BUS209: Organizational Behavior

Processes of Emotion and Stress in the Workplace

Thinking and Feeling

 Emotion in the Workplace

• Traditional Approach
• Human Resources / Human Relations

 Emotion

• Organizational life is typically governed by logic and rationality
• Since the 1990s, more attention has been paid to emotion in the workplace.
  • Stress and Burnout
    
    

 Emotion in the West

• Privilege of rationality
  • Need to "think on your feet"
  • Cost-benefit analysis
  • "Keep emotion out of it"
  • Scientific Method
• Separate spaces for emotional expression
  
  

Feeling at Work

• Individual experience
  • Emotional Labor
  • Stress & Burnout
• Relational experience

Individual Experience- Emotional Labor

• Genuine & managed emotions
  • "Service with a smile"
• Emotional labor
  Surface Acting: Displaying an emotion for the sake of the job (i.e. servers in a restaurant smiling at the customer)
  
  Deep Acting: Displaying an emotion on the job that one does not feel internally. This can lead to emotional dissonance.
  
  

Implications of Emotional Labor

• Commodification of emotions
• Feeling rules
  • Professionalism
• Mind-body dualism
  
  

Bounded Emotionality

• An alternative mode of organizing in which nurturance, caring, community, supportiveness & interrelatedness are fused with individual responsibility to shape organizational experiences (Mumby & Putnam, 1992)
• Challenges to bounded rationality & emotional labor
  • Mind-body dualism
  • Devaluation of physical labor
  • Co-optation of emotional experience

Bounded Rationality & Bounded Emotionality

• Organizational limitations
  
• Reduction of ambiguity
  
• Hierarchy – Means- end chain
  
• Mind-body dualism 
• Fragmented labor 
  
• Gendered & occupational feeling rules
• Intersubjective limitations
• Tolerance of ambiguity
• Heterarchy of goals & values
• Integrated self-identity
• Community
• Relational feeling rules
  
  

Relational Experience-Feeling at Work

• Emotion as Part of Workplace Relationships
  • Workplace bullying
  • Tension between public and private
  • Emotional "buzzing"
  • Conflicting allegiances
• Emotion Rules & Emotional Intelligence
  • Knowing when and how to implement a particular emotional response in a given situation
    
• Stress & Burnout

Stress, Burnout, & Social Support

• Stress: stressors create strain on the individual (burnout), which can lead to negative psychological, physiological, & organizational outcomes
  
  

 Stressors

• Workload
• Role conflict
• Role ambiguity
• Stressors outside the workplace
• Communication
• Emotional labor
  
  

Burnout

• Emotional exhaustion
• Lack of personal accomplishment
• Depersonalization
  
  

 Outcomes of Burnout

• Physiological -- Stroke, Heart Attack, High Blood Pressure
• Attitudinal -- Sense of depersonalization, Feeling a lack of accomplishment
• Organizational -- Absenteeism, Turnover
  
  

Empathy, Communication and Burnout

• Research conducted on human service work (e.g. healthcare, social work, teaching)
• "People oriented" careers feel a high degree of empathy for others.
• Two kinds of empathy:
  • Emotional contagion (parallel feelings towards how others are feeling)
  • Empathic concern (nonparallel emotional response)
• Emotional contagion= hinders communication (i.e. emotional exhaustion)
• Empathic concern=helps communication
  
  

Coping with Burnout

• Problem-focused coping
• Appraisal-focused coping
• Emotion-centered coping
• Social support
  
  

 Burning Out

Mary goes home late in the evening after a long day of work time after time. Her work as a nurse at the health clinic is beginning to take its toll on her. Her health is worsening, her sleep is fitful, and her fuse is short. Sure, she wants to stay with her clinic, but she is not sure how many more non-stop days she can take.

 How can Mary Cope?

• Problem-focused 
  
• Work with supervisor to reduce hours
• Delegate work
  
• Work with colleagues to schedule breaks
• Emotion-focused 
  
• Seek counseling
• Relaxation-techniques
• Appraisal-focused 
  
• Reframe as helping people out
• Think of herself as a rare breed of civil servant
  
  

Social Support & Coping

	Emotional	Informational	Instrumental
Supervisors		☑	☑
Co-Workers	☑	☑
Friends & Family	☑		☑

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Source: Naomi Rotter, https://s3.amazonaws.com/saylordotorg-resources/wwwresources/site/wp-content/uploads/2013/02/BUS209-2.1.4-Processes-of-Emotion-and-Stress-in-the-Workplace-FINAL.ppt
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