Psychological stress management for Central Bureau of Investigation
Yesterday (28.4.08), I was honored by the CBI officers to give lecture on " Psychological Stress Management" Below is my speech.
Definition of Stress
There has been a considerable debate about definition of stress. Stress is often researched as stimulus, response and process. As stimulus, it is the environmental agent or stressor, as person, it is the non-specific response. And as process it is the cognitive appraisal system. Current discussion will give much emphasis on stress as process variable (Lazarus, 1966). There are two processes – primary and secondary. Primary process is person’s realization that something is at stake and secondary process is concerned with identification and availability of coping resources to deal with threat, harm or challenge. Therefore, stress is not as the cause rather is embedded in our cognitive appraisal system. This definition gives this notion as stress is not always unpleasant. Unpleasant depends upon one’s cognitive appraisal system.
Dewe et al., (1993) defined stress as a dynamic cognitive state. It is the disruption in homeostasis or an imbalance that gives rise to a requirement for resolution of that imbalance or restoration of homeostasis.
Stress can be understood as P-E fit or fitness between individual characteristics (ability, personality, values, attitudes, interest) and the environment (demand and supplies). Strain occurs when there is a misfit in transaction between Person and environment.
Strain
Poor P-E fitness causes strain. Strain can be understood by stress audit. In the context of organization, stress audit can be made in two ways as
- Individual Stress audit (Table 1)
- Organizational Stress audit (Table 2).
Table 1
Individual Stress Audit
Please indicate whether you have frequently had any of the following symptoms during the last year. Using the following scale: O: Never or rarely 1 : Sometimes 2 : Quite often 3 : Frequently or constantly- Head burn- Loss of appetite- Nausea/Vomiting- Abdominal pain- Irregular intestinal functioning- Insomnia- Headaches- Faints- Sexual lack of appetite- Nightmares- Palpitation- Trembling hands- Excessive sweating without physical exercise- Feeling of breathlessness without physical exercise- Loss of energy- Tiredness or weakness- Anxiety- Irritability - High strung- Backache- Apathy- Sadness
Table 2
Organizational Stress Audit
Please indicate whether you have frequently had any of the following symptoms during the last year. Using the following scale:
O: Never or rarely
1 : Sometimes
2 : Quite often
3 : Frequently or constantly
- Accidents
-Absenteeism and lateness (often masked by other health problems)
-High staff turnover and recruitment problems
-Low production and missed targets
-Grievances, aggression and conflict
-Poor decision making and frequent mistakes
-Reluctance to take risks and lack of creativity
-Poor communication and interdepartmental relations,
-A lack of team-working
-Poor customer care
-Resistance to change
-Low moral
-Anti-organization feelings,
- Destructive criticism
-A blame culture and lack of learning
Risk of illness due to stress can be assessed using Holmes and Rahe’s Stress Scale (Table 3).
Table 3
Holmes and Rahe Stress Scale
To measure stress according to the Holmes and Rahe Stress Scale, the number of "Life Change Units" that apply to events in the past year of an individual's life are added and the final score will give a rough estimate of how stress affects health.
Life event Life change units
Death of a spouse 100
Divorce 73
Marital separation 65
Imprisonment 63
Death of a close family member 63
Personal injury or illness 53
Marriage 50
Dismissal from work 47
Marital reconciliation 45
Retirement 45
Change in health of family member 44
Pregnancy 40
Sexual difficulties 39
Gain a new family member 39
Business readjustment 39
Change in financial state 38
Change in frequency of arguments 35
Major mortgage 32
Foreclosure of mortgage or loan 30
Change in responsibilities at work 29
Child leaving home 29
Trouble with in-laws 29
Outstanding personal achievement 28
Spouse starts or stops work 26
Begin or end school 26
Change in living conditions 25
Revision of personal habits 24
Trouble with boss 23
Change in working hours or conditions 20
Change in residence 20
Change in schools 20
Change in recreation 19
Change in church activities 19
Change in social activities 18
Minor mortgage or loan 17
Change in sleeping habits 16
Change in number of family reunions 15
Change in eating habits 15
Vacation 13
Christmas 12
Minor violation of law 11
Score of 300+: At risk of illness.
Score of 150-299+: Risk of illness is moderate (reduced by 30% from the above risk).
Score 150-: Only have a slight risk of illness.
