Air University Review, July-August 1981

Coping with Managerial Stress

Four hundred years before the birth of Christ, Plato suggested that "all diseases of the body proceed from the mind or soul." Some 2000 years later he proved to be remarkably accurate. Contemporary experts believe that the mind is directly responsible for as much as ninety percent of all illness and disease.¹ Why it took so long to verify Plato’s observation seems obvious. The vast majority of human experience consisted of living in a world where survival was a constant, daily challenge. Questions raised by Plato and others were peripheral to this daily struggle for survival and therefore best left to the philosophers. Today we know better. Diseases produced by the mind can no longer be left to intellectual discussions. They are no longer a peripheral issue. They affect all of us everyday.

About forty years ago, Dr. Hans Selye, a Canadian biologist, identified the cause of these mentally produced illnesses. He called it stress. More recent research has validated Selye’s finding and expanded upon it. What is significant in the recent findings is the fact that all of us, whether we suffer personally from the effects of stress or not, pay for it. No longer can stress be considered a personal problem. Consider the following: in 1976, stress surpassed the common cold as America’s most prevalent health problem.² It is the number one cause of heart disease and has been directly related to such other maladies as hypertension, mental depression, migraine headaches, fever, colitis, fatigue, ulcers, allergies, excess clotting of the blood, and, most recently, cancer.³

The impact of all of this on the price we pay in terms of personal health and health care is obvious. Furthermore, stress affects the price we pay for consumer goods: estimates of the total cost of stress-related problems to industry have been placed in excess of $100 billion a year.⁴ Bethlehem Steel has reported that the cost of health insurance alone is a greater share of an automobile’s cost than steel,⁵ but the costs don’t stop there. Stress also affects the amount of taxes we pay; for the government is paying more and more of the nation’s health care costs. In 1950, the government share of the cost was 27 percent; by 1974, that figure had jumped to 40 percent of a much larger total.⁶

On the surface, the solution seems clear. Reduce stress and productivity will increase, while corollary costs will decrease. Unfortunately, the problem isn’t that simple. Stress is a necessary part of life, and its absence is in itself a kind of stress. Too little, as well as too much stress, can cause at worst death and at best decreased performance. Research supports this point. Behavioral scientists have found a link between stress, performance, and motivation.

Research into the question of stress and performance concluded that there is an inverted U-shaped relationship between stress and job performance. (See Figure 1.)

If there is no motivation to perform a job, no possible reward for performing the job well, or no ambition on the individual’s part, minimum effort will be expended. However, as the motivation level increases, the level of stress rises along with productivity and efficiency. The right amount of stress can turn a person on; it can lead to creativity, interest, and optimal performance. However, if the individual becomes too achievement oriented or too much turned on or if the demands and pressures of the job are too unrealistic and unreasonable, performance will again decline, for too much stress will sap a person’s health and mental ability.⁷ The significance of this to managers and supervisors is clear. We tend to overload the capable workers and underload the others. This is a natural tendency, but only recently have its results become known. The expression "You can ride a good horse to death," unfortunately, is more than just an expression.

Also significant in this regard is the explicit link between stress and motivation. A striking similarity exists between the inverted U-shaped model and the McClelland-Atkinson model on the relationship of motivation to probability of success. (See Figure 2.)

McClelland and Atkinson demonstrated that an individual is most highly motivated when the ultimate determination of success is the perception or estimate of a person’s own ability. As Figure 2 suggests, people are not usually highly motivated if the task is perceived as being too easy or too difficult. If a task is perceived as too easy, not enough stress is produced because motivation is low. Conversely, if the task assigned is perceived as too difficult to accomplish, performance also suffers, for the excess stress involved in attempting to satisfy unrealistic objectives drains a person's health and vigor.⁸ Obviously, a balance must be found between underload and overload if peak health and performance are to be maintained. This balance must be determined individually, not collectively, by the supervisor.

Although there are no easy solutions, there are behavioral patterns, skills, and attitudes that can be developed and used to deal with stress. To appreciate and accept these behaviors, skills, and attitudes, we must first look at what stress is and how it affects the body.

Most people have a similar idea of what stress is when they discuss it: tension, anxiety, and pressure. Despite this, finding a definition for stress that would meet with general agreement has not been possible because no two groups view stress in exactly the same way. To doctors, stress is a medical problem; to counselors, an emotional problem; and to managers, a management problem. However, research does point to two common threads of agreement. First, despite the fact that the body’s exclusive reaction to stress was designed to ensure survival in a life-or-death situation, the dangers in the environment now tend to be most often associated with nonviolent threats. Today, man-made, social threats are the most stressful.⁹ Second, social stress seems to be initiated by an intellectual rather than emotional activity. It is the individual’s interpretation of an event that makes it stressful. Only when the mind perceives an event as threatening do the emotions signal the body to react physiologically.¹⁰

