Question: Developing Effective Coping Strategies

Objective: Your objective is to gain experience in developing effective strategies for helping members of an organization cope with stress.
Procedure Assume the role of a supervisor of a group of 12 financial analysts for a petroleum company. Your subordinates tend to be in their late twenties and early thirties. Although some of them are single, others are married and have young children, and one is a single parent. Because of their job demands, they often work late and take work home on weekends. Your company has fallen on hard times and has recently downsized. You were forced to lay off three subordinates. The layoff has really shaken up the survivors, who fear that they may be next to get a "pink slip." Workloads have increased, and lately your subordinates always seem to be on edge. Recently, four of the financial analysts got into a serious and loud argument over a project they were working on. One of the participants in this fight came to you practically in tears. She said things had gotten so bad that members of the group always seemed to be at each other's throats, whereas in the past they had helped each other. This incident, along with your recent observations, suggested the need to take steps to help your subordinates cope effectively with the stress they seem to be experiencing.

1. Describe the steps you, as the supervisor, should take to determine which problemfocused and emotion-focused coping strategies might be effective in helping the financial analysts deal with the stress they are experiencing.

2. The class divides into groups of three to five people, and each group appoints one member as spokesperson to present the group's recommendations to the whole class.

3. Group members in the role of supervisor take turns describing the steps each would take to determine effective problem-focused and emotion-focused coping strategies to help subordinates deal with the stress they are experiencing.

4. Group members develop an action plan that the group as a whole thinks would best lead to the development of effective problem-focused and emotion-focused coping strategies.
When your group has completed those activities, the spokesperson will present the group's action plan to the whole class.