Professionals reduce stress with variety of approaches

Eat chocolate, share a joke, power up the Harley, work out, do yoga. Professionals around Northern Colorado take a variety of actions when they feel job-related stress coming on.

Most who have reached pinnacles in their careers as top managers, directors and business owners have stress and its related ailments pretty well under control. These are even-keeled professionals well schooled in dealing with high-pressure jobs.

Take Jeanine Truswell, for example. Truswell is executive director of the United Way of Weld County, a job she has held for 20 years.

Whether due to nature or nurture, Truswell says she has a high threshold for stress.

With a staff of 26, more than 1,000 community volunteers and multiple in-house programs as well as annual fund-raising obligations nearing $3.6 million, Truswell has plenty of opportunities to experience job-related stress.

“The main stress really comes because we know the community need far exceeds the resources we can raise in the community. And that’s stressful.”

Though she’s unlikely to actually focus on feeling stress, Truswell does have strategies for coping. Chief among these is perspective. The problems others face can quickly put hers into perspective, Truswell says.

“You might think you’re having a lot of stress, and then someone walks into the office who is homeless or can’t pay their utility bills.”

She takes time to decompress, making certain to spend quiet time with her family, keep Sundays free from work obligations whenever possible and create a calming environment when she does find herself working weekends.

“On weekends, even though I might be in the office working on paperwork, I’m always going to have some very relaxing music on.”

Truswell makes time for daily meditation, even if it’s only for a few minutes. “Ideally, I’d be sitting there for a good 20 to 30 minutes. Sometimes I just take a minute to take some full breaths … people who are really into meditation wouldn’t call that meditation. I do.”

At work, she tries to create an atmosphere where it’s O.K. to laugh. “Laughter is a great thing to do.”

Ron Carey, general manager of the Poudre Valley REA in Windsor, has to think a minute about what causes him stress at work. The job is certainly stressful, whether it’s dealing with occasional power outages or overseeing collection of utility bills.

As general manager, he explains, he is hired by the board of directors to implement the policies of the company. The job involves overseeing construction goals, staying ahead of growth, watching the company’s financial health.

But for Carey, the pressure of the job is “all internalized.” You won’t find him venting.

“I don’t get mad and scream,” he says. “I deal with it and go on.”

Sometimes the stress goes home, he says. “Sometimes it does cause you to lose some sleep at night.” Still, he says, dealing with stress at work means doing the work. At home he turns to hobbies and activities he enjoys. “I play golf, I have a Harley-Davidson motorcycle and I learned to sail last year.”

Positive outlooks

The position of owner of Co’s BMW in Loveland requires Christina Dawkins to wear many hats. She makes sure she understands everyone’s job, in case she has to fill in. She handles customer issues that come up and works hard to meet and greet every single customer who buys a car. “I like to be on the floor and meet the people who are doing business with us.”

Dawkins also keeps on eye on the numbers, sets goals and makes certain they are met. “I make sure we’re making a profit.”

She invests about 50 hours a week at work. Oh, and she has two small children at home.

While Dawkins says she handles stress well – “I’ve got a really good outlook, that really helps.” – that doesn’t mean she doesn’t experience stress. Her work is unpredictable and that can be stressful.

“A lot of things can all happen at once. Too many tasks at one time can create a lot of stress.”

When she feels her heart start to race, Dawkins sits down with pencil in hand. “I write it all down, exactly what needs to be taken care of and then I try to delegate some of it. I’ve got great people for that.”

She also tries to exercise regularly. That helps, along with just plain handling stress well. “I just take it one step at a time. That’s the only thing I can do.”

For Lori Gama-White, founder of DaGama Web Studio, the very best stress reliever is work that she loves. “Because I’m doing a job that I love, work that I love, that allows me to be creative and interact with people and be their guide to the Web, I feel so satisfied that really, honestly, I rarely get stressed.”

In addition to maintaining a positive outlook and calm demeanor, Gama-White is proactive about stress. “I work out regularly, four or five times a week. And I do yoga every morning.”

If she does experience stress, she does something else she loves: “I eat chocolate.”

Gama-White founded her business in 1997. She produces “strategic, results-oriented Web sites,” typically juggling about four to five projects each month as well as performing Web site maintenance.

 “People are going to hate me when they hear this: When there is a problem, it really is a challenge.”