Dr. Barbara Brown of the UCLA Medical Center has defined stress in relation to these two common, psychologically based threads. According to Brown, stress is "a perception of the social environment that constitutes a threat to our social well-being."¹¹ These social threats range from competition for mates and jobs to loss of esteem or social standing to a fear of failing. Brown describes the two intellectual activities that determine whether an event is stressful as "expectation" and "perception." Past experience dictates our expectations regarding an event. The event is then perceived in relation to expectations. If the two match, the situation is not stressful; if they do not match, we react by worrying.¹²

Worrying is basically a problem-solving activity.¹³ There are two types of worrying: productive and nonproductive. Productive worrying includes coping, understanding, rationalizing, or living with the differences. Conversely, nonproductive worrying is frustrated worrying, which leads to rumination (the act of meditating). Ruminating creates mental images of the events that led to the stressful situation. These images then continue to activate the physiological reaction to stress, which recreates the stress again and again. It appears as if these mental images are the most important consequences of stress.¹⁴ What causes nonproductive worrying? Dr. Gerald Piaget attributes it to what he calls "the try harder fallacy." In novel situations we use old solutions; if the old strategy doesn’t work, we try harder.¹⁵

It would appear that adaptability and flexibility are two personal characteristics necessary to mitigate stressful situations. Dr. Paul Rosch, President of the American Institute of Stress, says it this way: "It’s not stress so much but the individual’s ability to adapt to or cope with it that appears to be important in the production of disease states."¹⁶ This opinion is further supported by Dr. Robert J. Samp of the University of Wisconsin. In a study of 200 Americans who lived longer than average, he found that all of them tended to share a common characteristic: they adapted to life’s changes.¹⁷ Perhaps this point is summed up best by the American theologian, educator, and author Reinhold Niebuhr, who wrote: "God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change; courage to change the things I can; and wisdom to know the difference."¹⁸

Although all definitions of stress have been challenged, most researchers do agree on how stress affects the body. Simply, the body has only one way of responding to stress. Regardless of whether the stressor is someone with a gun threatening our life or a reprimand from our boss, the body always responds the same way.¹⁹ Dr. Walter Cannon of Harvard coined the phrase "fight or flight pattern" to describe the body’s exclusive reaction.²⁰

Immediately on perceiving an event as stressful, the brain reacts by stimulating the hypothalamus to control involuntary muscles and organs. Concurrently, the hypothalamus signals the pituitary glands to send a hormone (ACTH) to the adrenal glands. This injection signals the adrenals to manufacture two chemicals necessary to deal with stress: adrenalin and cortisone. Adrenalin functions as a stimulant to increase the heart rate and raise blood pressure, which in turn increases perspiration and affects the salivary glands, causing the mouth to become dry. Cortisone rushes through the bloodstream, sending out substances to fight infection. The muscles begin to tighten in preparation for absorbing blows. The stomach suspends activity. Undigested food begins to ferment, causing excess acid, indigestion, heartburn, and eventually ulcers. The spleen releases more red blood corpuscles, which enables the blood to clot more quickly. Additional white blood corpuscles are produced in the bone marrow to help fight infection. Oxygen-carrying red blood cells consume food to produce energy. To provide additional energy, the adrenals increase the amount of fat and cholesterol in the blood, and the liver is directed to increase the amount of sugar. The body is now prepared to meet a physical threat.²¹

This physiological reaction evolved over millions of years and was well suited to our Stone Age ancestors. It allowed them to reach peak efficiency quickly, prepared either to stand and fight or to run, depending on their perception of the odds. Regardless of the outcome of their decision, immediate action was taken that automatically dissipated the physiological buildup. Unfortunately, contemporary society frowns on both killing a competitor and running away in disgrace. This single factor has caused stress to become a significant contemporary problem. Without a release for the psychologically induced fight-or-flight pattern, stress continues to build up until the body’s system is pushed to the limit. The system then begins to break down.

Dr. Hans Selye, the discoverer of the stress phenomenon, has been particularly interested in this aspect. His research led him to develop the concept he calls "the general adaption syndrome." The syndrome has three phases: alarm reaction, stage of resistance, and stage of exhaustion. (See Figure 3.) The alarm reaction occurs when stress is first perceived. Initially, the body’s resistance is lowered as the body begins to adapt. The stage of resistance begins if the continued exposure to the stressor is compatible with the adaptation that occurs during the first phase. During phase two the body’s resistance rises above normal. If the body has a long and continuous exposure to the same stressor, eventually the adaptive energy becomes exhausted. The symptoms of the alarm reaction reappear, except now they become irreversible, and death follows.²²

