Workplace stress contributes to at least 120,000 deaths each year and accounts for up to US$190 billion in healthcare costs in the United States.
Jeffrey Pfeffer, a Stanford professor of organizational behaviour, along with colleagues Stefanos A. Zenios of Stanford Graduate School of Business and Joel Goh of Harvard Business School, conducted a meta-analysis of 228 studies, examining how 10 common workplace stressors affect a person’s health.
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They found that, overall, these stressors increase the nation’s healthcare costs by 5% to 8%. Job insecurity increased the odds of reporting poor health by 50%, while long work hours increased mortality by almost 20%. Additionally, highly demanding jobs raised the odds of a physician-diagnosed illness by 35%.
“The deaths are comparable to the fourth- and fifth-largest causes of death in the country: heart disease and accidents,” says Zenios, a professor of operations, information and technology. “It’s more than deaths from diabetes, Alzheimer’s or influenza.”
The stressor with the biggest impact overall is lack of health insurance. It ranks high in both increasing mortality and healthcare costs. Another big driver of early death is economic insecurity, captured in part by unemployment, layoffs and low job control.
The ramifications for the uninsured should come as no surprise, Pfeffer says, but what did surprise the team was the high impact of psychological stressors. Work-family conflict and work injustice had just as much impact on health as long work hours or shift work.
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For example, employees who reported that their work demands prevented them from meeting their family obligations or vice versa were 90% more likely to self-report poor physical health, the researchers note. And employees who perceive their workplaces as being unfair are about 50% more likely to develop a physician-diagnosed condition.
Many companies and organizations such as Stanford, he says, institute wellness programs that focus on encouraging employees to eat better or exercise more. Meanwhile, these companies overlook the atmosphere of the workplace setting itself.
Smoking cessation programs or incentives to lose weight focus on individual behaviour and ignore management practices that create stress and set the context for employee choices.
“Lots of research shows that your tendency to overeat, overdrink and take drugs are affected by your workplace,” Pfeffer says. “When people like their lives, and that includes work life, they will do a better job of taking care of themselves. When they don’t like their lives, they don’t.”
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Improving the work environment is not a Herculean feat, and many companies are already thinking beyond programs such as smoking cessation to those that address these stressors, says Pfeffer.
Companies need to get serious about creating a workplace where people feel valued, trusted and respected, where they’re engaged in their work, don’t worry about losing their jobs and where they can get home in time for family dinner, he explains.
“My meta-point is that we have lost focus on human well-being. It’s all about costs now. Can we afford this, can we afford that? Does it lead to better or worse financial performance for the company?” Pfeffer says. “We’re talking about human beings and the quality of their lives. To me, that ought to get some attention.”
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