. This study aims to investigate the relationship between work stress and employee deviance at Syarikat Air Johor Holdings Sdn. Bhd. (SAJH). In this study, the researcher choose to use three independent variable which are role conflict, role ambiguity and work overload and its relation to dependent variable which is employee deviance. A survey questionnaire will be distribute to 152 employees as a sample size. This research will use convenience sampling technique. The quantitative data in this research was analyzed by descriptive statistics using Statistical Package for the Social Sciences Software (SPSS) version 22.0. As a conclusion, this research helps the other researcher to explore the factor of stress and employee deviance in more detail

Economic Stress at Work: Its Impact over Absenteeism and Innovation

Economic stress has been recognized as a major threat to the well-being and performance of workers, especially during times of global economic crisis. An interesting and relatively unexplored research topic concerns the associations between economic stress and employee job outcomes such as innovative behaviors, indispensable for business survival. The aim of the present study was to investigate the relationship between economic stress, absenteeism and innovation. We considered both a direct and a mediation hypothesis and hypothesized that economic stress can have a negative influence on innovation directly and indirectly through increased absenteeism. A cross-sectional study was performed during 2018 and 2019 in an Italian food factory. A sample of 578 employees completed the Stress Questionnaire, the Janssen’s nine-item scale and a single-item regarding absenteeism. All relationships are supported by empirical data. As expected, the results indicated that economic stress is negatively related to innovation and positively related to absenteeism, which, in turn, plays a mediating role in the relationship between economic stress and innovative behavior. Herewith, those employees with higher levels of economic stress show higher levels of absenteeism contributing at the same time to a decrease in innovative behaviors. These findings show the importance of economic stress in understanding individual work outcomes and highlight the need to promote adequate intervention programs

Economic stress at work: Its impact over absenteeism and innovation

Economic stress has been recognized as a major threat to the well-being and performance of workers, especially during times of global economic crisis. An interesting and relatively unexplored research topic concerns the associations between economic stress and employee job outcomes such as innovative behaviors, indispensable for business survival. The aim of the present study was to investigate the relationship between economic stress, absenteeism and innovation. We considered both a direct and a mediation hypothesis and hypothesized that economic stress can have a negative influence on innovation directly and indirectly through increased absenteeism. A cross-sectional study was performed during 2018 and 2019 in an Italian food factory. A sample of 578 employees completed the Stress Questionnaire, the Janssen’s nine-item scale and a single-item regarding absenteeism. All relationships are supported by empirical data. As expected, the results indicated that economic stress is negatively related to innovation and positively related to absenteeism, which, in turn, plays a mediating role in the relationship between economic stress and innovative behavior. Herewith, those employees with higher levels of economic stress show higher levels of absenteeism contributing at the same time to a decrease in innovative behaviors. These findings show the importance of economic stress in understanding individual work outcomes and highlight the need to promote adequate intervention programs

Efficacy and cost-effectiveness of a web-based and mobile stress-management intervention for employees: design of a randomized controlled trial

Background: Work-related stress is associated with a variety of mental and emotional problems and can lead to substantial economic costs due to lost productivity, absenteeism or the inability to work. There is a considerable amount of evidence on the effectiveness of traditional face-to-face stress-management interventions for employees; however, they are often costly, time-consuming, and characterized by a high access threshold. Web-based interventions may overcome some of these problems yet the evidence in this field is scarce. This paper describes the protocol for a study that will examine the efficacy and cost-effectiveness of a web-based guided stress-management training which is based on problem solving and emotion regulation and aimed at reducing stress in adult employees. Methods. The study will target stressed employees aged 18 and older. A randomized controlled trial (RCT) design will be applied. Based on a power calculation of d=.35 (1-β of 80%, α =.05), 264 participants will be recruited and randomly assigned to either the intervention group or a six-month waitlist control group. Inclusion criteria include an elevated stress level (Cohen's Perceived Stress Scale-10 ≥ 22) and current employment. Exclusion criteria include risk of suicide or previously diagnosed psychosis or dissociative symptoms. The primary outcome will be perceived stress, and secondary outcomes include depression and anxiety. Data will be collected at baseline and seven weeks and six months after randomization. An extended follow up at 12 months is planned for the intervention group. Moreover, a cost-effectiveness analysis will be conducted from a societal perspective and will include both direct and indirect health care costs. Data will be analyzed on an intention-to-treat basis and per protocol. Discussion. The substantial negative consequences of work-related stress emphasize the necessity for effective stress-management trainings. If the proposed internet intervention proves to be (cost-) effective, a preventative, economical stress-management tool will be conceivable. The strengths and limitations of the present study are discussed. Trial registration. German Register of Clinical Studies (DRKS): DRKS00004749. © 2013 Heber et al.; licensee BioMed Central Ltd