Opinions of Personnel Working in Administrative Financial Affairs in University Faculties on Job Stress: Case Study
Ali Karakuş, İlhan GünbayıHuman life has undergone many recent changes, technologically and socio-culturally. These life changes have affected people both positively and negatively. Those affected negatively have suffered stress and have attempted to limit that stress to control everyday anxiety by researching developmental methods of coping with those problems. Stress, common in the workplace for many reasons, increases the level of anxiety according to the nature of the job. Disputes among personnel in the administrative financial affairs units of university faculties, the reasons for those disputes that arise from the work environment, the disagreements that employees have had with their supervisors, and most importantly, monetary penalties imposed upon these employees because of errors in doing their work, have, according to administrative and judicial investigations, created stress on the individuals involved. The fact that the fines charged have not been inadvertently rectified, that the investigations concern material issues, and that these individuals are accused of disgraceful crimes reveals even more clearly the magnitude of the stress they have experienced. This study aims to understand how the personnel working in the administrative financial affairs units experienced that stress, how they were affected by it, and their methods for coping with these stressors. The authors investigated these issues through interviews with administrative staff. The authors believe that there was an obvious need for qualified personnel to work in administrative financial affairs units and a concomitant need for solutions to the issue of administrative fines. Since there had been no previous similar study of administrative and financial affairs personnel working in faculties before, the authors believed it would significantly contribute to the literature. This paper represents qualitative research with a descriptive holistic case design. The research population consisted of 12 volunteer personnel working in the administrative financial affairs units of the faculties within Akdeniz University between 2020 and 2021. Using semi-structured interviews, authors performed content analysis, and the results were directly conveyed in a descriptive narrative manner. Findings obtained from the interviews demonstrated that the ongoing stress created diverse physical and mental pressures on the subjects. Those interviewed reported various methods of alleviating these effects.
Üniversite Fakültelerinde İdari Mali İşler Biriminde Çalışan Personelin Yaşadığı İş Stresi
Ali Karakuş, İlhan GünbayıYaşamış olduğumuz dönemde, insan yaşamı gerek teknolojik olsun gerek sosyo-kültürel olarak birçok değişime uğramıştır. Bu değişen yaşam, kişileri hem olumlu hem olumsuz olarak etkilemiştir. Olumsuz yönde etkilenen insan stresli bir yapıya bürünmüş, yaşamının her anında kaygı ile yaşayarak, bu sorunla baş etme yöntemlerini öğrenip araştırarak en az şekilde etkilenmeye çalışmıştır. Özellikle çalışma ortamında birçok sebepten dolayı daha fazla görülen stres, yapılan işin niteliğine göre kaygı düzeyini artırmıştır. Fakültelerin idari mali işler biriminde çalışan personeller arasındaki anlaşmazlıklar, çalışma ortamından kaynaklanan sebepler, çalışanların amirleri ile yaşamış oldukları anlaşmazlıklar ve en önemlisi işin hatalı yapılması sonucunda çalışanlara yansıtılan parasal cezalar, idari ve adli soruşturmalar kişiler üzerinde baskı oluşturarak stres yaratmaktadır. Yansıtılan para cezalarının sehven düzeltilme gibi bir durumu olmaması ve yapılan soruşturmaların maddi konular olması sebebiyle yüz kızartıcı suçlarla karşı karşıya kalınması yaşanılan stresin büyüklüğünü daha net bir şekilde ortaya koymaktadır. Yapılan bu çalışmadaki amaç, idari mali işler biriminde çalışan personellerin yaşamış oldukları iş stresini neye benzettiklerini, nasıl etkilendiklerini ve bu stres yapıcılarla başa çıkma yöntemlerini minimum görüşmeler yapılarak anlaşılmasıdır. Bu görüşmeler sonucunda hizmet içi eğitimlerin daha sık yapılması gerektiği, sehven yapılan hatalı işlemler sonucu gelen idari para cezalarına karşılık çözüm önerilerinin sunulması ve idari mali işler biriminde çalışacak kalifiye eleman ihtiyacının olduğu ön görülmüştür. Daha önce fakültelerde çalışan idari mali işler personellerine yönelik benzeri bir çalışma yapılmamış olması sebebiyle, literatüre kazandırılmak istenmiştir. Nitel bir araştırma olan çalışmamız betimsel tek durum desenli yöntem kullanılarak araştırılmıştır. Araştırmanın evrenini 2020-2021 yılları içerisinde Akdeniz Üniversitesi sınırları içerisinde yer alan fakültelerin idari mali işler biriminde çalışan 12 gönüllü personelle yapılmıştır. Yapılan bu görüşmeler sonucunda elde edilen bulgular, stresin kişiler üzerinde bedenen ve ruhen baskılar yarattığı ve bu etkilerden kurtulabilmek için farklı yöntemlere başvurdukları görülmektedir. Yarı yapılandırılmış görüşme formları kullanılarak, içerik analizi yapılıp elde edilen sonuçlar betimsel bir anlatımla doğrudan aktarılmıştır.