STRESS IN CBI
The last half century has seen an enormous change in the nature of society and of the working pattern of law enforcement agencies like Central Bureau of Investigation or CBI particularly. Nature of investigation cases are rapidly changing with the change in users and their demands. Now-a-days, users are not merely police departments or the Govt. of India., court is entrusting CBI for investigation. The democratic set up of the Government demands CBI investigation more frequently. Registered cases are growing (Figure 1). And more and more public servants and gazetted officers are under suspicions. All the issues are making the working pattern of CBI more challenging. High challenging work environment with very high moral values (Industry, Impartiality and Integrity) causing stress on CBI officers.
Figure 1
(Data collected from http://www.cbi.gov.in/performance/performancemain.php)
Stress Management
Following the process model, management of stress in CBI can be conceptualised as developing fit between individual characteristics of CBI personnel and their job demands. Figure 2 presents stress process in CBI.
Figure 2
Stress process in CBI
Stress management (Ecological Perspective)
Figure 3 Ecological Approach
Individual Approach
Fitting individual’s self-perception and characteristic attitudes, values and behaviour with Job and organizational structure, technology and culture. Therefore, it is important to develop self-efficacy (Bandura, 1977) in managing stress. Self-efficacy refers to People's beliefs about their capabilities to produce effects. It can be developed through four ways :
1. Enactive Mastery experience : It refers to knowledge about the objectives supervisor expects from the officer; Officer should develop mastery over
· Selection of case
· Collection of evidence
· Quality and timeliness of files
· Promoting efficient of resources
· Net work support establishment
· Right court selection
· Selection of right time
· Placement of right charge
2. Vicarious experience : Supervisor should act as role model to the officer. Officer by imagination can develop relaxed role model of CBI officer.
3. Verbal persuasion : Communicating ideas, verbal recognition or praise may be given to officer by the supervisor for achievement.
4. Physiological and affective state : Progressive relaxation, Music therapy, Vibroacoustic therapy, Autogenic training, Time management, Cognitive behaviour therapy, Meditation or Yoga
Role Stress
Role Space Conflicts (Pareek, 1993)
Self-Role Distance: This stress arises out of the conflict between the self-concept and the expectations from the role, as perceived by the role occupant.
Intra-Role Conflict: Since an individual learns to develop expectations as a result of his socialization and identification with ‘significant’ others, it is quite likely that he sees certain incompatibility between the expectations (functions) of his role. For example, a professor may see incompatibility between the expectations of teaching students and of doing research. These may not be inherently conflicting, but the individual may perceive these as incompatible.
Role Stagnation: As the teacher grows older, the need for taking up a new role becomes crucial. This problem of role growth becomes acute especially when an individual who has occupied a role for a long time enters another role in which he may feel less secure. However, the new role demands that an individual outgrow the previous one and take charge of the new role effectively. This is bound to produce some stress. In college which are fast expanding, and which do not have any systematic strategy of manpower development, teachers are likely to experience this stress of role stagnation.
Role Ambiguity: When teacher is not clear about the various expectations that people have from his role the conflict that he faces is called role ambiguity. Role ambiguity may be due to lack of information available to the role occupant, or due to lack of understanding of the ‘cues’ available to him.
Role Expectation Conflict: When there are conflicting expectations or demands by different role senders (persons having expectations from the role), the role occupant may experience the stress. There may be conflicting from the boss, subordinates, peers or clients.
Role Overload: When the role occupant feels that there are too many expectations from the ‘significant’ others in his role set, he experiences role overload.
Role Erosion: A role occupant may feel that the functions which he would like to perform are being performed by some other role.
Resource Inadequacy: Resource inadequacy stress is experienced when the resources required by the role occupant for performing the role effectively are not available.
Personal Inadequacy: When a role occupant feels that he is not prepared to undertake the role effectively, he may experience this stress. This role occupant may feel that he does not have enough knowledge, skills, or training, or he/she has not had time to prepare for the assigned new roles without enough preparation or orientation are likely to experience this type of stress.
Role Isolation: the role occupant may feel that certain roles are psychologically closer to him, while others are a t a much greater distance. The main criterion of distance is the frequency and ease of interaction. When linkages are strong, the role isolation will be low & in the absence of strong linkages the role isolation will be high.
