Stressed Managers: Measuring up to Gates

Aditya Suri (name changed), a 23-year-old IT professional from Delhi, was perched on the edge of the Golden Gate Bridge, San Francisco. Gazing down at the water below, he had started his countdown, when the police came. His office was foxed: Why would their brightest engineer, handpicked to provide software solutions to a US client, want to kill himself?
Rajat Mitra, who counselled Suri later, says: ‘‘His role model was Bill Gates, he was depressed because he could not live upto his own benchmark of success.�
A lonely CEO started visiting chatrooms on the Web which led to a relationship.It was bad enough that his wife found out. It also cost him his job — he had started spending money on his girlfriend at company expense. Says Achal Bhagat who helps stressed professionals in Delhi: ‘‘He was stressed at work but could not talk about it.’’
Almost 60 per cent managers face stress, according to a survey done by Bhagat two years ago amongst 30 Indian companies. Of these, 30 per cent suffered from psychological disorders.
What’s triggering stress? Heavy workload, long hours, deadlines and job insecurity, say experts. Other factors: managing change, financial responsibility, poor working relationships and understaffing. Mitra adds a new dimension: ‘‘The lack of a good moral fibre creates huge dilemmas and a situation where bad apples thrive because good ones keep quiet.’’
Some common manifestations of stress around the office: bad temper, absenteeism, lack of communication, and aggression. Studies show that stressed out managers indulged in ‘finger drumming’, ‘clicking teeth’, ‘throat clearing’ and ‘key rattling’. The downstream impact on health are cardiac diseases, asthma, diabetes, backaches and lethargy.
Young people — in IT companies and call-centres — are very vulnerable. Says Bhagat: ‘‘Young organisations which grow rapidly and have high attrition rates are primed for stress.’’ Call-centre executives often end up being confused about their identities, as they have to be a ‘‘another person’’.
Unrealistic, difficult-to-replicate role models such as Gates and Sachin Tendulkar and the quest for instantaneous success are stress-drivers. ‘‘Midlife crisis is happening at 30 now,’’ says Bhagat. ‘‘Tendulkar is a phenomenon at 30, they measure their success against him and that creates problems.’’
Raising the bar for themselves sometimes helps. Says Usha Kothary of Indraprastha Apollo Hospital, which has a popular executive health check facility: ‘‘A certain amount of stress is essential for good performance, in excess, stress is harmful.’’
Experts say men often end up being more stressed as they think it’s ‘‘not manly’’ to talk about their problems. For women, stress arises from the guilt of ‘‘neglecting home’’ and sexual harassment at the workplace.
Mitra points out that every individual needs to be ‘‘stroked’’ or appreciated, which, very often, is not recognised by organisations. Says S Ramesh, HRD head of Eicher, known for its people-friendly approach: ‘‘The individual is the focus in our company, it has paid off richly.’’
Companies like Maruti have introduced Art of Living courses, Coke has a gymn and table-tennis room in its Gurgaon office. IT companies like Infosys offer cafeteria, entertainment and golf facilities. Though yoga classes and outbound tours are now standard practice, stress helplines and counselling are not. No wonder, stress continues to bog down doctors, TV, ad and marketing professionals and entrepreneurs.