It follows from Selye’s research that it is important to develop a sensitivity to the physical and emotional reactions to stress by recognizing the symptoms that precede the exhaustion stage. Stress manifests itself in several ways: anxiety, irritability, heavy drinking, restlessness, and difficulty sleeping, concentrating, and making decisions. Emotional states tend to display themselves in bodily reactions, such as headaches, an increase in the heart rate, backaches, knots in the stomach, or indigestion. The physical ailments are usually much easier to identify than the emotional ones; however, both are warning signals that there is an imbalance in the system. During times of imbalance it is easiest to identify the situations that caused the imbalance and take corrective action. Conversely, constantly ignoring these symptoms will eventually, as Selye notes, lead to a breakdown of the entire system.²³

From his point of view as a biologist, Selye described stress as ". . . the nonspecific response of the body to demands placed upon it."²⁴ What is meant by nonspecific is that even though all causes of stress are specific (e.g., a reprimand from the boss, a fight with a spouse), and all the results from these causes are specific too (e.g., ulcers, headaches, heart attacks, etc.), no specific cause leads to a specific event. Even though all parts of the body are equally exposed to stress, the weakest part will suffer first. What this weakest part is depends on such factors as age, genetic predisposition, sociocultural environment, and individual behavior patterns.²⁵

Although stress affects everyone, managers, by the very nature of their jobs, tend to face more stressful situations than the rest of the working population.²⁶ In fact, an executive stress organization, after analyzing a major U.S. corporation’s top managers, found that 21 of the company’s 22-man executive committee were suffering from some serious, stress-related illness.²⁷ Also, research indicates that individuals reaching the management levels of their organizations tend to display behavioral patterns closely associated with a vulnerability toward stress. The seminal work in this area was done by cardiologists Meyer Friedman and Ray Rosenman.

Doctors Friedman and Rosenman have found that certain behavioral patterns relate very closely to a vulnerability toward stress-related illness in general and heart disease in particular, while other patterns tend to be more resistant. Friedman and Rosenman have referred to these personalities as Type A and Type B, respectively.²⁸

The Type A personality is the most stress-prone. The more common characteristics of Type A people are excessive competitive drive, impatience, and a significant sense of urgency and time. They tend to try to accomplish too much or become involved in too many activities. To compensate, they try to put more and more into less and less time. Type A people do this in a number of ways. The two most common are to create suspenses for themselves if none exist and to use quantity rather than quality as their measure of success. For many, their drive puts them on the edge of habitual hostility. They normally have few sources of diversion outside their work and tend to feel somewhat guilty if they are not working. They bring to their "playtime" the same competitive drive—whether they are playing Monopoly with their children or a game of tennis or golf with friends; they go all out to win. This competitiveness, of course, discounts the benefits of play and relaxation, and makes stress a constant companion.²⁹

In contrast, Type B personalities are much more relaxed, easygoing, and free from the habits of a Type A. They are not driven by the clock, are more patient, and feel less hostility. When they play or exercise, they relax and have fun without the need constantly to prove that they are superior.³⁰

Compounding the stress difficulties of Type A people is the fact that they are more likely to ruminate than Type Bs. What Piaget refers to as the try harder fallacy, Friedman and Rosenman call stereotyped behavior:

More and more, again to save time, the Type A subject tends to think and do things in exactly the same way. Consciously or not, the Type A man apparently feels that if he can bring the previously "coded" thought and action processes again to bear on a new task, he can accomplish it faster. He more and more substitutes "faster" for 'better" or "different" in his way of thinking and doing. In other words, he indulges in stereotyped responses.³¹

At the conclusion of their ten-year study, Friedman and Rosenman found that there was a strong correlation between Type A behavior and coronary heart disease. On the average, Type A men were almost three times more likely to develop coronary heart disease than Type B men.³² This study supported and complemented an earlier research effort by Dr. Flanders Dunbar at New York’s Columbia Presbyterian Medical Center.

In 1943, Dr. Dunbar attempted to draw a relationship between personality traits and various disorders associated with emotional problems. Her study revealed a large number of highly trained managers who had suffered heart attacks. All of these men shared one common characteristic: a compulsive striving to achieve. As Dr. Dunbar stated, "They would rather die than fail."³³

Significantly, Friedman and Rosenman estimate that more than half of all Americans are Type A and that the frequency of Type A behavior is increasing. They attribute this to the fact that Type A behavior is encouraged and rewarded in American society. After all, the hard-driving, achievement-oriented person is considered the organization’s most valuable asset and therefore a likely candidate for promotion to a management position.³⁴

Interestingly, after Friedman and Rosenman concluded their study of men, they conducted the same study on women. Again, they found that the prevalence of heart disease was far more frequent in Type A women than in Type B. Although statistically women suffer less heart disease than men, Friedman and Rosenman attribute this to the comparatively small number of Type A women in our society. Historically, American culture has not nurtured or rewarded Type A behavior in women. However, today more and more women are being groomed to enter the business world. Eventually, as Friedman and Rosenman suggest, the women will find themselves with the same frequency of heart disease as men.³⁵

There is some historic support for the Friedman and Rosenman assumption regarding women. For example, during the Victorian age when most of the pressures and responsibilities were aimed at women, seven of every ten cases of ulcers belonged to women.³⁶ Despite this, there is some disagreement. Dr. Tobias W. Brocher, a psychiatrist and mental health seminar director for the Menninger Foundation, thinks differently. He believes that although the next few years will be very stressful for women as they break into previously all-male domains, eventually, as they become established and less isolated, they will be better able to cope with stress than men.³⁷ Obviously, more research is needed in this area.