Change in Job characteristics
Hackman and Oldham’s Job characteristics model assumes five core job dimensions as:
- Skill variety describes the degree to which a job requires the exercise of a number of different skills, abilities, or talents. Such activities must not merely be different, but they must be distinct enough to require different skills.
- Task identity defines the extent to which a job requires completion of a whole and identifiable piece of work
- Task significance refers to the importance of the job; the degree to which the job has an impact on the lives of other people, the immediate organization or the external environment.
- Autonomy is the degree to which the jobholder is free to schedule the pace of his or her work and determine the procedures to be used.
- Feedback is the degree to which the individual doing a job obtains information about the effectiveness of the performance. Feedback does not only refer to supervisory feedback, but also the ability to observe the results of their work.
Figure 4
The Job Characteristics Model
Organizational Perspective
Several organizational development values and its associated tools can be adopted to manage stress in CBI.
OD values
1. Respect for people : Individuals are perceived as being responsible, conscientious and caring;
2. Trust and Support : Trust and supportive climate;
3. Power equalization : De-emphasize hierarchical authority and control;
4. Confrontation: Problems should not be kept under the rug. They should be openly confronted;
5. Participation : Involving people in decision making process;
OD Tools:
1. Sensitivity training or T-group training : Changing behaviour through unstructured group interactions;
2. Survey feedback : Assessing attitudes and perceptions of the members in organization;
3. Process Consultation : Inviting consultants to assess the work flow through informal relation among the unit members or through formal communication channels;
4. Team Building : Goal setting, development of interpersonal relations among team members, role analysis to clarify each member’s role and responsibilities and team process analysis.
5. Inter group development : It aims to change the attitudes, stereotypes and perceptions that groups have of each other.
6. Role Drama : Acting out role and analyse the roles.
References:
1. Bandura, A. (1977). Self-Efficacy: Toward a unifying theory of behaviour change. Psychological Review. 84, 191-215.
2. Chatterjee, A. (2006). Organizational Behaviour : Technology & Psychosocial Systems. New Delhi: Galgotia Publications Limited.
3. Pareek, U. (1993). Making Organizational Roles Effective. New Delhi: Tata McGraw-Hill Publishing Company Limited.
4. Robbins,S.P. (1993). Organizational Behaviour: Concepts, controversies and applications. New Delhi: Prentice Hall of India
Definition of Stress
There has been a considerable debate about definition of stress. Stress is often researched as stimulus, response and process. As stimulus, it is the environmental agent or stressor, as person, it is the non-specific response. And as process it is the cognitive appraisal system. Current discussion will give much emphasis on stress as process variable (Lazarus, 1966). There are two processes – primary and secondary. Primary process is person’s realization that something is at stake and secondary process is concerned with identification and availability of coping resources to deal with threat, harm or challenge. Therefore, stress is not as the cause rather is embedded in our cognitive appraisal system. This definition gives this notion as stress is not always unpleasant. Unpleasant depends upon one’s cognitive appraisal system.
Dewe et al., (1993) defined stress as a dynamic cognitive state. It is the disruption in homeostasis or an imbalance that gives rise to a requirement for resolution of that imbalance or restoration of homeostasis.
Stress can be understood as P-E fit or fitness between individual characteristics (ability, personality, values, attitudes, interest) and the environment (demand and supplies). Strain occurs when there is a misfit in transaction between Person and environment.
Strain
Poor P-E fitness causes strain. Strain can be understood by stress audit. In the context of organization, stress audit can be made in two ways as
- Individual Stress audit (Table 1)
- Organizational Stress audit (Table 2).
Table 1
Individual Stress Audit
Please indicate whether you have frequently had any of the following symptoms during the last year. Using the following scale: O: Never or rarely 1 : Sometimes 2 : Quite often 3 : Frequently or constantly- Head burn- Loss of appetite- Nausea/Vomiting- Abdominal pain- Irregular intestinal functioning- Insomnia- Headaches- Faints- Sexual lack of appetite- Nightmares- Palpitation- Trembling hands- Excessive sweating without physical exercise- Feeling of breathlessness without physical exercise- Loss of energy- Tiredness or weakness- Anxiety- Irritability - High strung- Backache- Apathy- Sadness
Table 2
Organizational Stress Audit
Please indicate whether you have frequently had any of the following symptoms during the last year. Using the following scale:
O: Never or rarely
1 : Sometimes
2 : Quite often
3 : Frequently or constantly
- Accidents
-Absenteeism and lateness (often masked by other health problems)
-High staff turnover and recruitment problems
-Low production and missed targets
-Grievances, aggression and conflict
-Poor decision making and frequent mistakes
-Reluctance to take risks and lack of creativity
-Poor communication and interdepartmental relations,
-A lack of team-working
-Poor customer care
-Resistance to change
-Low moral
-Anti-organization feelings,
- Destructive criticism
-A blame culture and lack of learning
Risk of illness due to stress can be assessed using Holmes and Rahe’s Stress Scale (Table 3).
