STUDENT EXAMINATION NUMBER Y__1__
MODULE NO: ___MAN00077M___
MODULE TITLE: _____Human Resources Management and Sustainability_____
Module Tutor: ________Dr Chido Umeh_______
Essay Title: ______Critically discuss the impact of emotional labour and coping strategies______
Word Count: ____
Introduction
In the past, organizations operated significantly under business environments that were predictable and were driven towards planned agreement. However, there has been a discontinuous and dynamic change in recent years which has completely altered the former organizational assumptions and routines. This change has made some of the practices perceived to be the best in the past to be considered the worst practices in the current organizations, while the core competencies in the former organizations have turned out into fundamental rigidities. The contributions of the workers and their attitudes have been the primary area of research for many studies as they seek to determine how the organizations can smoothly transform into ones that are current, performing, and suitable. The general implications for establishing the proper employee positive perceptions and attitudes can be researched for an increase in organizational effectiveness and growth, employee productivity, and the overall boost in work-life quality and satisfaction among the workers. The attitudes of workers are usually significantly influenced by the fundamental emotions which they face while in their working environments and outside. Emotions are usually structured by the perceptions derived from cognitive situational appraisal, which dictate well-being. Emotional well-being, in its expression as an experience, has been a vital interest construct for many researchers due to the implications associated with it. Despite the fact that emotions have been existing in organizations for the longest time, they have not been receiving the appropriate considerations and frameworks from behavioral frameworks until recent years. In the current marketplace that is increasingly becoming service-oriented, it is essential to comprehend how emotional labor influences employees and what strategies the organizations can implement to address the effects.
Definition of Emotional Labor
The definition of emotional labor was first defined by Arlie Hochschild in 1983, where he described it as having to suppress or induce a feeling with the aim of sustaining the outward countenance that creates the appropriate mental state for other people. Essentially, emotional labor refers to having to keep faking a smile on the face irrespective of how someone feels just because they are employed in a service industry, and their actual feelings or even lack of the smile on their faces might make the customers or the boss start complaining (Grandey and Sayre, 2019,). The general ideology is that portraying frank concern for the needs of the clients, making positive eye contact and smiling are all vital to the perceptions of the customers of the service quality. For instance, a hotel attendant has to show utmost concern to the orders made by customers and keep smiling all day for his or her services to be regarded as quality. It is more of an employee having to pretend that they are not entirely affected by the microaggressions in the working environment as they actually are. This is irrespective of whether the aggressions are ableist, homophobic, sexist, or racist. It refers to any form of work-related situation where the employee feels that they have been in some stereotyped or an attack has been made on their identity, but they have to pretend to be fine with it so that their seniors or clients might be satisfied (Modekurti-Mahato, Kumar, and Raju, 2014). For instance, an employee might be working at the customer care desk or reception office in a certain organization, be facing discrimination but has to keep smiling all day and pretending to be just fine with all that.
However, when dealing with unpleasant or angry clients, emotional labor can be very challenging. The significant part of that challenge is associated with having to hide the actual emotions and keeping on smiling and nodding head even though one is receiving critical or negative feedback (Yao, Gao, Chen, and Mu, 2019). Organizations usually place significant strategic essentiality on service orientation to internal clients and colleagues apart from just external clients. Despite the fact that the concept of emotional labor is usually applicable in many business areas, the consequences are usually significant in traditional service roles. For a good understanding of the adverse effects of emotional labor, it is important to analyze the types of emotional labor.
Types of Emotional Labor
Surface Acting
In this type of emotional labor, the workers tend to modify their observable characteristics, including vocal tones, facial expressions, and gestures. Based on previous researches, service acting influences the employees negatively, more so on their job satisfaction, and potentially result in emotional exhaustion (Schiopu, 2014). The aim of surface acting is to change the facial emotional expression without modifying the real feelings of the individual. It entails negative emotions suppression and mimicking positive emotional expressions for employments that necessitate positive portrayals of emotions. As a result, it adversely affects the well-being, job satisfaction, and emotional exhaustion of workers (Yoo and Jeong, 2017). This is based on the fact that surface acting drains the mental resources, is effortful, undermines the authenticity sense of employees, and hinders the aspect of socially interacting with customers. Previous research has indicated that many employees engage in this type of emotional labor most of the time, especially when dealing with difficult customers and confront anger and stress.
