Emotional labour Implications for worker's

When you do emotional work, you control your emotions to achieve the goals and expectations of your organization. From a practical point of view, this means that you are (a) expressing only your positive feelings, or (b) hiding or managing your negative feelings. To deal with negative emotions, people tend to take one of the following actions:

ü  Show emotions that you don't really feel.

ü  Hide the emotions they really feel.

ü  Create the right emotions for the situation.

You can do this by using two techniques for emotional work:

Surface acting - You pretend or pretend to have emotions using artificial, unnatural body language and verbal communication. By smiling and using a gentle tone, you can show emotions you don't feel or hide those you do feel.

Deep Acting - You take control of your inner emotions, instruct them to believe that you are truly happy, and enjoy interacting with other people. Instead of feeling like you're faking it, make sure you don't react negatively.

Constantly needing to show only emotions that are appropriate for the job, no matter how you really feel, can often lead to emotional conflicts between your true emotions and those you show others.

Some researchers believe that such emotional conflict causes emotional exhaustion and burnout among workers - and that regularly hiding your emotions leads to high levels of stress and even detachment from close personal relationships. However, other studies have not found a link between emotional conflict and emotional exhaustion.

A popular theory explaining this difference in research is that people differ in their ability to deal with false or "false" emotional expressions. Some employees may be able to identify organizational values ​​for positive emotional communication, which will make them better equipped to express emotions accordingly. People who are usually happier and happier may find it easier to shut down negative emotions than other people.

Another factor can be a person's ability to recognize various social situations and behave well. People with more negative personalities and lower social awareness have the hardest time dealing with emotional conflicts - and they tend to tire emotionally more easily.

 

To better understand emotional work, there are some questions you should ask yourself and perhaps explore with your team:

 

·         What are the emotional labor requirements of your job?

·         How do you deal with these requirements?

·         How often do you experience emotional conflict?

·         Do you think emotional conflict has led to emotional exhaustion?

·         How do you manage stress and other signs of emotional exhaustion?

 

Reference

 

Mindtools.com. (2009). Emotional Labor: Helping Workers Present a Positive Face. [online] Available at: https://www.mindtools.com/pages/article/newTMM_44.htm.[Accessed on 21 May 2021].