Regardless of some areas of disagreement, the Friedman and Rosenman thesis in general is well supported. For example, an American Management Association (AMA) study revealed that Type A managers experienced more stress on all surveyed factors than Type Bs. Significantly, Type A managers stated that they were often confronted with heavy workloads and unrealistic deadlines, while the Type B managers perceived the very same jobs quite differently.³⁸

For this reason, managers are encouraged to determine whether they have a Type A personality. Friedman and Rosenman suggest that if there is some doubt, chances are the individuals are Type A—perhaps not fully developed, but enough so that thought should be given to changing. They further advise that when people assess themselves, they should talk to a spouse, relative, or friend who knows them well. They say this is necessary because many Type A people are completely unaware of their Type A behavior patterns. In fact, of every five people who display, beyond doubt, Type A behavior, four will deny or minimize the intensity of their behavior.³⁹ Therefore, if there is a disagreement, the individuals doing the assessment are probably wrong.⁴⁰

If it is determined that Type A behavior patterns are present, Friedman and Rosenmart suggest adopting some of the personality and behavioral patterns of a Type B. The following are some of their suggestions:

• Allow more time for activities than they seem to require.
• Wake up 15 to 20 minutes earlier than usual and spend the time doing almost anything, from taking a walk to reading the paper, or just taking longer to eat breakfast.
• Develop the habit of listening to people without interrupting.
• Cultivate the habit of smiling at people, even strangers.
• Drop acquaintances who are consistently annoying.
• Frequent restaurants and theaters where delays can be expected.
• Avoid appointments at definite times, if possible.
• Carry a book around and read it when required to wait.
• Verbalize appreciation to workers and others who perform their jobs well.
• Avoid the phrase "I told you so."
• And find time each day to be alone.

Friedman and Rosenman also believe that Type A people are at their worst while driving a car. Their advice is purposely to avoid passing a slower car, even if the chance arises. They suggest levying a penalty each time a slower car is passed. One possibility is to slow down and let the car repass you. Most important, they advise people always to maintain a sense of humor, especially regarding themselves. A sense of humor about ourselves is acknowledgment of the fact that we are imperfect human beings.⁴¹

Obviously, any attempts at wholesale personality changes are doomed to failure. It is extremely difficult to develop new behavioral patterns that may run counter to impulses and habits that have been developed over a lifetime.⁴² Therefore, it may be more effective to begin modestly. Select one of the previously mentioned suggestions and apply it. When it becomes an automatic response, not requiring conscious activity, select another pattern and repeat the process. Although it is desirable to adopt as many Type B behavioral tendencies as possible, it is the total accumulation of the various behaviors and skills that will ultimately move stress to and maintain it at each person’s optimal level.

Thus far I have discussed what stress is, how it affects the body, and the behavioral patterns of stress-prone people. Now, let’s turn our attention to the leading causes of stress on the job and what can be done to help us cope.

In 1979, the American Management Association (AMA) sponsored a research study into the area of executive stress. The objective of the study was to determine managers’ perceptions of what they find most stressful on the job and the methods they use to cope effectively.⁴³

The following are leading causes of stress on the job as perceived by the managers surveyed, in order of significance: heavy workload and its concomitant time pressures and unrealistic deadlines; the disparity between what must be done on the job and what the manager would like to accomplish: the general organizational "political" climate; and lack of feedback on job performance.⁴⁴

It is significant that heavy workload and time pressures were rated as the number one cause of stress on the job. The relationship between this perception and a Type A personality is clear. Friedman and Rosenman have reported that time urgency represents over fifty percent of a Type A’s behavioral pattern.⁴⁵

The AMA reports that the three most effective skills that managers use to deal with time pressures are delegating responsibility, selectively worrying about only the most important stress-producing situations, and establishing daily goals and setting priorities to accomplish important objectives.⁴⁶

Few effective managers reach levels of responsibility without a basic understanding of the concept of delegation. Therefore, the discussion will focus on the quality of the delegation, as it relates to stress, and not on the basic principles of delegation.

There seems to be a tendency in many organizations to place people in either overly stressful or tedious positions. Many managers then exacerbate this problem in their method of delegating. Delegation is usually done to relieve hard-pressed managers by sharing their responsibility with subordinates. However, where practiced, delegation usually increases a manager’s stress. Managers tend to delegate the routine parts of their job and the more structured problems. The time saved is then spent worrying about the most stress-producing problems. By delegating in this way, managers increase their personal stress portfolio. To be most effective, it would appear that managers should delegate some of their more stressful responsibilities. This would serve a dual purpose. It would reduce the stress level of overloaded managers and increase the stress level of underloaded subordinates.⁴⁷ As Peter Drucker puts it: ". . . just figure out what others can do and have them do it. Its that simple."⁴⁸

After effective delegation has balanced the stress load, the next step is to prioritize the duties that remain. By doing this, managers will find it easier to establish daily goals and set priorities.