Deep Acting
This type of emotional labor entails controlling the feelings so that someone may appear to be authentic. Just like the case of surface acting, the ultimate goal is to ensure that all the responsibilities of the job are fulfilled. During deep acting, the individuals regulate the emotional precursors by changing their view of the situation. Based on pieces of research conducted on deep acting, it is believed that it results in better and positive outcomes for both the clients and service providers (Wharton, 1999). For instance, hotel service providers who engage in deep acting are less likely to experience burnout resulting from emotional labor. Additionally, studies depict that deep acting is efficacious compared to surface acting for the well-being and performance of employees specializing in customer service. Although both types of emotional labor entail an attempt to portray the needed emotions, deep acting entails more of modifying the cognitive, emotional basis. For instance, controlling emotions by remembering good memories can be vital in eliminating the feelings of anger.
Non-Verbal and Verbal Communication
Expression is an essential interaction means that links and controls the relationships of an individual with others in society. In the service industry, both types of communications happen to be the primary factors that impact job performance and customer satisfaction. Since the communication between employees and clients can potentially be a determinant of making a certain organization competitive in the market, it is essential to manage the communication between workers and clients to ensure that their interactions meet the required quality. This is based on the fact that clients tend to communicate with frontline workers of a certain company in which they choose its services or products before reaching out to the company itself. In this case, the response of the customers will rely on the kind of communication that will take place between them. However, the attempts made by the employee to communicate significantly depend on their emotions. This implies that the employees who are unable to utilize either surface acting or deep acting are bound to give the wrong impression of the company.
Negative Effects of Emotional Labor
Emotional Exhaustion
Emotional exhaustion can be defined as the depleted and exhausted emotions because of work and is usually considered to be a chronic response to stressful working situations that are linked with ideologically high human contact levels. It has further been defined as a negative self-concept, and experience of negative feelings towards employment, and having low feelings or interest loss to clients. It is the adverse psychological effects that an individual in a job position with increased interpersonal contacts faces when exposed to a specific stressor for a long time (Lazányi, 2011). It usually results from excessive and persistent emotional labor. This is because emotional labor leads to other negative consequences such as absenteeism, physical exhaustion, and emotional inactivation stress, alongside emotional exhaustion. Additionally, other researchers indicated that the social needs and emotional adjustments of emotional labor employees lead to work exhaustion. For emotional depletion to be eliminated, the de-personification phenomenon that focuses on distancing oneself psychologically from other people appears. In the event the phenomenon becomes severe, it results in a self-fulfillment sense decrease, implying that an individual will not feel efficient in performing their duties or interacting with customers.
Individuals engaging in surface acting are at the risk of facing emotional experience basing on the fact that the organizations force them to act in a certain manner irrespective of how they actually feel, which makes them experience notable suffering. Researchers claim that when the workers perform the service behavior while there is a difference between the job requirements and the feelings of the worker, the employee experiences work exhaustion for being dissatisfied with the work and their feelings as well. On the other hand, the effect of deep acting on emotional exhaustion is not that significant because it entails modification of the perception towards the situation. Generally, the effect of emotional exhaustion, which is caused by emotional labor, is negative to both the organization and employees. Apart from the decreased sense of accomplishment affecting someone’s emotions, it also impacts an individual’s self majorly. This is because employees who experience emotional exhaustion usually tend to have decreased performance in serving their customers.
High Turnover Intentions
Turnover can be broadly defined as the process of someone ceasing from being a part of an organization’s employees. In this case, the turnover intention is used to refer to the stage just before the individual quits the job, hence used as an indicator of employee turnover (Lee, Lee, and Chung, 2019). Employee turnover can potentially result in lowering the remaining worker’s willingness to keep on performing their duties. Additionally, it can potentially result in an escalation of expenses in the organization, especially in cases where skilled workers have left the organization and others have to be recruited (Kong and Jeon, 2018). Also, before other competitive employees are hired, the quality of the services provided by the specific company is usually affected negatively. This implies that the employee turnover rate has adverse effects on the firm; hence it should be lowered to the minimal level possible. Despite the fact that there are multiple factors that lead to employee turnover in the service sector, one of the most significant factors is the emotional exhaustion that results from emotional labor. Therefore, it is essential for any organization providing services to the customers to ensure that emotional labor is managed as it can potentially lead to an increase in employee turnover.
