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FORUM on Corrections Research
What is Most Stressful for Correctional Managers?
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The notion that correctional managers experience neither more nor less stress than managers in other
human service professions holds up under investigation, reports Richard Weinberg of the University of
Florida and colleagues. The researchers administered the Managerial Stress Inventory (MSI) to 32 Florida Department of Corrections managers (i.e., prison superintendents, district administrators, and other supervisory managers), in order to assess how various possible stress factors affected correctional managers. Their 39-item questionnaire required managers to indicate the extent to which they were affected by each stressor (e.g., feeling that you failed a specific assignment). Weinberg and colleagues also compared the managerial stress reported by corrections personnel with that of managers in other human service organizations. These included psychiatric hospitals (n = 184), community mental health centres (n 91), and general hospitals (n = 73). Although the researchers found that the managerial stress reported by correctional managers was unrelated to age, gender, or education, and that the amount of stress reported fell about in the middle of the human service distribution, they noted that the pressures faced by correctional managers were distinctly different from those experienced by other organizations. For example, "poor employee productivity, having to reprimand or terminate an employee, insubordination and poor communication" were among the greatest sources of stress for corrections managers. On the other hand, "inadequate salary, meeting unrealistic deadlines, and organizational politics" were the most stressful factors affecting other human service managers. These findings suggest that the major stress of working in corrections involves intra-organizational relations; that is, "the greatest source of worry and unhappiness still lies at the level of person-to-person contact," Weinberg says. Weinberg, R.R., Evans, J.R., Otten, C.A., Marlowe, R.A. (1985). Managerial Stress in Corrections Personnel. Corrective and Social Psychiatry, 31, 39-45. |
