Evaluation
Intense working, perceived apathy by many line and senior managers and an unapproachable Human Resources Department have combined to ensure that employees at Edge Hill are suffering from severe levels of work-related stress. The emotional and physical manifestations of the high levels of work-related stress experienced at Edge Hill are varied and, at times, life-threatening. Whilst structural and cultural changes play a significant role in determining the levels of stress for employees at Edge Hill, the decisions made by managers are at least as important if not more so.
Structural Change
People working in academic institutions have been subjected to a range of stress-giving factors. An extension of surveillance methods into all areas of academic work through peer observation of teaching, line manager observation of teaching, ‘quality’ reviews and surveillance of electronic and telephonic communications can increase the likelihood that work-related stress eventuates. At the same time, the government in power has been pursuing a ‘cost-minimisation’ strategy while seeking to broaden access to higher education.
There has been a diminution in the pay and social status of academic staff over the last 15 years compared to other professional groups (Keep et al., 1996). As Kinman (1998:p7) points out, "there is powerful evidence that widespread changes in policy and practice have led to a significant increase in workload and job-related pressures for many British academic and academic-related staff".
Culture Change
Although there has been a proliferation of customer service rhetoric in the higher education sector, academic work has been less affected by pressures to manage emotions (the outward presentation of our feelings through learned social codes – Gabriel, Fineman and Sims, 2000:p160) than other occupations. Airline cabin crew (Hochschild, 1983) and supermarket checkout operators (Ogbonna and Wilkinson, 1990), for example, have been under severe pressure to manage their emotions when interacting with ‘customers’.
Nonetheless, academic work does involve high levels of emotion management. Lecture and seminar contact, feedback on formal and informal assessments and the presentation of conference papers can require high levels of emotion management. Frequently, the way in which these emotions are managed is through their suppression. The suppression of emotions can detrimentally impact upon levels of work-related stress. As Noon and Blyton (1997: p122) suggest, engagement in emotional labour often involves the masking of particular feelings:
As social actors we all learn through processes of socialisation in families, schools, and elsewhere how to control and 'manage' emotions in different contexts. Many children, for example, are taught not to be overwhelmed by adversity, but rather to persevere by
'putting on a brave face' or 'grinning and bearing it': that is to say, by creating an emotional 'mask' behind which real feelings can be hidden.
For academic staff the masking of emotions is a common occurrence. Such masking is seen as necessary in ensuring that students and other staff are not detrimentally affected by what could be perceived as ‘transgressive’ emotions. These emotions can include frustration, anger, annoyance and agitation. Their suppression reflects a broader social pressure to keep particular emotions under wraps.
The public unwrapping of such emotions could be perceived as a weakness. As such, many people discipline themselves to maintain an emotional distance from students and other staff members. The result of emotional distancing can be that the levels of work-related stress are maintained or even inflated because there is less space for emotional escape.
Identity Challenge
Identity theory suggests that the level of importance people attach to the job they do can significantly increase the extent to which work-related stress impacts upon their physical and mental health (Frone et al., 1995:p2).
From the responses to the open-ended questions in the survey used for this study it is clear that academic staff, more often than not, regard the job they do as highly important. Many of the academic staff focused specifically on how the actual or potential impact of their job performance could affect students. One commented that there is too much work and, therefore, they "worry that [their] standard of work (teaching) is falling because [they] can’t put the amount of preparation required in". For many of the academic staff the barriers to effective performance of job-related activities compounds the work-related stress experienced.
The Edge Hill experience
While structural and cultural change has been evidenced across the higher education sector, the focus of this study is on the contribution of working practices at Edge Hill to employees’ work-related stress. From the responses to the survey received, we conclude that the levels of work-related stress at Edge Hill are unacceptably high. A total of 88 percent of those people who responded to the survey had suffered some form of work-related stress in this academic year. Many employees are experiencing severe symptoms including strokes (as diagnosed by a doctor), alcohol abuse, frustration, powerlessness, headaches, insomnia and anxiety to name just a few. HSE Fact Sheet 3 on work-related stress identifies these symptoms (among others) as resulting from prolonged work-related stress. Just over half of the people who had experienced work-related stress raised the issue with a doctor. The Edge Hill Occupational Stress Policy Document (see Appendix 4) states, "there should be a climate in which people have the confidence to seek assistance and discuss their work-related problems".
However, this survey highlights an extreme unwillingness to discuss such problems with line managers and, in particular, human resources. Seventy percent of respondents believe that work-related stress is inadequately dealt with at Edge Hill, whereas just 7 percent believed that it was dealt with appropriately. Only two people who responded to the survey had actually been to speak to human resources about work-related stress. Reported reasons for reluctance have included that "it would be career suicide" and "nothing would be done anyway".
In order that work-related stress levels can be significantly reduced there is an urgent need to make fundamental changes to the way in which the Human Resource Department interfaces with members of staff. At present, there is a deep-seated mistrust of the Human Resource Department. As a result, people are extremely reluctant to consult them about work-related stress. Theoretically at least, the Human Resource Department should be the first port of call for employees experiencing intolerable work-related stress. In practice, it is all-to-often seen as a last resort.
It is immediately necessary to reduce the burden of overwork placed on academic staff. As this survey has discovered, the commonest self-reported reason for work-related stress is overwork. The Working Time Regulations, giving effect to the EU Directive on the Organisation of Working Time places a legislative requirement on Edge Hill to restrict the number of hours worked by all staff to a maximum of 48 hours. In practice however, the job-related expectations placed upon many academic staff require an input of more than 48 hours per week.
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