Occupational health: the impact of occupational stressors on job productivity

Abstract

Occupational health is assessing and managing the effects of work on an individual’s health and effects of their health on their capability to work. Occupational stress plays a prominent role in employee productivity. Studies on occupational stress among administrative personnel in Sri Lanka are inadequate. The general objective of this study was to investigate the impact of occupational stressors on the job productivity of administrative staff in the newly established public sector universities in Sri Lanka. The study design was hypothetico deductive. The task (task autonomy, task variety, task overload, working conditions, physical work layout, facilities provided, noises and continuous interruptions), role (role conflicts, role overload, role ambiguity, proactive coping behaviours, situational constraints, employee hassles and employee harassments), and interpersonal demands (support provided by the staff, pressure created by the staff) were considered as independent variables. Productivity was the dependent variable (efficiency: availability of quality standards, guidelines and benchmarks; effectiveness: action plans, monitoring procedures and controlling mechanisms). Ninetytwo administrative officers were selected from the newly established public sector universities as the sample. A selfadministrated questionnaire was applied to collect data. Four hypotheses were developed, and data was analysed through the SPSS package. Pearson’s correlation, determinant of coefficient, Model summary and ANOVA for multiple regression were used to analyse data. Positive relationships of the task, role and interpersonal demands with job productivity were observed. Variance in job productivity was significantly explained by the variables associated with occupational stressors. In conclusion, conducting longitudinal or interventional studies to address occupational stressors is recommended.