But Gama-White has done her time in stress land. “I worked 15 years as a general manager for McDonald’s. You talk about stress.”

Even in her current, beloved, position, Gama-White says she does, at times, experience a bit of stress. If regular exercise, a positive outlook and chocolate don’t quite keep the frustration at bay, Gama-White has another strategy. She calls a friend. “There are those occasions when you just get so frustrated. You call a friend and you get that validation that you’re doing the right thing.”

Power of prayer

Trenton Scott, a Loveland chiropractor, says that he sometimes experiences stress when he can’t provide relief to patients as quickly as he would like.

 “I guess I hold myself to a high standard, so I am very empathetic with patients and I want to fix them. Sometimes it’s stressful when they don’t respond as quickly as I’d like.”

Scott has been practicing for more than 10 years. His Loveland practice employs six and includes acupuncture, massage and Rolfing therapies as well as chiropractic care.

Scott says that when he feels stressed he likes to take a minute to be alone. “We have a private office where we can just go and relax for a while.”

He also employs exercise to relieve and prevent stress, working out over the lunch hour. Prayer, too, is a stress reliever, Scott says. “I pray a lot. Some people meditate. I pray. And that’s always good for stress.”

Another stress reliever for Scott is time spent with his children. “I try to spend more time with my children. If you want to act silly with your kids I think that’s a stress reliever. They have few worries.”

Like the Loveland chiropractor, Carol Peddicord looks to a higher power when job frustrations threaten to overflow.

Peddicord is operations manager for Fort Collins-based Payroll Plus. Hers is a high-stress position that requires oversight of payroll preparation for about 600 clients who employ some 26,000 workers altogether. The deadline-driven job requires attention to detail and a high degree of accuracy and vigilance.

“There are a lot of things that could go wrong in a day. If I’m not on top of it, we could face some major penalties or shortages,” she says.

Peddicord knows from experience that it’s important to keep stress levels under control. “I have blood pressure issues and I can always tell if my blood pressure is starting to move up.”

To keep things in hand, she makes certain to get out and away from the office at noon each day. Even if it’s just a walk around the block and a few deep breaths of fresh air.

“It doesn’t have to necessarily be very long,” Peddicord says. “Sometimes it’s a matter of just stepping away from the situation.”

To be proactive about controlling stress, Peddicord exercises and tries to eat right. Her final line of defense is faith, she says, noting that prayer is always an important part of her day.

“There are times when I just lift my eyes up and say ‘O.K., God, I’ve got to give it to you because I can’t do anything else about it.’ It’s amazing how many times the situation will calm down.”

Maintaining and multi-tasking

Lou D’Angeli’s position as assistant general manager/director of marketing for the Budweiser Events Center at The Ranch requires the ability to multi-task at a high rate of speed. And that can be stressful.

“We have to be able to switch gears at any given moment,” D’Angeli says. The next caller might be somebody who wants to book a date, a person calling with questions about a contract, inquiries about the advertising schedule or ticket sales and on and on.

The objective is to keep the building busy. “That’s what we strive for.”

There are times, however, when D’Angeli observes that the amount of effort invested doesn’t always equal the results.

“Sometimes stuff doesn’t work out,” and that’s stressful.

Much of the stress is simply absorbed, D’Angeli says. “My whole thing is if something’s not going to happen, you’ve got to move past it quickly.”

D’Angeli says his staff works as a team, consulting each other and employing realistic and professional scrutiny in making decisions. When things don’t work as planned, “we adjust,” he says. “Quickly, hopefully. That relieves stress.”

Dwelling on things doesn’t do any good. It’s a matter of doing what you can and moving on, D’Angeli says. “You have to.”

Doug Larson, too, says that being required to do many things simultaneously can be stressful. Larson is founder of Sage Marketing Group, a full-service advertising agency, and TeamSage Productions, an event production company.

With 20 major clients and five to six events between the two businesses, “having so many balls in the air at one time” can cause stress. TeamSage Productions stages varied events, including the Steamboat Wine Festival and an adventure race series. Most of these fall between April and October.

Larson, who says he loses sleep when things get tense at work, has a simple prescription for coping: Just do it.

“The way I get unstressed when things are stressing me is by jotting things down.” Then he gets to work.

Regular exercise – four to five times a week – and making sure to spend quality time with friends and family also help Larson maintain.

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