Time management expert Alan Lakein suggests using an ABC approach to prioritizing tasks. He suggests that managers make a list of all tasks they perform, without regard to importance. Once the list is established, they should then compare the items on the list. Those items on the list that will yield the highest value to the manager should be marked with an A; those with medium value, a B; and those with a low value, a C. The list should then be further refined and priorities assigned by comparing like values. All tasks marked A should be recategorized by using Al, A2, etc. After this is done, managers should be able to spend their problem-solving (worry) time more effectively and with less stress. By forcing themselves to concentrate on as few tasks as possible, the ABC system offers assistance in mitigating one of the Type A’s behavioral patterns, that of trying to be a "one-man band."⁴⁹

The second leading cause of stress on the job is the disparity between what managers must do and what they would like to do. This is a somewhat more complex problem. This finding shows the importance of having jobs that fit abilities and needs. If individuals find no satisfaction in their work, they will not be able to realize their full potential. If they cannot reconcile their individual objectives with those of the organization, the consequences will be a lack of self-fulfillment and daily frustration. If this is the case, managers would be wise to consider another job.⁵⁰

The first two leading causes of stress are within the manager’s own ability to control. Factors three and four, the general "political" climate of the organization and lack of feedback on the job, require the assistance of the organization. As the survey reported, if the organizational atmosphere conveys the perception that "it’s not what you know but whom you know," the organization will tend to be a very stressful place to work.⁵¹ The organization loses in these cases, too. Studies have pointed out that there is a direct and significant correlation between organizational climate and job performance. Poor climates tend to yield minimum performance.⁵²

As my purpose is to identify the skills a manager can develop and use to control stress, I will not delve into how to improve an organization’s climate. If the problem seems significant enough, based on turnover, absenteeism, and other pertinent factors, thought should be given to hiring a management consultant to evaluate the climate and make recommendations for change.

Thus far, the skills mentioned were directly applicable to specific causes of stress. Unfortunately, many of these specific causes are beyond an individual’s control. Few people can just get up and leave their jobs because the jobs are not satisfying. Even fewer people are in a position to influence their organization’s climate. Therefore, something must be said about coping skills of a general nature.

Coping with stress beyond one’s control presents a significant potential danger. Familiar home remedies include a couple of martinis at lunch and again in the evening to calm the nerves; cigarettes by the pack to get through the day; overeating our problems away; and, above all, pills and more pills. In fact, the largest-selling prescription in the world is Valium, a tranquilizer used to relieve the minor symptoms of stress. In management circles, Valium has been called the "Executive Excedrin."⁵³ All these so-called home remedies are effective short-term stress relievers; sadly, their long-term effects far outweigh any temporary relief they may provide.

Fortunately, new techniques are available as well as some safe and effective traditional methods. The new techniques are primarily aimed at relieving stress by allowing individuals to control their physical response to stress or to develop a healthier attitude toward themselves and their lives. Among the new approaches to stress control are biofeedback and meditation. Some of the more traditional approaches include a program of physical exercise and involvement in religious activities.

Of the newer approaches to stress control, biofeedback is perhaps the most novel. It was introduced in the 1920s, when a German psychiatrist, Hans Berger, discovered that the brain gives off electrical signals that can be measured by a recording machine, now called the electroencephalograph or EEG. Berger identified four types of brain signals, each of which has since been identified with a Greek letter: Beta, Alpha, Theta, and Delta.⁵⁴

When the brain is most active, as when an individual is under stress, it emits Beta waves; when an individual relaxes, the brain emits Alpha waves; deep thoughts provoke Theta waves; and sleep sends out Delta waves. During the biofeedback session, each of these waves is signaled back to the individual through flashing lights or clicking sounds. For example, Beta waves are translated into loud sounds and Alpha waves into a quieter tone. Individuals are then connected to the biofeedback apparatus, most commonly an electromyograph (EMG). The EMG is designed to measure the waves and reproduce the appropriate sound. Individuals are then asked to lower the tone of the clicking sounds. Each time the individual tenses the sound gets louder; when the individual relaxes, the tone softens. By being able to hear the pitch of the EMG tone, individuals are able to control the tension level within their bodies.⁵⁵

As exotic as it sounds, biofeedback appears to offer some distinct advantages over other stress-reduction programs. It takes less time away from the job; it is cheaper than many other methods; and its effectiveness can be objectively measured.

