Slow down, you move too fast

by Roslyn Guy

Philomena Tan knows all about stress. By her early 30s,she was a successful, highly paid market research consultant who sometimes worked till 10 p.m. “We had a lot of meetings and deadlines: we had to win projects, so I was writing proposals, making presentations, supervising staff”, she says.

For a long while, she loved her job and there were perks – lots of travel, for instance – but it was never what she had planned to do with her life. Like so many others , she just got involved in a career that had started accidentally.

Tan had studied psychology, and she was also good with statistics and computers. In the early 1980s, these were a rare and valuable combination of skills, so Tan made steady progress up the corporate ladder. But the turning point came the year she spent the entire week of her husband’s birthday in Brisbane running market research groups while he was home alone in Melbourne.

It made her examine her life and think about what she was really contributing to society. Tan planned her escape carefully. She saved money and returned to study. A decade later, it has all come together, and she is happy. The research she did for a doctorate in psychology not only added to her qualifications as a psychologist and psychotherapist, but gave her the raw material for her first book, Leaving the Rat Race to Get a Life, a handbook for anyone seriously considering changing the pace of their lives.

These days, Tan is in private practice in her local community, does yoga and chooses her own hours. She rarely works more than four hours. A week, and because she sees clients in the evening, she keeps her afternoons free to catch up with reading, meet with friends or research her next book. She is happy. “ When you are working up to 70 hours a week, you don’t have time for this”, she says.

Task 3.

Decide whether these statements are true (T) or false(F).

1. Philomena had always wanted to be a market research consultant , but she soon found the job too stressful.

2. One day, she realized she was not giving enough care to her husband because of the job.

3. It took her more than five years to achieve a good-work-life balance.

4. She did not write her first book exclusively for business people.

5. These days, she works up to 70 hours a week, but she is happy.

Unit 10 Stress in the Working Place

Exercise 1.

Match the words (1-5) to their definitions (a-e).

1. lifestyle	a. a time or date by which you have to do something
2. workaholic	b. a system where employees choose the time they start and finish work each day
3.workload	c. the way people choose to organize their lives
4. deadline	d. someone who cannot stop working and has no time for anything else
5. flexitime	e. the amount of work a person is expected to do

Exercise 2.

Complete each sentence with an appropriate word from the list in Exercise 1 .

1. I worked until 11 o’clock at night to meet … for presenting the report.

2. I work six days a week and never have a holiday. My girlfriend says I’m a …

3. Karl has a heavy … at the moment because several colleagues are off sick.

4. She gave up a highly paid job to join a meditation group in India. She’s completely changed her …

5. A … system can help to reduce stress levels of employees by giving them more control over their working hours.

Exercise 3.

Discuss the following questions.

1. Do you like working under pressure? Why or why not?

2. What deadlines do you have to meet in you daily life?

Which are the most difficult to meet?

3. Why do people become workaholics?

Exercise 4.

Rank these situations from 1 (most stressful) to 9 (least stressful). Then discuss your choices.

1. making a presentation to senior executives

2. leading a formal meting

3. telephoning in English

4. writing a report with tight deadline

5. negotiating a very valuable contract

6. meeting important visitors from abroad for the first time

7. asking your boss for a pay rise

8. dealing with a customer who has a major complaint

9. being afraid of losing your job

Listening

(CD) Task 1.

Alan Bradshaw is a director of In Equilibrium, a stress management consultancy. Listen to the first part of the interview and complete these notes.

• The most common cause of stress is usually a … of things rather than …

• For example, a very bad combination is where someone is under a lot of …, but they also feel that they have no …, and they feel unsupported.

• That combination can cause severe stress and … People in that situation often feel that nothing they can do will make …, and that’s a very bad feeling.

(CD) Task 2.

Listen to the second part of the interview and answer this question.

What are the two main ways in which In Equilibrium helps companies deal with stress?

(CD)Task 3.

Listen to the third part of the interview. Choose the correct answer, according to Alan Bradshaw. Then discuss whether you agree with him.

1.Men/women report less stress.

2. Men/women are better at asking for and getting support

3..Men/women don’t like to appear vulnerable.

4.Men/women are in fact often more vulnerable.

5.Men/women cope with pressure better.

(CD)Task 4.