Stress and Employee Performance at the Cape Coast Teaching Hospital

Abstract

The study sought to examine the effect of job-related stress on the performance of nurses at the Cape Coast Teaching Hospital. The study adopted the quantitative research approach with explanatory research design to examine the effect of the variables. Specifically, the objectives were; the effect of job-related stress on nurses’ performance, the effect of demand-related stress on nurses’ performance and also, the combined effect of job-related stress and demand-related stress on nurses’ performance at the Cape Coast Teaching Hospital. Using the Krejcie and Morgan’s (1970) statistical table, 175 nurses were sampled out of 320. However, only 160 nurses participated in the study and filled the questionnaires. The retrieved data was processed with the Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS 25.0 version) and analyzed using descriptive statistics including frequency and percentages and inferential tools such as Pearson moment correlation coefficient and linear regression. The findings revealed that there was a weak correlation between both job-related stress and demand-related stress, and employee performance. It was also found that, both job-related and demand-related stress had negative and significant effect on employee performance. The study then concluded that nurses who are stressed are likely to have poor performance. This study recommends that the management and senior staff of the Cape Coast Teaching Hospital should put up measures to help mitigate the job-related stress factors to ensure that the nurses are able to perform efficiently and effectively