Low Job Satisfaction
Job satisfaction is usually defined as the combination of the environmental, physiological, and psychological contexts of employees. It is usually determined by both the difference between the real experience by the workers and their expectations and the relationship between the personal characteristics and the employee environment. Job satisfaction is a type of personal responsibility and can be viewed in terms of the emotional response to a particular job or task (Pugliesi, 1999). It is usually known that the emotions of an individual affect both their job satisfaction and their performance, something which can potentially spread to the rest of the company workers. Some of the recent studies have attempted to define job satisfaction in relation to job satisfaction by stating that it is the state of emotions that the employee may feel in their relative or subjective perception of the process of fulfilling their responsibilities at the workplace and the outcomes of their work performance, according to the beliefs and values of the employee.
Job satisfaction is essential for the overall success of the organization because it plays a vital role in the performance improvement and efficient operation of the company. Essentially, low job satisfaction can be associated with factors such as low morale and work exhaustion (Zapf and Holz, 2006). Additionally, low job satisfaction has been closely linked with emotional labor through emotional exhaustion. The emotions of workers constantly interacting with clients are associated with the clients’ satisfaction and the relationship existing between the employee and the client. This means that if the employee is facing emotional labor, that there is a disparity between the employee’s feelings and those that are supposed to be portrayed according to the job requirements, there are higher chances that the employee will experience job dissatisfaction. This is based on the fact that the employee’s feelings will not be linked to the job he or she is doing. Therefore, emotional labor significantly contributes to low job satisfaction.
Burnout
The increasing competition in the service industry has led to significant changes, which have, in return, resulted in an escalation of our mental demands and workloads. Despite the fact that previous studies have suggested that burnout can result from both inside and outside working environment, it is usually apparent that the individuals are working in environments associated with proving services suffer more from burnouts compared with the rest of the workers in other environments (Iqbal, Mirza, Sajid, and Adeel, 2018). Increased levels of job demand can potentially contribute to multiple stress reactions, including depressions and burnout, which may lead to turnover, work disability, and absenteeism. Emotional regulation and demand are usually common in occupations such a public and human service, where the clients demand the attention of the service providers constantly. The service providers in these types of environments are likely to experience burnout most of the time.
Various mechanisms offer theoretical explanations concerning the contributions of emotional labor is experiencing burnout. One of the mechanisms asserts that surface acting lowers the individual’s self-efficacy and self-worth. Such acts of changing behaviors, thoughts, and emotions of someone need cognitive efforts. Secondly, the loss of a person’s resources in cases where the resources are threatened may potentially lead to increased distress or anxiety (Zapf and Holz, 2006). Interpersonal stressors are regarded as one of the possible sources of stress, which then affects the self-image of an individual. Employees working in environments where they interact with clients are more likely to respond to rude and angry customers by hiding their actual feelings. Such often, self-regulatory attempts can lead to burnout. The third mechanism focuses on surface acting to attempt to explain the link between burnout and emotional labor (Pugliesi, 1999). Surface acting consistently produces emotional exhaustion as the employee is constantly required to suppress their actual emotions. The act of suppressing emotions results in energy depletion due to t the unending internal tension between the actual feelings and portrayed feelings, which results in emotional dissonance. A continued increase in emotional dissonance experience potentially increases the psychological effort levels, which leads to burnout.
Adverse Effect on Health
The majority of studies conducted on the relationship between emotional labor and fatigue depict that there is a relationship between the two. Additionally, they also affect the health of employers, more those working in environments completely involved in service provision. For instance, employers in a hotel are more likely to get involved in emotional labor, which leads to increased fatigue, whose higher levels can potentially disrupt homeostasis state, leading to both psychological and physical illness. Nurses are usually at the risk of suffering from depression and experiencing emotional pain (Aung and Tewogbola, 2019, p. 3). This is because their work involves dealing with patients of all types, many of whom require the nurses to suppress their emotions most of the time. Further, employees working in sales and call centers were linked with dysmenorrhea (Holman, Martinez‐Iñigo, and Totterdell, 2008,). This can be attributed to a strong relationship between emotional labor and stress, which causes imbalances in hormones that definitely cause menstrual cycle irregularities. Additionally, the workers are usually at risk of developing mental health issues, including depression. Studies suggest that emotional labor utilized in hiding actual emotions in the working environment cause sleep pattern disruptions and suicidal tendencies, which are majorly associated with anxiety and depression. Finally, the toll collectors are more likely to engage in emotional labor, which has both negative, positive impacts on them. Even though emotional labor is considered to help in blood circulation and general sense wellbeing, it has adverse effects on them as it causes musculoskeletal malfunctions, neural problems, cardiovascular diseases, and subjective dysesthesia. Therefore, emotional labor can potentially lead to multiple health problems for the service providers who actively engage in it.
