Ravalier PhD Theis.pdf - Anglia Ruskin Research Online

316
The daily hassle approach was assessed using the AI approach, and therefore the organisational
interventions designed were based on the hassle outcomes. Daily hassles were the main focus of the AI approach
because of the feasibility of daily hassles in the development of organisational interventions. Indeed the approach
proved to be both provocative and fruitful. The sheer number of responses to the AI phases indicated that the
approach provided a strong attraction to employees, and individual responses provided shows a great strength of
feeling toward these daily hassles. Indeed, a mixing of the daily hassle and major life event played a strong part in
the development of the local stress theory, whereas the AI approach led to the development and implementation
of organisational change interventions.
Burnout has been shown to be a potentially devastating outcome of chronic workplace stress (Collings &
Murray, 1996). Within the presented study 10% of respondents in the first survey phase, and by extrapolation
approximately 7% of all of the individuals within the participating organisation were suffering from high levels of
burnout at the time of answering the survey first time around. Similarly, the MSIT found that a number of
workplace hazards were strongly associated with each of the three separate aspects of burnout, thus indicating
that stress had indeed played a part in the experience of burnout for the population as a whole.
The secondary research objective in the presented thesis was to develop interventions for the improvement
of organisational stress. Soft systems approaches (Chapter IV, Section 2a) describe an organisational change
process which is messy, and lacks any pre-defined outcome goals. This soft systems approach was the most useful
for the presented study – the participating organisation has been going through a dynamic and chaotic period of
change as evidenced through the Service 6 demographic changes in the 12 months between surveys 1 and 2 (see
Chapter VII, Section 3a.1). Therefore measuring pre-defined goals and outcomes from the study would be