Stress, the most common disease of the current era, has affected many people of all ages. Stress, encountered at every stage of life, causes physical and psychological disease. Today, human life, subject to constant change, creates psychological and economic pressure on those struggling to keep up with the changes, which results in stress.
Every person suffers unique causes and symptoms of stress. For some, any given situation is normal and ordinary, while for others, the same situation can be a cause of stress. Of course, some situations can be shown as a common cause of stress for virtually everyone who experiences them.
When we examine the factors that cause stress in working life, we see that one of the most important features of the job, among all environmental and physical factors, is the relationship between employees and their motivation. As a consequence of stress, many psychological and physical diseases occur in people, negatively affecting their performance in the working environment and causing behavioral disorders.
Although stress is often experienced as a negative, it can also act as a stimulant and stimulate important human responses in situations of difficulty and change. While healthy anxiety may increase the ability to work, excessive pressure and strain can be distressing and cause loss of motivation and deterioration of health.
When dealing with stress, there are no common methods of analysis that will apply to everyone. Every individual has a clear tolerable level of exposure to stress. Therefore, individuals should endeavor to find and implement methods suitable for their own lives and take their stress management into their own hands.
In this study, we investigated their sources of stress and how they coped with that stress. In this descriptive case study with a qualitative holistic single-case design, the authors created semi-structured open-ended problem sentences and conducted recorded interviews with the participants. The data obtained from the interviews and accompanying document review were first coded and themes determined between these codes. The researcher then interpreted the findings obtained as a result of the themes.
As a result of the interviews performed in this study, the authors concluded that annual periodic in-service training should be given to financial affairs employees or during process changes. Such training would enable these personnel to progress more confidently and carry out their work with fewer errors. Even though they are in different faculties, these employees often strive to overcome their ongoing problems by communicating with one another in a team spirit. In addition, the authors found that the number of qualified personnel desiring to work in this field in faculties is very low due to the acknowledged stressful work environment in the field of financial affairs.
It is clearly impossible to eliminate stress completely. However, employees should attempt to maintain their stress at the lowest level possible in their particular situation and the conditions of their job. Further, they should aim to learn effective coping methods for stress and try to minimize the negative effects of stress on their work life. It is difficult to eliminate the factors that cause stress in business life but managing them is possible. People are not necessarily affected in similar ways by the stress they experience because of differences in their character. Nonetheless, the data argue that some stress is essential to maintain and increase the quality of an individual’s work.
Based on the research findings, the authors make the following suggestions: (1) In order to reduce the stress of financial affairs employees resulting from the imposition of administrative fines, an additional compensation payment might be made in their salaries. (2) The acceptable margin of error in the work of this personnel could be minimized by providing a calmer and better equipped environment to reduce distraction by improving the working environment. (3) The number of trained financial affairs employees should be increased. (4) Faculty administration should regularly communicate with financial affairs personnel and support them in obtaining information about the various transactions to better understand these employees and the work performed by them.
