Boostress_ebook

Page | 14 www.boostress.eu any specific method, they just react emotionally based on their instincts, e.g. “I freeze, I become inert, I lose control, and I laugh”, “I smoke, and I drink water”, “I call to a friend and I talk with them”. While most participants do not know any resources that can help them to manage workplace stress, a few referred to books that they use to help them manage stress; others say that they get support from a psychologist, psychotherapy, friends; while others practice meditation, pilates, work-outs in the gym, music, dancing and positive thinking to overcome stress. Young professionals who participated in the focus group were not aware of any ICT tools that can help them to manage work-related stress and thus have never used such tools to improve their stress management skills. Moreover, they are not aware of any training programs that could help them to improve their stress management skills. These exact responses were provided by stakeholders and trainers who participated in the second focus group in Cyprus. Nevertheless, the stakeholders referred to other tools and techniques that they use to help young professionals to develop their stress management skills. These include: educating them through examples and scenarios from the working environment (“orientation techniques”); providing advice on how they must behave towards clients, employers, colleagues, and helping them to grow in confidence to discuss their ideas and problems; developing their collaboration skills so that they can share knowledge, experiences and feelings for their work with colleagues; advising them to do sports, gym and other hobbies during their leisure time; suggesting they read books about emotional intelligence at work; and accessing support from psychologist therapists and other professionals if needed. According to the group of young professionals involved in the focus group, the main challenges affecting young employees today include their working relations with other employees and their employers, clients and patients, time management due to workload and team building. Most of the participants feel that they do not receive enough support from older employees, because – in their opinion - older employees feel competition with younger employees in their workplace. As a result, they feel that they lack adequate support at work. In comparison, most of the stakeholders answered that time pressure, workload, fatigue, as well as the lack of motivation and adequate opportunities for young employees prevent them from participating in a training programme on how to deal with work-related stress. In addition, different ways of thinking between the management and the young employees as well as the lack of resources (or unwillingness on behalf of managers to pay) for such educational programmes are other barriers which hinder young professionals in developing stress management skills and competences in Cyprus. In relation to the young professionals who completed the online questionnaire in Cyprus, 73% of respondents stated that they experience stress in their current job, while only 27% said that they do not. The frequency of stressful experience varies, but it is notable that only 21% never feel stressed in work. In spite of the fact that most of the participants feel stress in their current job, the vast majority (91%) have never undertaken training to help them to manage stress in work; with the remaining 9% stating that they had undertaken training in the form of private workshops (two responses) or from their family (one response). Moreover, the 85% have never been offered support or training by their employer; 15% replied that they received support (3 participants further commented that they were supported and only 1 participant attended a 6-hour seminar); the support received as part of the training offered by the employer was useful to help to manage stress in work or at work for only 18% of the participants. Despite the high levels of work-related stress, most participants (58%) do not use any specific tools or resources to help them to manage stress and 73% do not have any specific strategies in place to help them to manage stress. Certain recommendations and suggestions about the format, usability and content of the BooStress Training Package emerged from the results of the online questionnaires distributed to young