Copying Strategies
Separation of Working Environment and Other Environments
The majority of the workers working in the service industry stress the need to separate work either mentally or physically from other environments, especially while at home. By physical separation, it refers to physically separating oneself from the working environment or stresses related to employment. While some individuals can achieve physical separation by traveling from work to home or even another location, others have to go on a vacation to achieve it (Kroll, Remington, Awasthi, and Ganapati, 2021). Mental separation refers to leaving all the work at work and forgetting everything once one gets home. However, it is essential to note that this strategy may be impossible for workers residing in the same compound their work is situated. This because workers tend to feel as though they are never off their work due to the fact that they can be accessed by their administrators or clients at any time. Essentially, separation of work from other activities is essential in making the employees enjoy every aspect of life. This is essential in relieving depression and stress associated with work. Therefore, workers should consider separating work and home both physically and mentally to be able to mitigate some of the negative effects of emotional labor.
Decompressing alone
Decompressing is usually possible when an individual is alone, either at work or at home. This significantly helps the workers to recover and respond. Decompressing is essential in draining stress as someone gets the time to chill out and has nothing to be responsible for nothing (Kroll, Remington, Awasthi, and Ganapati, 2021). This implies that the employees need to find their own personal time to refresh as being around people may be very stressful to them. Some of the activities that some can engage in while having the time of their own include watching movies, sleeping, or reading books. Others may use the time to workouts, praying or even cooking. Being alone makes someone take a break from interacting with people. Although some of the employees may find it so hard to find their time to be on their own, it is essential to take breaks regularly as it helps them refresh their minds.
Rotation in Working Environments
For organizations that expose their workers to environments that are stressful or simply situations where the workers have to constantly interact with customers, they can implement a program where the employees rotate in their offices or units. For instance, the health care organizations can arrange the nurses in a way that their shifts include rotation of offices and care units (Weaver, Allen, and Byrne, 2019). In this way, the employees may be able to relieve some of their stress as they are constantly changing their environment. Additionally, changing patient rooms helps in preventing the patients from taking note of the nurse’s weakness and taking advantage of it. This strategy is also applicable in other organizations. Therefore, the organizations should this type of program to help the employees manage the negative effects of emotional labor, such as low job satisfaction and high turnover rates.
Educate Employees on Problem-Solving Techniques and Integrate Emotional Labor in Performance Evaluation
To assist the workers in mitigating the negative effects of emotional labor, it is essential to teach them problem-solving techniques. In this way, the employees will be able to gain confidence and lower their negative responses to unpredictable and angry situations. This will help the employees to have the capabilities to address their interpersonal problems before they result in adverse feelings. Additionally, the organization can integrate emotional labor in its performance evaluation process (Jeung, Kim, and Chang, 2018). Measuring the employees’ commitment to clients and the efforts which they make towards regulating their emotions is essential in motivating the workers. This is essential in making the employees get engaged in emotional regulation willingly. By willingly engaging in emotional regulation, the employees will be able to mitigate the negative effects of emotional labor, such as burnouts or illnesses.
Conclusion
In summary, emotional labor has negative effects on both the organization and the employees. First, emotional labor causes emotional exhaustion, which results in a self-fulfillment sense decrease, implying that an individual will not feel efficient in performing their duties or interacting with customers hence affecting the performance of the organization generally. Secondly, it also leads to a high turnover rate, which results in lowering of the worker’s willingness to keep on performing their duties and escalation of expenses in the organization, especially in cases where skilled workers have left the organization, and others have to be recruited, and adverse effect on the services’ quality. Thirdly, emotional labor results in low job satisfaction, which can be associated with factors such as low morale and work exhaustion. Additionally, it causes burnout which results from an increase in emotional dissonance and can potentially affect employee performance. Lastly, emotional labor has adverse effects on an individual’s health which affects the overall performance of the company. These negative effects can be mitigated using various strategies, including separation of the working environment and other environments, decompressing alone, rotation in working environments and educating employees on problem-solving techniques, and integrating emotional labor in performance evaluation. If employed appropriately, the strategies can take away most of the pain in emotional labor.
References
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