Stress, health, and wellbeing in practice: Workplace leadership and leveraging stress for positive outcomes

Stress, health, and wellbeing are inexorably intertwined in practice. In this chapter we focus on the positive aspects of stress, health, and wellbeing for organizations and for workers. That which depletes health and wellbeing, that which is negative, cannot be ignored however. Cameron (2007) makes the point clearly that the positive and the negative are often intertwined within organizations. To ignore stress, burnout, toxic emotions, trauma, or tragedy in practice would be irresponsible. However, the focus on these can be debilitating and depleting when there is tremendous upside potential available when accentuating the positive. For that reason alone, we focus on the positive aspects for organizations and for workers.
We begin with a discussion of stress as a double edged sword, ending on a positive note that segues into and exploration of the positive pathways to health and wellbeing to build a healthy workplace. The five positive pathways to health and wellbeing that help develop resource surpluses within the human organization are: strength of character, self-regulation, power sharing, self-reliance, and a supportive organizational culture.