Do you know how much stress costs?.EN

Carmen López

Psychologist. Master in Human Resources.

Looking for talent doesn't mean that you have to read a lot of curriculums, but to follow the trace it leaves: An excellent work. Because the most important thing is not what you learn, or the companies in which you have worked in. The most important thing is what you do.

You need five things to make your work exceptional: Energy, focus, time, creativity and an total commitment to quality.

Behind these five pillars there's just one thing: Motivation. Motivation is the difference between the world champion and the second classified. Motivation makes a runner run to the finish line when he has no more stamina left, a climber reach an impossible summit, a creator fight against himself until his work is perfect. With motivation you find time where there's no more time, motivation keeps your energy level and your focus at the highest level, and makes you see the world differently. When you are motivated you are capable of throwing away an almost finished work and starting it again until it is excellent.

The motivation is generated by the necessity. It's clear: If someone is hungry, no doubt he will put all his mental, physical and time resources to satisfy that necessity. The necessity is the motive; the necessity shoots the motivation up. This isn´t new. In the 1930's, Abraham Maslow proposed a theory about the human needs. According to it, the people who mobilize their resources do it on account of a necessity: Eating, sex, money, belonging, acknowledgement or self-realization.

But to find the source of Talent we have to look beyond the necessity. There´s no doubt that the physical needs subjugate the rest: Hunger, thirst, to avoid pain... but in developed economies, these needs are very often covered. Most of the people are motivated by the superior needs in the Maslow Pyramid: Money, power, belonging, freedom, acknowledgement or self-realization. And how the marketing experts and the sales people know very well, the needs can be created, changed or slanted. You just need to control one thing: the beliefs. If someone is absolute convinced about something he becomes unstoppable.

The beliefs are the origin of everything else.

According to a study by the European Agency for Safety and Health at Work in 2016, the stress costs the EU every year 136 billion euros.

The share of GDP is on average 3.2% and the results in Switzerland are the same. According to the study of the State Secretariat for Economic Affairs SECO 2010

34.4% of workers are very often under stress.

Would you like to know how much stress costs your company?

If a company produces 10 million a year, the stress costs are 320,000 CHF per year due to absences and less productivity in the workplace. Do the maths for your company.

The good news is that we can reduce these costs through applied business psychology.

This means more money for your company and better health and satisfaction for your employees at work.