By Brad Farris

Stress has long been known as a silent killer.  Not only is stress bad for your health, it can be bad for the bottom line of your small business.  When our bodies get stressed out they send hormones throughout your body.  These hormones affect brain function and more specifically they affect our memory. When our bodies get stressed our brains get washed with hormones that are meant to help us during emergency situations. When you’re chronically stressed these hormones can damage and even kill brain cells.

Stress can not only impede productivity on the job, but can also make us much more ineffective while working. Each year in the United States, job-related stress costs business upwards of $300 billion dollars.  That is no small number.

There are many reasons for stress at the workplace.  The most common reasons include: low salary, heavy workloads, bad management/bosses, long hours and job insecurity among other reasons. I’ve highlighted some of the interesting data in the graphic below:

  • 83% of American’s say that work is a major cause of stress.
  • An estimated 40% of workers say they are unproductive at work as a direct result from stress.
  • 1,000,000 people are absent every day from work due to stress.
  • 40% of employee turnover is directly related to stress.
  • For the average company, turnover can cost almost 40% of total earnings.
  • The top workplace stressors include: low pay, unrealistic job expectations, long and inflexible hours, lack of opportunity for growth and advancement, lack of participation in decision making, job insecurity and undefined job expectations.

To read more about the solutions to common stressors in the workplace, check out the infographic below.

The-Cost-of-Stress-on-Business-Small

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