Time Management: Find the time of day that you are most productive and the setting that is the most conducive to getting things done. Use those factors to your advantage. Identify the tasks that are most important and focus energy on those before addressing other things.

Affinity Groups: Join a group of colleagues who share similar interests and needs. If one doesn’t exist, start your own. Relationships formed within these groups provide a support system that can help you cope with and lessen your workplace stress.

Mighty Purpose: Define the purpose of your job and focus on fulfilling it. Keep this purpose in the forefront of your mind and avoid distractions that can pull you away from achieving it. Once you find your mighty purpose, you will feel freer to be your true self and accomplish your goals.

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It’s no secret that working women today are facing ever-increasing demands in both their personal and professional lives. That often leads to unhealthy levels of stress.

Research by Gonzaga University management and marketing professors Molly Pepper and Peggy Sue Loroz has revealed key contributors to the problem as well as a few practical tools to help women reduce stress and prevent workplace burnout.

They found that some of the biggest stress factors involve trying to attain work-life balance, overcoming career advancement hurdles and coping with workplace bullying. Over time, dealing with these issues can lead to emotional exhaustion, detachment and reduced physical and emotional energy.

Consistent with Gonzaga’s mission, Pepper and Loroz focused on cura personalis – or care for the whole person – when developing their techniques for handling these issues. They identified three main ways to improve workplace stress levels:

Gonzaga professors help women reduce work-related stress

Professors Molly Pepper and Peggy Sue Loroz present workshops based on their findings that can help women reduce stress and prevent workplace burnout. To learn more about current research done by Gonzaga faculty, visit the School of Business Administration’s online Knowledge Center at gonzaga.edu/sbaknowledgecenter.

Molly Pepper, Associate Professor of Management and Peggy Sue Loroz, Associate Professor of Marketing

In everyday life, balance is a delicate yet dynamic thing. Some days simply demand more focus on one part of life than another. But over time, each area requires tending. A periodic inventory can be helpful in creating an awareness of what contributes to and what takes away from that balance. “Being physically active is one of the best things we can do to improve our health,” Professor Geithner said. Yoga is a building block for her own whole-person health routine, because of its focus on presence and the mind-body-spirit connection, and its capacity to increase strength, stability and flexibility; but any form of exercise can be a starting point. “Just move,” she said. “Making time to take care of yourself is an investment that pays great dividends, including having more energy to be present with and give to others.”

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For today’s professionals, juggling multiple roles and responsibilities is the rule rather than the exception, leaving little time or energy for others or our health. Such imbalance takes its toll over time, in the forms of stress and chronic disease.

Finding equilibrium is the key to overall wellness and life satisfaction, according to Professor Tina Geithner of Gonzaga University’s Department of Human Physiology. “Taking good care of ourselves positively impacts how we feel and look, and improves not only our functional capacity, but our quality of life,” Geithner said. Achieving that equilibrium involves tending to our physical, emotional, intellectual, spiritual, social and vocational health, according to Professor Geithner. At Gonzaga, that’s known as cura personalis – care for the whole person – a central tenet of Jesuit education and at the heart of the University’s mission.

Whole-Person Health Begins With Finding Balance in Your Life

Want to learn more about how you can experience the well-documented physical, mental and emotional benefits of yoga? Check out the American College of Sports Medicine’s “Selectively and Effectively Using a Yoga Program” by Professor Tina Geithner Ph.D. and Gonzaga alumna, Jennifer Jens at gonzaga.edu/yoga.

Tina Giethner Professor of Human Physiology