David Maister’s Passion, People and Principles

Hi David,

I have not seen stress sponges at work, but I consider being a stress sponge part of consulting.  I do provide information technology services.  However, soon after I started my career I found out that my services is not limited to IT.  I listen to my clients problems, be it workplace or personal.  When I do that, I let them vent their stress.  I think this way we start to build the trust needed for a long term relationship.  I also think me being an outsider - you are not competing with your client - makes it is easier for them to vent their workplace frustrations.

-Ahmet

My work as a technology marketing consultant frequently places me onsite with my clients. I think it helps clients quite a bit when they can rely on me as a sounding board for their professional frustrations. I find that by providing "off the record" advice and counsel about how they can work more effectively, it dramatically increases the level of trust between us for the work I'm actually being paid for. I have found, though, that if the information they want to share is intensely personal, it can sometimes interfere with our working relationship.

In my work, venting about frustrations to relieve stress often has the opposite effect: it builds stress and frustration. This particularly happens when talking with men and it happens less when talking with women.

Men have a tendency of being solution-oriented. When venting frustrations and stress, they typically try to find a solution or a way to a solution ("Have you tried..." or "Talk to ...") or they try to avoid making it their problem ("That's not my responsibility" or "I can't help you with that") or they offer help ("What do you want me to do about it?").

Women on the other hand are more process-oriented. They typically try to empathize and try to understand the situation; they try to discover how I feel about it and what I did, do and are going to do.

Venting stress is in fact not about not being able to find a solution for a particular problem, but about dealing with feelings, contradicting thoughts and arguable arguments. Therefore, the feminine approach works much better (for me at least). However, it's often a men's world we work in and only few men are able to act feminine - especially in technical jobs.

Alternatively, I can turn to my wife. She is a great listener! But since she is not familiar with the peculiarities of my work, she has a hard time understanding me, and what causes my stress level. She can empathize with me having those feelings, but it is hard to relieve stress when talking to someone who doesn't understand my situation.

David -

Working mostly on my own, my stress sponge is a long walk, or talking to my husband, or playing with my dog - basically - it's a break, a change of scenery and and a chance to come back to a stressful situation with a fresh perspective.

I would also agree with Frank that if you're not careful talking about a stressful situation (especially with the wrong person - regardless of gender) can be very damaging.

I've been in situations where horrible morale spread like wildfire and where legitimate issues got magnified (and even embelished) as they went from person to person - many of whom were trying to relieve stress.