Job Stress of a Creative Manager

The ‘inverted-U’ relationship between stress and performance is well-known. It is reasonable to assume a similar relationship between stress and creativity. However, very little is known about the reverse relationship; the stress potential of creativity has rarely been studies. The major hypothesis of this paper is that because of the special characteristics of the creative person and the nature of the creative process, it is likely that there are a few special types of stress experienced by the creative manager, which are moderated by the organizational context. The model that emerges views the job stress of a creative manger as a consequence of the interaction among (1) the traits of the creative person, (2) the nature of creative process and (3) the organizational context. The special traits of the creative personality may make him susceptible to stresses such as pressures of conformity goal/role ambiguity, task difficulties, exposure to hazards, boredom with routines, social boycott, loneliness, interpersonal conflicts and time-pressure. For the owner-manager, the most important of these is loneliness. Stresses implied by the nature of the creative process may be identified as self-doubt, agony of abandoning pet notions and theories, feeling of stuckness, outcome/uncertainty, fear of failure, communication anxiety, evaluation anxiety, difficulties in keeping up group morale and interpersonal problems. The organization context may mitigate or enhance one or the other of these stresses. For example in a non-creative organization/role, the most dominant stresses will be boredom, frustration, self-role distance, role-stagnation, approach avoidance conflicts about the job and the like. In a creative organization, however, the influence of the organizational context is minimal on the stresses resulting from the personality traits, the creative process and/or their interaction. Since the job-stress of a creative manager is viewed as an outcome of the interaction of three variables, the coping strategies adopted would depend on the extent of influence of the personal and organization variables in a particular context, assuming that the creative process remains largely unchanged. Hence, the coping strategies are broadly classified into two, namely, the personal and the organizational, which are also discussed in some detail.