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Stress: Is It A Good Thing?

Stress is defined as the experience of opportunities or threats that people perceive as important and also perceive they might not be able to handle or deal with effectively. One of the major sources of stress comes from work. Research has found that work-related stress, which can be in the form of physical, mental and emotional stress, have profound impact on an individual’s psychological well-being, attitudes and behaviours at work and beyond (e.g. Schwartz, T., 2007; Lim, V.K.G., 1996).

We believe that the impact of work-related stress is closely related to the intensity of stress experienced by the individual. If he feels that the stress levels are too high, it may prevent him from effectively performing his job. Our reference articles suggested some effects of excessively high levels of work-related stress, including: declining levels of organizational commitment, increasing levels of distraction and withdrawal behaviours such as job dissatisfaction, proactive job search and noncompliant job behaviours (Schwartz, T., 2007; Lim, V.K.G., 1996). These negatively affect productivity and consequently lead to a decline in job performance. Such effects of stress may also spill over to the individual’s nonwork domain and result in dissatisfaction with life (Lim, V.K.G., 1996).

While we agree with the articles about the effects of high stress, we also believe that excessively low stress levels may also result in similar negative effects. This is because the individual may lack the motivation and satisfaction to perform his job well.
However, stress may result in positive effects if it is at the optimal level. Under the optimum level of stress, an individual may perform better than if he were in a nearly stress-free situation. For instance, challenging situations with time constraints can create stress which may stimulate him to apply innovative procedures to complete the task. Although challenge-related job demands may be stressful, we feel employees may view...