Stress o’clock

Stress is now a big issue here at the department of administrative administrations (universal services) thanks to Eric Pickles and his crew. My boss has gone, his role merged with another, and there are fewer bods at desks now than 12 months ago. Workloads have increased and everyone has their heads down to ensure they are not on any future hit lists.

In this climate, I was interested to read that the most stressful time of the week is 10 am on a Tuesday.

This seems a bit arbitrary, but over half of 3,000 British workers surveyed by recruitment firm Michael Page named this slot as their most frazzled period. Many said they ‘coast though Monday getting their brain in gear and catch up with gossip’ while, on Tuesday, reality mercilessly crashes in. Staff spend the very first part of the day going through emails they ignored on Monday before planning the week ahead. The to-do list is then huge and they struggle with their boss' demands or looming deadlines.

The study of office workers aged between 18 and 45 sought to gauge stress throughout the typical working week. It found a quarter regularly feel stressed at work while three quarters of workers regularly reach the end of their tether by 11.16am each day.

One in five find it gets too much before nine o'clock, and I can only imagine most of these work for local government at the moment.

On a ‘positive’ note, people generally make getting a new job in 2011 a resolution for the new year. Where these jobs will come from remains to be seen.