A typical biofeedback program requires only about twelve training sessions of one hour each. Normally, the sessions are conducted twice per week. It would appear relatively easy to work this time into even a busy manager’s schedule. The cost, too, compares very favorably with other stress-reduction programs. A standard charge runs about $250 for the complete program. The objectivity of the method is self-evident. Once through the program, individuals are able to reduce Beta waves to Alpha waves by applying the same mental images they used to reduce Beta to Alpha waves on the EMG.⁵⁶

The ability to control bodily reactions mentally is not new. It has been claimed by Oriental mystics for centuries. Yoga and Zen Buddhism, for example, are methods of individual meditation used to achieve increased awareness of consciousness and well-being, as well as control over heartbeat, breathing, and other bodily processes. The desire of many Americans for stress relief has led to an increasing popularity of various forms of Oriental mysticism.

The most popular of these forms is transcendental meditation or TM. TM was introduced into the United States in the 1960s by an Indian monk named Maharishi Mahesh Yogi. Today, TM has more than a million American advocates, including stress expert Hans Selye.⁵⁷

At the core of TM’s wide appeal is its basic simplicity. Training involves only two lectures and one hour of individual attention. As part of their training, individuals receive their mantra, an easy to pronounce but meaningless word which individuals can focus on. Once out of training, meditation requires only two, twenty-minute periods a day. Few people have trouble fitting these periods of meditation into their schedules.⁵⁸

TM received a scientific boost in 1974, when two Harvard doctors, Robert Wallace and Herbert Benson, reported that regular meditation can reduce stress.⁵⁹ Following is a report of their study:

The experiments showed that when subjects meditated, their bodies relaxed in such a way as to reverse the reactions associated with stress. A reduction in the consumption of oxygen and the release of carbon dioxide indicated that the rate of energy production, which increases with stress, had gone down. Blood pressure, another direct indicator of stress, was not reduced by meditation itself; pressure went down during the relaxation preceding meditation, but it then stayed at the low level. Still another indicator of stress—the skin’s resistance to electricity—declined. And the concentration of a chemical called lactate, which is known to increase when stress occurs, also decreased sharply.⁶⁰

Although proven effective, biofeedback and meditation, because of their rather specialized nature, have thus far been limited to relatively few people. However, there are many other methods of a more traditional nature that are available to just about everyone. Two of these methods include physical exercise and involvement in religion.

I have selected physical exercise for inclusion in this article for two reasons. One is the already large and growing popularity of jogging as a form of physical exercise. The other reason is the danger that jogging presents to Type A people. Friedman and Rosenman are adamant on this point. They claim that Type A people do not know how to exercise properly and therefore should avoid it. They base their claim on the fact that Type A people are extremely competitive by nature and cannot establish a sensible, moderate jogging schedule and stick to it. The two miles a day soon becomes five and eventually ten, until the stress on the heart becomes too much. According to Friedman and Rosenman, jogging is responsible for more deaths in Type A people than any other individual factor:

Approximately 200,000 American men who had never experienced a single symptom of coronary heart disease died suddenly last year. From our own studies of scores of these cases, we have learned . . .more than a third of these men died during or a few minutes after indulging in strenuous activity. In many cases, moreover, the men had been exercising strenuously, regularly, and for years prior to their demise.⁶¹

Moderate physical exercise, on the other hand, does not seem to cause the same cardiac problems that strenuous exercise does. Therefore, moderate exercise can be an excellent stress control technique. Friedman and Rosenman advise potential exercisers to get a check-up first and then work out an exercise program suitable to their present condition. They conclude with this final piece of advice:

Never take a wristwatch or stopwatch with you when you do your exercises. . . .Type A subjects tend to want to time themselves. This miserable offshoot of numeration and/or "hurry sickness" is a particularly pathetic—and deadly-characteristic of some Type A joggers.⁶²

One of the least researched methods of stress control, yet one that appears with startling frequency in books and periodicals dealing with stress, is religious faith. In fact, even though the American Management Association did not include religion in its recent survey, it showed up as a recurring theme in the returned questionnaires. The following is typical of the comments they received:

It’s disappointing to find no reference . . . to the one solution to stress that has literally changed my life during the past nine years. In 1969 I became a committed Christian and have since experienced the reality of Christ in my life. This has had a profound impact on all interpersonal relationships: family, job, community, etc.⁶³

The hope and courage engendered by faith have been expressed in stories of personal tragedy and triumph for more than 5000 years. Rose Kennedy had two sons assassinated, one in killed in combat, a daughter killed in an airplane crash, and another daughter who is mentally retarded. Mrs. Kennedy gives her faith the credit for her surviving those traumas:

I have come to the conclusion that the most important element in human life is faith. From faith, and through it, we come to a new understanding of ourselves and all the world about us. It puts everything into a spiritual focus.⁶⁴

By now, two things are obvious. First, the skills, behaviors, and attitudes mentioned here are just a few of many available to people help combat stress. Second, there is no one best way to control stress. One person’s nourishment may well be another’s poison. What is important is for each individual to have some program for dealing with stress. The results of having no methods at all may be disastrous.

