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It may surprise you but the main reason why we get stressed isn’t that we have “too much to do”. For most of us, having too much to do is perfectly fine as long as we know what our priorities are and if we can have a good oerview of our work. Instead, the plague of modern office life is that we have to MANY things to do and that we loose track of it all.

Discover an easy and effective way of managing your work. These simple techniques have been proven time and time again. In essence, the simple secret lies in taking charge of your time.

1. Write it down! I never cease to be amazed by how often stressed out people try to keep all the things they have to do in their heads. Stress is often more about knowing that we have a lot to do but not being able to remember exactly what.

2. Write it ALL down! In order for you to have a to-do list that you can rely on, you must trust that it contains ALL the things you have to do. Otherwise, you will still have a nagging feeling that you may not be focussing on the
right things.

3. Channel interruptions to your to-do list. Interruptions are a part of life so don’t let them stress you. 95% of all interruptions are either very quick so that you can deal with them straight away or something that you can defer to a time when YOU decide.

4. Don’t let your email inbox become your to-do list. Receiving emails can be great fun. Unfortunately, it is also very easy to confuse your inbox with your to-do list. Try to only scan your email inbox once every hour or two
(If you lack the discipline, you can set your email client to do this).

5. You don’t have to do everything! If I had to choose one single reason why people fail with their to-do lists it would have to be that they lack the ability to strike things off it. Things change and so should your to-do list. If you are uncomfortable with deleting tasks, create a “storage” list and move it to that.

6. The Nibble. Let’s face it, some tasks are big, vague and truly and utterly boring. We end up postponing these tasks forever and as a result they never leave our to-do list. Eventually, our list is filled with these types of tasks
and finally we decide not to look at the depressing thing. The trick is “The ibble”. Break the task down into smaller components. Make sure that the first step is takes less than 5 minutes to do. Then take that first step.

7. Not my time of day - Listen to your own rhythm. Let’s face it. Were human, not machines. At times we are productive and at times we are not. I see it as a surfer who times the waves and then rides them to their fullest. Try to find a task management system that let’s you monitor your own “waves”. You will probably find that you know less about yourself than you think you do.

8. Play! Why oh why do all planners and task managers have to look so professional and at the end of the day, so very very boring? Make your work into a game. Set small targets and reward yourself.

In my survey conducted few weeks back I realized a very crucial fact pertaining to professional career. A common question <b>Is your job really stressful?</b> was the theme of the survey. What was really uncommon was the result of the survey. I realized that a majority of the survey takers were happy with their job. Every morning was a new challenge to them as far as their jobs were concerned. However this was a positive feedback and contradicts the fact that many people are unhappy with their jobs. So I researched more on this topic. This is what I found out, 90% of the masses are happy with their job but extremely stressed because of many allied factors. Let us see these factors in detail.

<b>Here goes the boss’s pet</b>, a phrase used commonly against people that try to be extra friendly to their seniors or bosses. This is mainly done with the motive to get noticed in the eyes of your seniors or bosses. People who are called so cause unavoidable stress to the rest of their colleagues. Their colleagues won’t just envy such people but would be worried that their contribution towards the company would be overlooked and decisions could be influenced by that particular person. On the other side of this story would be the fear incurred by such people, of loosing the attention that they got from the seniors. The co-operation level got by their colleague would constantly be reducing. Hatred and anger would be emotions constantly shown towards people with this behavior. This could be considered as one important factor that could cause that person to part ways from the company or cause their colleagues to do so.

Another point that was high up in the list of factors that cause stress in a corporate environment is <b>sabotage the company</b>. This can happen in many different ways, so let us see few incidents on this topic. This is what happened in one case scenario; A senior chef of a hotel got a better job opportunity at another place. He made up his mind and decided to leave. During his notice period at the company, he offered better job opportunities and remunerations to his junior chefs and asked them to quit too. They did the same and joined him at his new work place. All the chefs who left were happy. However this is not the end of the story, here we see that one person so easily sabotaged the entire hotel. This is one concern that keeps bothering many people. They keep living under the fear that if any member of their team quits then how do they manage the rest of the team, so that it doesn’t affect the business.

Another cause of the stress element in everyday professional life is <b>competition</b>. In fact competition is one issue that if done over a certain limit could be harmful in any phase of life. This is what I once witnessed; two good friends were employed at the same law firm. They were new and the urge to impress your seniors was obviously. This led to mere competition between the two of them. For every small case they got they was always a tough battle for the poll position. Every case was thoroughly studied, well researched and amazingly presented to their seniors. The seniors were happy with both their performances. However, something that was ignored and later faded was their friendly and their trust in each other. A healthy competition is always a step towards success but over a certain limit it could be very harmful. This competition would make all the competitors stressful. It could cause ill health, mental sickness, employee sabotage or even force an employee to quit their job.

Last but not the least is <b>back stabbing a colleague</b>. This happens in most cases and could cause a lot of stress to the person who is being back stabbed and the person who back stabbed him. The first person may be extremely stressed as he was back stabbed once and would fear to trust any other employee. He might also be forced to quit his job due to bad performance. The back stabber on the other hand will also be stressed because he would fear the fact that someone else could back stab him or else if his colleagues would realize his behavior then they would avoid him and ignore him completely. People generally back stab other friends or colleagues with the intensions of hatred, envy and jealousy.

These were some conclusive factors that the second survey resulted in. One more thing I often see is people often change their jobs because they were offered more pay or a lesser hard working job. Well your work should be spiritual. So work hard and true, there are no short cuts in life. You may try a short cut but soon you will realize that we don’t work for the money but we get money because we work.

Every job has stress. Some stress is due to the nature of the job, some stress we apply to ourselves, and some stress is caused by those around us, be it demanding bosses, unreasonable customers or unproductive and scheming co-workers.

Malcolm S. Forbes once said, “If you have a job without any aggravations, you don’t have a job.”

So if workplace stress is a given, then how we handle this stress has a large impact on how well we perform and how much we enjoy our job.

The fact is that living and working with others is not always easy. You don’t have to like the people you work with, but you do need to be able to co-exist and co-operate with them. You can start by remembering that everyone has their place and the more harmony you can bring to the situation the more enjoyable it will be for everyone.

Why not try bringing a little harmony to the workplace by imagining your job as being a member of a choir. In a choir some people sing too loud, others too softly and some out of tune, but we’re all still part of the same choir. If you sing louder to compete with the loud singers or sing so softly that you are not heard or sing out of tune just to fit in, then you do nothing to help the choir-you don’t add anything to the harmony.

You can’t change how another sings, you can only do the best that you can and hope that others follow your lead.

The Roman philosopher Sallust said, “Harmony makes small things grow, lack of it makes great things decay.”

Wise words, indeed. Whatever you do, don’t add to the disharmony, this will only make matters worse and drag the choir further out of tune.

Your performance should be based on how well you perform, and not the performance of others. The more harmony there is in a choir the better it sounds. The more harmony we can create at work the less stressful our job becomes. Don’t let someone else singing off key ruin your song.