How to turn everyday stress into ‘optimal stress’

I am among those who differentiate pressure and stress. Others view them as being essentially the same and focus on what can happen when one or the other is excessive. What do you think?

Here is an excerpt from an article written by Jan Ascher and Fleur Tonies for the McKinsey Quarterly, published by McKinsey & Company. To read the complete article, check out others, learn more about the firm, and sign up for email alerts, please click here.

* * *

Peter is stressed out. He’d hoped a vacation would be the reset he needed, giving him a productive head of steam to fight through the growing sense of frustration, anxiety, and restlessness he’d been feeling as the pandemic wore on. But it isn’t working outPrior to COVID-19, Peter was to all appearances a successful bank executive, a self-professed “numbers guy” who coped well with stress and tackled setbacks with a “see it, solve it” attitude. But now, he can hardly get a night’s sleep. He’s exercising less and gaining weight, and sometimes his heart races for no obvious reason. He’s having trouble staying on task, gets irritable with colleagues, and finds himself working longer hours despite a commute that’s just a dozen steps to the dining room. Quicker to anger with his spouse, he’s struggling to juggle the needs of their careers with the care of their young daughter, who still hasn’t adjusted to kindergarten on a laptop screen. While these might also be symptoms of depression and anxiety, Peter’s doctor informs him that he’s most likely experiencing burnout.Peter is a composite of several executives we know,but he stands out in that he’s seeking help. Many of us are experiencing levels of stress that are overwhelming the coping strategies that worked in the past, but not fully recognizing it. By losing our ability to manage stress, not knowing when to seek help—or both—we’re putting our health, personal relationships, and professional success at risk.

At the core of this challenge for many people is a misguided view of stress itself, which contributes to our inability to recognize and manage it. Many executives view stress as an unalloyed negative, something to fight through or minimize. As a result, they may manage it ineffectively.In fact, stress serves a natural, physiological purpose that can help us solve important problems and learn and grow from our experiences. Instead of trying to eliminate or tamp down stress, we should try to understand it and optimize it, minimizing the downsides while capturing the upsides. No meaningful life is stress-free. But, managed correctly, stress can be an engine of personal growth and peak performance. In this article, we’ll help you better understand stress and reframe how you manage it for yourself and the colleagues you lead and work with.

Understanding stress

Here’s a medical fact: there is nothing inherently negative about the physiological side of stress. It is a hormonal jolt of adrenaline and cortisol brought on by our sympathetic nervous system that gives us a boost of physical energy and mental focus to confront an actual or perceived threat. In a normal stress response, when the threat passes, the heightened state is followed by calming effects of our parasympathetic nervous system, a natural brake returning us to a state of recovery and rest. Our body and mind calm, we restore our resources, and we prepare for the next challenge (See Exhibit 1.)

Too often, however, we don’t calm down but continue to experience stressors without the restorative effects of a normal stress response. This can lead to chronic stress, which is associated with mood swings, reduced empathy and impulse control, and an increased risk of cardiovascular disease, stroke, and other ailments (See Exhibit 2).

Chronic stress also opens the door to burnout at work—a toxic mix of exhaustion, reduced professional efficacy, and increased cynicism about work that research from Gallup suggests affects about two-thirds of full-time workers at any given time. The pandemic has only increased the likelihood of burnout, along with a number of other concerning challenges to our behavioral health such as depression, anxiety, and substance use.

When managed well, however, stress can be a path to personal growth. To turn stress into an opportunity for growth is to find your optimal stress point. The key is understanding our own stress so that we can better harness our body’s normal stress response, rather than only being subservient to it. Through practice, we can learn to move deliberately between an engaged state, where we’re energized, focused, creative, and productive, and a recovery state, where our brain processes events, learns, and recuperates.

The process is analogous to the concept of supercompensation in physical training. When we exercise, we break down muscle tissue and add strain on the body. Muscle strengthening happens later, during recovery. By moving progressively between the two states, we can reach levels of physical performance far beyond our starting point (See Exhibit 3).

* * *

Here is a direct link to the complete article.

Jan Ascher is a senior partner in McKinsey’s Zurich office. Fleur Tonies is an associate leader at McKinsey subsidiary Aberkyn, which offers transformational leadership, team, and organizational programs. She is based in the Singapore office.

The authors wish to thank Hintsa Performance’s Annastiina Hintsa, Pekka Pohjakallio, and Nora Rosendahl; Health Quotient’s Dr. Jaime Lee; and Erica Coe and Kana Enomoto from McKinsey’s Center for Societal Benefit through Healthcare for their contributions to this article.

This article was edited by Tom Fleming, an executive editor in the Chicago office.

 

 

Posted in

Leave a Comment





This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.