Perhaps Charles Knight put it best when quoting advice his father had given him,

. . . your health comes first; without that you have nothing. The family comes second. Your business comes third. You better recognize and organize those first two, so that you can take care of the third.⁶⁵

Stress represents a dichotomy. It is both an asset and an anathema. It is neither possible nor desirable to eliminate stress from life. Stress is part of motivation; you can’t have one without the other. When kept within tolerable limits, it represents a driving force to achieve and accomplish. However, evidence shows that when internal or external circumstances create either too much or too little stress, the result will be a decrease in performance and ultimately a breakdown in health. Meanwhile, the costs associated with these underloaded and overloaded postures are felt directly or indirectly by everyone. Be it in the form of increased costs for health care, or goods and services, or taxes, stress has become much more than a "personal problem."

Compounding the difficulty of coping with stress is the body’s own mechanism for responding to stress. Although the causes of stress have evolved throughout time—from the daily fight for physical survival of our Stone Age ancestors to the daily fight for psychological survival of contemporary humankind—the body’s reaction has remained the same. To ensure survival, nature has equipped us with an automatic, stereotyped response to stress. This has created the dilemma of living in a twentieth-century world with a biological nature largely shaped by evolution to deal with Ice Age problems. That nature is a conglomeration of genetic adaptations to an environment that has largely vanished. It does not help a manager who is sweating over a budget to have quick clotting blood.

Since human genetic adaptation changes with a geological leisureliness, people must have alternate methods of coping in an ever-changing world that is constantly imposing novel circumstances. Research has shown that people can, in fact, modify instinctive responses. Perhaps that is the one thing that sets human beings apart from all other living creatures: they need not be a slave to their genes. People can, through conscious thought, control nature’s dictates. However, it is best to modify those instincts now rather than wait for the irresistible force of necessity to demand it. For, as Ben Franklin once said, "Necessity never made a good bargain."

You can increase your capacity to deal with stress in three primary ways. You can reduce the quantity and/or difficulty of the tasks that confront you; you can reduce the time pressures you are under to complete the tasks; and you can increase your coping skills through education.

Interestingly, and significantly, almost all of the techniques for coping with stress involve applying the very principles that behavioral scientists have been advocating for years. Delegation of authority, for example, has proved effective in reducing stress. At the same time, delegation implies a trust and confidence in subordinates to accomplish the delegated assignments successfully. Delegating without this trust and confidence would appear to be self-defeating, as the delegating managers would probably spend their time worrying about whether the subordinate can and will do the job. Not only is it good management to apply these skills but it also makes good sense from a health standpoint.

In addition to applying behavioral science principles at the workplace, there are other methods that can be used, too. Some people meditate, others exercise, and still others find comfort in their religious faith as their most meaningful way to cope with stress. Regardless of the methods used, the ultimate purpose of all stress control methods is the same: to demobilize the stress response as soon as it is not needed. By returning the body and mind to a more harmonious and normal state, people can conserve energy for subsequent situations.

Practicing stress-control methods appears to enable people to acquire mental, emotional, and physical tranquility on an enduring basis. Knowledge about oneself increases the ability of people to develop greater individual control, a sense of mastery over their own lives, their own difficulties, and their own problems.

U.S. Air Force Senior Noncommissioned Officer Academy

1. Barbara Brown, "Mind: The Cause and Cure of Stress Disorders," First Annual Southern Conference of Health Care, Atlanta, Georgia, 26-28 October 1979. Hereafter referred to as "Mind."

2. Rose Mary Rummel and John W. Radar, "Coping with Executive Stress," Personnel Journal, June 1978, p. 305.

3. "Family Sickness," Time, 24 November 1975, p.73; Paul Rosch, "How Music and Laughter Can Keep Stress from Killing You." US, November 13, 1979, pp. 32-32; Rummel and Radar, p. 305; Kiril Sokoloff, "Tension at the Top," SKY, August 1979, pp. 60-61; Ogden Tanner, Stress (Alexandria, Virginia, 1976), p. 130; "The Big Squeeze," Time, November 26, 1979, p. 103.

4. Sokoloff, p. 60.

5. Regina Herzlinger, "Can We Control Health Care Costs?" Harvard Business Review, March-April 1978, p. 102.

6. Ibid., p 103.

7. Ari Kiev and Vera Kohn, "Executive Stress," An AMA Study Report (New York, 1979), p. 10.

8. Paul Hersey and Kenneth Blanchard, Management of Organizational Behavior: Utilizing Human Resources (Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey, 1977), p. 26.

9. Dan Gowler and Karen Legge, editors, Managerial Stress (New York, 1975), p. 22; Brown, "Mind."

10. Barbara Brown, Stress and the Art of Biofeedback (New York, 1977), pp. 28, 35-36; Meyer Friedman and Ray H. Rosenman, Type A Behavior and Your Heart (New York, 1974), pp. 38, 200;

Gowler and Legge, p. 23; Richard S. Lazarus, "Positive Denial: The Case for Not Facing Reality," Interview, Psychology Today, November 1979, pp. 52-53; Barbara Brown, "Mind"; Oliver L.

