KEY POINTS:
As the economy tightens, employees may begin to feel the pinch as they're asked to do more work.
And, as Dr Giles St. J Burch, registered psychologist and senior lecturer at UOA says, some may even be taking on more projects in order to be seen as indispensable
should redundancies become necessary.
"We're going to see a lot of interesting work habits over the next year or two as we head into a global recession, if we're heading into one," Burch says.
"There's downsizing and people won't want to say no then because they want to be seen to be working. They'll have a fear of losing jobs."
But some employees are over-achievers and regularly take on more work anyway.
"There are those people who are very driven to achieve and they've got that achievement side of their personality. They're the ones who will take on extra work and work hard."
Burch studies personality behaviours at work and says the workers who take on the extra projects fall into two categories.
"You have those who are driven and want to do more work and manage their time effectively to deal with that, and you have those who just can't say no."
Employees who can't say no are less assertive than their colleagues and often end up with the lion's share of the work.
"If you can't work smart and you can't say no, then you're going to get far too much work put on to you. It raises issues about the quality of the work that may come out the other end."
It's not just the quality of work, but the quality of life for the worker who is under the extra pressure. Burch says these people need to challenge their core beliefs about saying no to others.
He says they're not necessarily letting people down by saying that they're snowed under and can't take anything else on - but they have to want to change their mindset in order to be able to normalise their workflow.
"If you're changing someone's beliefs then that will take a long time. But personality determines how we behave and beliefs have an important role to play."
Burch uses coaching and cognitive therapy to help workers become more assertive in the office, but this doesn't work for everyone.
"People with anxiety may not be able to say no. If you've got somebody who can't challenge other people or raise a point of view and who also experiences anxiety when they're in that situation where they should be saying no, it raises their anxiety so much that they won't do it."
Often the reward for avoiding the anxiety of confrontation is well worth the burden of having to take on the extra work.
"When you're not a worrier about these things, it's not always quite so difficult. But when you do worry and you get anxious about things, sometimes it's just easier to get on with it."
But for some workers who take on more projects than their peers, it's not about having difficulty saying no. They actively seek out more assignments.
"Taking on more work could just be about striving for recognition and wanting success."
But for either type of over-achiever, Burch says they should develop a way of handling the extra work.
"One needs to develop a skill which is not so much about saying no, but a skill of recognising what are the important things to do and which aren't."
It's often clear when someone has taken on too much and things just aren't working out.
"When suddenly things aren't completed or the quality of work isn't necessarily there and people start to pick up on that. It can also have an impact on wider family or work-life balance issues."
But in a world where people are rewarded for productivity, the temptation to take on too much can truly influence how someone lives their life.
"We need to get up at 5am and work through the day and into the evening because that's what will help us be productive. It's a difficult one when your promotion or any other decisions about your career are being based on your level of productivity."
Constantly being the "go-to person" can eventually become counter-productive.
"If there's a culture of a lot of people working too hard and they can't manage, then it becomes a negative culture," Burch says. With this negative culture comes high levels of turnover, stress and absenteeism.
Donald Jessep, leadership facilitator and author of Achieving More, Doing Less, says workers are left with just one alternative when faced with such a thankless job.
"The good ones will go away and leave the organisation," he says.
But sometimes it takes awhile for workers to realise what is going on. Jessep says most workers are just trying to get on with the job.
"They just get driven along. They don't think about how what they're doing day to day and the decisions they're making will impact on their career. In every project, people have to be able to see the bigger cause."
Looking at the bigger cause in terms of the company's objectives and personal career progression can often provide the inspiration and energy to get on with the task.
"People who are ambitious assume responsibility for more work. They really want it. If they're accustomed to succeeding, they sometimes bite off more than they can chew."
Biting off more than one can chew can lead not only to stress and anxiety, but a sense of failure if things go wrong.
Jessep says over-achievers should feel they can decline an assignment every once in a while without worrying about hurting their reputations.
"Today, it's more about creating connections and inspiring people to come along with us. The need to be achieving tangible results is often a bigger challenge than the fear that they'll be thought less of."
Workers who willingly take on excessive amounts of work are generally proud achievers. But in order to survive long term, they should realise that they need to put some boundaries in place.
"It's about the individual person having a strategy that's a little bit longer term. It's about their growth, their power play, their career path and being clear on what that is for themselves." Jessep says workers should be taking on projects for more than just the desire to complete the task. Each project should in some way contribute to his or her career goals.
A certain amount of "looking after number one" has to come into play here. Praise is no substitute for personal growth.
"A lot of team managers think praise is important and will get them working harder. It will for awhile. But it becomes a Band-Aid and people will see through it quickly."
In the instance where a worker is being "dumped on" and is unable or unwilling to say no, Jessep suggests that they use a specific technique.
"It could be as simple as a supervisor giving them another job and the worker saying, 'Hey, that would be great. I'd love to do that. However, how do you want me to prioritise it with other work I already have?"'
Firing it back to the supervisor in this way is a polite and professional way of letting them know that you're going to need some help.
Employees might assume their manager knows everything they're working on and can determine what pressure they're under, but this may not be the case. Often a supervisor can be too focused on the bigger picture to notice the effect it is having on an individual employee.
"The employee is responsible for making the manager understand. It's not just, 'Yes sir, how high do I jump?' "
* Contact David Maida at: www.DavidMaida.com