Table 3
Holmes and Rahe Stress Scale
To measure stress according to the Holmes and Rahe Stress Scale, the number of "Life Change Units" that apply to events in the past year of an individual's life are added and the final score will give a rough estimate of how stress affects health.
Life event Life change units
Death of a spouse 100
Divorce 73
Marital separation 65
Imprisonment 63
Death of a close family member 63
Personal injury or illness 53
Marriage 50
Dismissal from work 47
Marital reconciliation 45
Retirement 45
Change in health of family member 44
Pregnancy 40
Sexual difficulties 39
Gain a new family member 39
Business readjustment 39
Change in financial state 38
Change in frequency of arguments 35
Major mortgage 32
Foreclosure of mortgage or loan 30
Change in responsibilities at work 29
Child leaving home 29
Trouble with in-laws 29
Outstanding personal achievement 28
Spouse starts or stops work 26
Begin or end school 26
Change in living conditions 25
Revision of personal habits 24
Trouble with boss 23
Change in working hours or conditions 20
Change in residence 20
Change in schools 20
Change in recreation 19
Change in church activities 19
Change in social activities 18
Minor mortgage or loan 17
Change in sleeping habits 16
Change in number of family reunions 15
Change in eating habits 15
Vacation 13
Christmas 12
Minor violation of law 11
Score of 300+: At risk of illness.
Score of 150-299+: Risk of illness is moderate (reduced by 30% from the above risk).
Score 150-: Only have a slight risk of illness.
STRESS IN CBI
The last half century has seen an enormous change in the nature of society and of the working pattern of law enforcement agencies like Central Bureau of Investigation or CBI particularly. Nature of investigation cases are rapidly changing with the change in users and their demands. Now-a-days, users are not merely police departments or the Govt. of India., court is entrusting CBI for investigation. The democratic set up of the Government demands CBI investigation more frequently. Registered cases are growing (Figure 1). And more and more public servants and gazetted officers are under suspicions. All the issues are making the working pattern of CBI more challenging. High challenging work environment with very high moral values (Industry, Impartiality and Integrity) causing stress on CBI officers.
Figure 1
(Data collected from http://www.cbi.gov.in/performance/performancemain.php)
Stress Management
Following the process model, management of stress in CBI can be conceptualised as developing fit between individual characteristics of CBI personnel and their job demands. Figure 2 presents stress process in CBI.
Figure 2
Stress process in CBI
Stress management (Ecological Perspective)
Figure 3 Ecological Approach
Individual Approach
Fitting individual’s self-perception and characteristic attitudes, values and behaviour with Job and organizational structure, technology and culture. Therefore, it is important to develop self-efficacy (Bandura, 1977) in managing stress. Self-efficacy refers to People's beliefs about their capabilities to produce effects. It can be developed through four ways :
1. Enactive Mastery experience : It refers to knowledge about the objectives supervisor expects from the officer; Officer should develop mastery over
· Selection of case
· Collection of evidence
· Quality and timeliness of files
· Promoting efficient of resources
· Net work support establishment
· Right court selection
· Selection of right time
· Placement of right charge
2. Vicarious experience : Supervisor should act as role model to the officer. Officer by imagination can develop relaxed role model of CBI officer.
3. Verbal persuasion : Communicating ideas, verbal recognition or praise may be given to officer by the supervisor for achievement.
4. Physiological and affective state : Progressive relaxation, Music therapy, Vibroacoustic therapy, Autogenic training, Time management, Cognitive behaviour therapy, Meditation or Yoga
Role Stress
Role Space Conflicts (Pareek, 1993)
Self-Role Distance: This stress arises out of the conflict between the self-concept and the expectations from the role, as perceived by the role occupant.
