Background

One goal of the Europe 2020 new skills and jobs agenda is the improvement of job quality through better working conditions. One cornerstone of the agenda is the occupational safety and health (OSH) legal framework under the Rights at Work directive, part of the EU policy on employment and social affairs.

  • “In Europe 25% of workers say they experience work-related stress for all or most of their working time, and a similar proportion reports that work affects their health negatively”

Project Target Group

The Strategic Framework on Health & Safety at Work 2014-2020 underlines the importance of preventing work-related diseases and health hazards by tackling new and emerging risks namely derived from the use (or overuse) of digital technology (DT). Most recently, the use (or overuse) of digital technology aggravated these problems and introduced new health issues like difficulty to focus, cognitive losses, deficits in social skills, sense of isolation, etc.

Employees and owners/managers of SMEs as end users and main beneficiaries.

VET trainers, HR and Health & Safety consultants.

Professional associations.

OSH decision makers and governmental entities.

What is Technostress?

Developing Competences for Stress Resilience @SMEs (DeSTRESS) aims to provide an innovative VET-based solution to this problem. Building on existing research, partners will identify a required set of competences leading to the development of a VET curriculum and a new VET Digital Training Platform using the latest techniques in game-based training and gamification complemented by a set of practical tools and resources to facilitate the transfer of learning into the workplace. This e-environment will expose the main health risks arising from DT and their real impact on the individuals’ life and on the companies’ productivity. Players will assume roles, enabling them to realize if they have already experienced specific situations and how it happened, and which solutions are available for each scenario. Besides raising the awareness of the problem it will enable owners, managers and decision makers to plan for and to mitigate the occurrence and the negative consequences of work-based stress. For that purpose, a policy report and recommendations will also be produced.

The five accepted techno-stressors ​

According to the last European Working Condition Survey (Eurofound, 2017), the number of workers using the Information Technologies (IT) is increasing. Although IT have improved several aspects of our daily life (e.g. reducing distances, allowing to have access and process high quantity of information, etc.), the use of technology might provoke adverse effects (La Torre et al. 2019). Ragu-Nathan et al. (2008) define technostress as the IT user’s experience of stress when using technologies.
This refers to an ICT’s potential to drive an employee to work faster and longer.
This refers to an ICT’s potential to invade an employee’s personal life when performing job tasks, because employees can be reached at any time, and they may feel the need to be constantly connected.
This refers to the inherent quality of an ICT that makes employees feel inadequate with regard to their computer skills.
Refers to the constant changes and upgrades of software and hardware that may impose stress on employees.
Refers to situations where users feel threatened about losing their jobs.
Destress

2 years ago

Destress
Technostress, or digital stress, has many negative consequences. Can we recognize the symptoms of technostress and its sources (techno-stressors)? How to deal with it? Can digital hygiene help with wellness? What is psychological fitness and how to train mental resilience and fight digital stress? How should the employer take care of his employees in the era of remote work?All these issues were discussed during the Seminar-Workshop entitled "Digital stress - how to deal with it?", that took place on May 12, 2022 organised by Fundacja Małopolska Izba Samorządowa in the cooperation with WSEI Kraków - Wyższa Szkoła Ekonomii i Informatyki.During the seminar, the following lectures were given by:🖌PhD Tomasz Czapran (WSEI in Krakow) on "Remote work and digital stress. How to take care of your employees?";🖌Ms Katarzyna Matyjewicz from IBM on "Psychological fitness - how to train mental resilience and fight digital stress;🖌Mr Kamil Śliwowski on "How to take care of digital well-being?"In the second part of the seminar a workshop was held, where participants tested the educational game on the DeSTRESS platform, which describes real situations in the work environment related to stressors caused by techno-stress.The seminar was organized as part of the project "Developing Competences for Stress Resilience @SMEs” DeSTRESS, implemented in partnership with universities and organizations from Portugal, Spain, Italy, Greece, Ireland and Poland, and financed by the Erasmus + Program ... See MoreSee Less

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Destress

2 years ago

Destress
How to maintain a healthy balance between real and virtual life?📱💻📧We are surrounded by technology that not only provides us with entertainment, but also allows us to perform professional duties without leaving home. Video conferences, e-mails, instant messaging make life easier, but they can also have negative effects on our health, especially mental health.👇👇👇A conscious manager should also take care of digital well-being in the company.See the DeSTRESS training platform that develop competences to cope with technostress, using the latest techniques in game-based training and gamification, complemented by a set of practical tools and resources to facilitate the transfer of learning into the workplace.⤵destress.eu/training/Follow us on LinkedIn 👉https://www.linkedin.com/company/destress-project/#destress #stress #workfromhome ... See MoreSee Less

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The European Commission support for the production of this publication does not constitute an endorsement of the contents which reflects the views only of the authors, and the Commission cannot be held responsi­ble for any use which may be made of the information contained therein.

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