When leaders effectively manage their stress levels, they positively impact others. By doing so, an organization becomes healthier and better equipped to respond to the constantly changing business environment. How stressed are you? What are you transmitting to your team? Use this stress meter to understand this.
The Main ‘Why’ in Stress Assessment
Many entrepreneurs and leaders I’ve met often think that it’s okay to be constantly stressed out because this is simply the nature of the business environment. I’ve been there too. What I’ve learned is that it is hard to change this opinion. However, there is another way to think about it.
Even if you prefer to ignore your personal emotional hygiene, as a leader you probably cannot afford to ignore efficiency. Being constantly stressed can make you less efficient in at least these ways:
- Decision Making: Stress may generally result in a failure to consider the full range of possible consequences of a decision, thus reducing its quality.
- Over-controlling the Situation: A sense of control is a stress buffer for leaders. When you are stressed, you might subconsciously take on extra demands that can disrupt the efficiency and well-being of your team.
- Isolation, Negative Mood, Irritability: These can affect your professional communication and relationships.
- Sleep Problems, Health Issues: These eventually impact your efficiency, even if you think you can cope with them while maintaining your performance level.
“The worst aspect of chronic stress is that people get used to it.
Miller and Smith, The Stress Solution
They forget it’s there. People are immediately aware of acute stress because it is new; they ignore chronic stress because it is old, familiar, and sometimes, almost comfortable.”
The Stress Meter: PSS-10 Test
The Perceived Stress Scale, known as PSS-10 (there are other versions), is one of the most widely used stress perception assessment tools in the world. This stress meter measures how unpredictable, uncontrollable, and overwhelmed respondents feel their lives are.
The test contains 10 questions. It assesses your feelings and thoughts during the last month. You need to indicate how often you felt or thought a certain way.
The best approach is to answer fairly quickly. Do not try to count up numbers but rather use a reasonable estimate.
PSS-10 Test Results Interpretation
Scores ranging:
0-13 would be considered low stress.
14-26 would be considered moderate stress.
27-40 would be considered high perceived stress.
The PSS score does not reflect any specific diagnosis. The most valuable part is comparing your own results over time. (For reference, you can check this data from large US samples.)
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Until next time, Olga