Romania lacks the legislation to identify, measure and reduce stress at work, despite studies showing over half of lost work days are due to stress. Most affected by stress in Romania are men aged over 45, as they also fear losing their job, and being unable to find another because of their age, a recent study by the European Agency for Work Health revealed, quoted by Mediafax.

Half of Romanian staff believe stress is something common at work and that 60 percent of the lost work days – when the employees does not go to work, without being on their paid holiday – are due to stress. Four in ten workers believe stress is not well managed within their organization. A lot of the stress in Romania is caused by the staff’s lack of training, as workers tend to stress out when they don’t know how to handle a task.

A method to asses stress is needed in Romania, to be used by inspectors every time they receive complains about it. Romania currently uses the ‘Denmark method’, which however still needs to be adapted to Romania, authorities say. In the EU, 22 percent of workers are affected by stress.

Most frequent stressors are major changes or frequent changes in procedures, overtime, tight deadlines, lack of positive feedback or complete lack of feedback, frequent work conflicts and uncertainty over one’s job. Stressed people are sad, anxious, fearful, they make frequent mistakes, are disorganized, nervous, lack focus, and complain of headaches and stomach pain.

editor@romania-insider.com