1 CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION 1.0 Overview Over ... - DSpace@UM

In this new era, Globalization has presented private and public sectors, includingaccountants, with many challenges; among these are to work better with less, theacceptance of mobility; flexible management styles, ability to adapt, cultural sensitivityand the ability to cope with the stress of working in the global environment. Anorganization’s success or failure depends on how they meet these new global challenges.Apparently, work stress is one feature of globalization, in which future human beings areat risk of losing their jobs, of role ambiguity, role conflict and role overload, bothqualitative and quantitative.Rightfully, Micheal (1996) argues that even people based in their own countries may beconsidered global managers if they have dealings with international businesses. Anability to adapt well to different business environments is a basic attribute that is neededand further to that should be able to respect different beliefs, solve problems quickly innew circumstances, communicate well with other people from different cultures, speakmore than one language, understand different government and political systems conveyrespect and enthusiasm when dealing with others and possess high technical expertise intheir work (Schermerhorn and Osborn, 2003). In this study, some accountants are at amanagerial level in a private organization and the above statements could be true to them.The coping strategy adopted by accountants is crucial in determining their state ofpsychological health symptoms. Most professional would probably be adopting problemfocus coping solution as studies on lawyers in Singapore has shown (Choo, 1993) but thecoping strategy in this study reflected Emotional focus and Flight/Fight focus. It is hoped69