Intra-Role Conflict: Since an individual learns to develop expectations as a result of his socialization and identification with ‘significant’ others, it is quite likely that he sees certain incompatibility between the expectations (functions) of his role. For example, a professor may see incompatibility between the expectations of teaching students and of doing research. These may not be inherently conflicting, but the individual may perceive these as incompatible.
Role Stagnation: As the teacher grows older, the need for taking up a new role becomes crucial. This problem of role growth becomes acute especially when an individual who has occupied a role for a long time enters another role in which he may feel less secure. However, the new role demands that an individual outgrow the previous one and take charge of the new role effectively. This is bound to produce some stress. In college which are fast expanding, and which do not have any systematic strategy of manpower development, teachers are likely to experience this stress of role stagnation.
Role Ambiguity: When teacher is not clear about the various expectations that people have from his role the conflict that he faces is called role ambiguity. Role ambiguity may be due to lack of information available to the role occupant, or due to lack of understanding of the ‘cues’ available to him.
Role Expectation Conflict: When there are conflicting expectations or demands by different role senders (persons having expectations from the role), the role occupant may experience the stress. There may be conflicting from the boss, subordinates, peers or clients.
Role Overload: When the role occupant feels that there are too many expectations from the ‘significant’ others in his role set, he experiences role overload.
Role Erosion: A role occupant may feel that the functions which he would like to perform are being performed by some other role.
Resource Inadequacy: Resource inadequacy stress is experienced when the resources required by the role occupant for performing the role effectively are not available.
Personal Inadequacy: When a role occupant feels that he is not prepared to undertake the role effectively, he may experience this stress. This role occupant may feel that he does not have enough knowledge, skills, or training, or he/she has not had time to prepare for the assigned new roles without enough preparation or orientation are likely to experience this type of stress.
Role Isolation: the role occupant may feel that certain roles are psychologically closer to him, while others are a t a much greater distance. The main criterion of distance is the frequency and ease of interaction. When linkages are strong, the role isolation will be low & in the absence of strong linkages the role isolation will be high.
Change in Job characteristics
Hackman and Oldham’s Job characteristics model assumes five core job dimensions as:
- Skill variety describes the degree to which a job requires the exercise of a number of different skills, abilities, or talents. Such activities must not merely be different, but they must be distinct enough to require different skills.
- Task identity defines the extent to which a job requires completion of a whole and identifiable piece of work
- Task significance refers to the importance of the job; the degree to which the job has an impact on the lives of other people, the immediate organization or the external environment.
- Autonomy is the degree to which the jobholder is free to schedule the pace of his or her work and determine the procedures to be used.
- Feedback is the degree to which the individual doing a job obtains information about the effectiveness of the performance. Feedback does not only refer to supervisory feedback, but also the ability to observe the results of their work.
Figure 4
The Job Characteristics Model
Organizational Perspective
Several organizational development values and its associated tools can be adopted to manage stress in CBI.
OD values
1. Respect for people : Individuals are perceived as being responsible, conscientious and caring;
2. Trust and Support : Trust and supportive climate;
3. Power equalization : De-emphasize hierarchical authority and control;
4. Confrontation: Problems should not be kept under the rug. They should be openly confronted;
5. Participation : Involving people in decision making process;
OD Tools:
1. Sensitivity training or T-group training : Changing behaviour through unstructured group interactions;
2. Survey feedback : Assessing attitudes and perceptions of the members in organization;
3. Process Consultation : Inviting consultants to assess the work flow through informal relation among the unit members or through formal communication channels;
4. Team Building : Goal setting, development of interpersonal relations among team members, role analysis to clarify each member’s role and responsibilities and team process analysis.
5. Inter group development : It aims to change the attitudes, stereotypes and perceptions that groups have of each other.
6. Role Drama : Acting out role and analyse the roles.
References:
1. Bandura, A. (1977). Self-Efficacy: Toward a unifying theory of behaviour change. Psychological Review. 84, 191-215.
2. Chatterjee, A. (2006). Organizational Behaviour : Technology & Psychosocial Systems. New Delhi: Galgotia Publications Limited.
3. Pareek, U. (1993). Making Organizational Roles Effective. New Delhi: Tata McGraw-Hill Publishing Company Limited.
4. Robbins,S.P. (1993). Organizational Behaviour: Concepts, controversies and applications. New Delhi: Prentice Hall of India
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