
The Myth of Executive Stress - saurabh
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=the-myth-of-executive-str
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orasis
This article is bullshit. I have never in my life experienced anything more
stressful than running my own software company and being responsible for
making payroll.

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lsc
> I have never in my life experienced anything more stressful than running my
> own software company and being responsible for making payroll.

That statement, I think, says more about your background than anything else.
Running your own company is stressful, sure. But compare it to a situation
that is just as stressful where you don't have control. For me? High school
was dramatically worse.

And that says a lot about my life experience. That I've never experienced
anything worse than high school. I'm certain that anyone who has spent any
time, say in jail has had it much worse.

Or what about those minimum wage service jobs? that's gotta be pretty bad. I
remember the other day in taco bell listening to another customer berate the
staff for misspelling his name. I can imagine feeling trapped in one of those
jobs. That would be pretty bad. I've never had a job where I didn't feel like
I could quit and have a better job within a week. This simply isn't the case
for the vast majority of the population; if you work at taco bell, and you get
fired? it could be quite some time before someone else gives you a chance. And
what about your opportunities for advancement? For me to feel okay about
myself, personally, I need to know that I'm 'making progress' \- even if you
aren't a greedy jerk like me who measures himself with money, I can imagine
that the prospect of supporting yourself and your family on near minimum wage-
with little hope of improving that would be a lot more stressful than doing
the same thing when you have reason to believe that you will be doing better
in the future.

Or, what about the military? You can literally be shot for walking off the
job. You're paid peanuts and can only change commanders with the permission of
your superiors. Even before we talk about combat (which I'm not qualified to
talk about.) that's gotta be pretty stressful.

Yeah, I'm not buying the idea that running a company can be rated 'very
stressful' on the scale of general human experiences. You have a lot of
control over your situation.

I do agree that it can be rated as 'very stressful' on the scale of upper-
middle class experiences. But I think that people who run businesses? we are
far less likely to fear getting fired. If you have what it takes to run a
business, you probably have what it takes to sell yourself to a new employer.
The same job is going to be less stressful for us than for most people because
we don't fear getting fired like they do.

