Why stressed teams underperfom

Once, I received a call from a HR specialist who told me: "Claudia, some strange things are happening in a team we recruited last year. All of their members have high qualifications but in a few months this team that was excellent has become a disaster. They started to fight each other, two of them got divorced from their couples, another almost have a heart attack during a flight to Brazil and one of the girls was diagnosed as schizofrenic. Do you think it could be stress?".

Yes. Stress can create a mess in high performance teams when their members don't know how to deal with pressure. A century ago, Yerkes and Dodson discovered that whereas an amount of stress is needed for performance, when stress is increasing or prolonged over the time, it can also ruin people performance.

In his article Overloaded circuits: Why smart people underperfom , Dr. Edward Hallowell mentioned another stress outcome: Attention Deficit Trait (ADT), a kind of Attention Deficit Disorder (ADD) in the workplace, which symptoms are distractibility, inner frenzy, and impatience.

People with ADT have difficulty staying organized, setting priorities, and managing time. These symptoms can undermine the work of an otherwise gifted executive.

When a person or a team have high stress levels, he/they might show some identifiable signs such as:

• Irritability
• Mood changes
• Agressiveness
• Impulsiveness

In the long-term, these signs can affect its relationships and effectiveness as a person or a team.

In the other hand, a chronic-stressed person or team could also show mental and physical symptoms such as:

• Chronic fatigue
• High blood pressure
• Depression
• Mental issues

Among others

How a person/team can deal with stress?

You can't avoid stress, but you can learn to manage it. You must be able to switch on/off depending of the situation. Some people remain stressed after an emergency stopped.

There are several factors in business that can affect the ability of people to cope with stress. Some of them are:

• BAD LEADERSHIP
• DEADLINES
• WORKLOADS

Individually, there are many things affecting your stress level, but there are many things you can do to reduce it.

You might check your

• SLEEP HABITS
• EATING HABITS
• THINKING HABITS

Your team's performance or your individual performance is affected by stress? Feel free to contact me.

Here are some other recent posts I have written:

• Are you a stressful leader? 7 signs to know it
• What does your company do to prevent employee's burnout?
• "Honey I shrunk my brain" Why stress isn't really good for you?

About the author:

Claudia Juarez is Stress Management Expert. She has been working with many companies about transforming stress to create resilience and improving health and performance. As Wellness Consultant she has been working with companies and partners to assess, create and develop wellness programs. In her private practice she attends clients with anxiety, stress and related disorders, also provides peak performance training for executives and athletes.

Image: freedigitalphotos.net