Niehouse and Karen B. Massoni, "Stress—An inevitable Part of Change," S.A.M. Advanced Management Journal, Spring 1979, p. 19; Tanner, p. 18.

11. Brown, "Mind."

12. Ibid.

13. Ibid., pp. 36-38; Friedman and Rosenman, pp. 87-88; Lazarus, p. 51.

14. Brown, "Mind."

15. Gerald W. Piaget, "Barriers to Change," Lecture delivered at First Annual Southern Conference on the Psychology of Health Care, Atlanta, Georgia, 26-28 October 1979.

16. Rosch, p. 32.

17. Lloyd Shearer, "On Living Longer," Parade, December 30, 1979, p. 6.

18. A prayer given to parishioners in Heath, Massachusetts, 1934.

19. Hans Selye, Stress without Distress (New York, 1974), p. 29.

20. Tanner, p. 11.

21. Friedman and Rosenman, pp. 201-6; Kiev and Kohn, p. 6; Rummell and Rader, p. 306; Tanner, pp. 11-13; David Zimmerman, "The Battle against Stress," SKY, February 1978, p. 51.

22. Selye, p. 39.

23. Kiev and Kohn, p. 7.

24. Selye, p. 27.

25. Friedman and Rosenman, p. 6; Selye, pp. 27-30.

26. John J. Tarrant, Drucker: The Man Who Invented the Corporate Society (New York, 1976), pp. 126, 130.

27. Sokoloff, p. 61.

28. Friedman and Rosenman, pp. 9-10, 97-106.

29. Ibid., pp. 14, 180-84; Meyer Friedman, "Modification of Type A Behavior," lecture, First Annual Southern Conference on the Psychology of Health Care, Atlanta, Georgia, 26-28 October 1979.

30. Friedman and Rosenman, p. 103.

31. Ibid., pp. 87-88.

32, Ibid., p. 80.

33. Tanner, p. 139.

34. Friedman and Rosenman, pp. 85, 193-98; Kiev and Kohn, p. 10.

35. Friedman and Rosenman, pp. 78-79.

36. Tanner, p. 133.

37. Zimmerman, p. 52.

38. Kiev and Kohn, p. 24.

39. Friedman and Rosenman, p. 209.

40. Ibid., pp. 99-100, 105.

41. Ibid., pp. 206-71.

42. Ibid., p. 235; Hersey and Blanchard, pp. 28-29.

43. Kiev and Kohn, p. 2.

44. Ibid.

45. Friedman and Rosenman, p. 236.

46. Kiev and Kohn, p. 39.

47. Gowler and Legge, pp. 31-33.

48. Tarrant, p. 96.

49. Alan Lakein, How to Get Control of Your Time and Your Life (New York, 1973), pp. 25-27.

50. Kiev and Kohn, p. 3.

51. Ibid.

52. Don Hellriegel and John A. Slocum, "Organizational Climate: Measures, Research and Contingencies," Academy of Management Journal, June 1974, pp. 255-80.

53. Niehouse and Massoni, p. 18.

54. Ibid., pp. 189-90.

55. Robert C. Ford and Jack Hartje, "Biofeedback and Management Stress," Human Resource Management, Fall 1978, p. 13; Niehouse and Massoni, pp. 189-90; "No Deux ex Machina," Time,

December 8, 1975, p. 57; Tanner, p. 142.

56. Ford and Hartje, p. 14.

57. Tanner, pp. 144-45.

58. Ibid., p. 145.

59. Walter McQuade and Ann Aikman, Stress: What It Is, What It Can Do to Your Health, How to Fight Back (New York, 1974), p. 179.

60. Tanner, p. 145.

61. Friedman and Rosenman, p. 182.

62. Ibid., p. 289.

63. Kiev and Kohn, p. 41.

64. Tanner, p. 159.

65. Marshall Loeb, "A Guide to Taking Charge," Time, February 25, 1980, p. 82.

Contributor

Chief Master Sergeant Mark H. Topper (B.S., Troy State University) is Chief, Human Behavior Management Section, Curriculum Division, USAF Senior Noncommissioned Officer Academy, Gunter Air Force Station, Alabama, and Air Force Management Consultant for the Leadership and Management Development Center. Chief Topper is a graduate of Academic Instructor School, Maxwell AFB, Alabama, and the Technical Instructor Course, Amarillo AFB, Texas.

The conclusions and opinions expressed in this document are those of the author cultivated in the freedom of expression, academic environment of Air University. They do not reflect the official position of the U.S. Government, Department of Defense, the United States Air Force or the Air University.

Air & Space Power Home Page | Feedback? Email the Editor