Stress is as natural to the human condition as the desire to avoid it. We all deal with stress. And we all would like to avoid stress as much as possible. While many conditions outside of work can cause stress, a leader can only affect the conditions at work. But while at work, leaders have a great deal of power over (and responsibility to mitigate) the 3 most common workplace stressors.

These 3 stressors were originally identified in the 1964 book, Organizational Stress: Studies in Role Conflict and Ambiguity by Kahn et al., which has been cited nearly 12,000 times and is considered a seminal work on the topic. A 2026 meta-analysis by Sawhney et al., drawing on 515 studies and nearly 788,000 participants, confirmed that all three stressors continue to harm both individual and organizational performance. But the research also revealed something important: the three stressors don't cause the same kinds of harm, and they don't respond to the same interventions. Here are the 3 role stressors:

Stress occurs when individuals are incapable of fulfilling the expectations of their role. The research also shows that all 3 stressors impact individual and organizational performance. However, it’s important to note that not all job stress is equal; each of the 3 stressors identified above has its own causes. As leaders, we need to understand the drivers of workplace stress if we hope to mitigate it for our employees.

The Sawhney meta-analysis makes this point sharply. Role ambiguity turned out to be the most broadly damaging of the three, accounting for more than 80% of the explained variance in task performance and organizational citizenship behaviors across the studies reviewed. Role conflict was the strongest driver of burnout and turnover intentions. And role overload had the most pronounced effect on negative emotions and physical symptoms.

As you’ve probably already guessed, each stressor has specific interventions and solutions that individual leaders can leverage to help mitigate stress for each employee.

Role ambiguity is caused by a lack of pertinent information, which can be driven by organizational complexity, change, or poor communication. For most instances, leaders can provide additional information and clarity on the role, helping employees align on what’s expected and how to accomplish the assigned tasks. The best tool for leaders in these instances is a good task assignment that provides the employee with all the information they need to work autonomously.

Role Conflict is caused when an employee feels that what they are asked to do contradicts something else. It could be policies or guidelines that contradict an organization’s or individual’s values, conflicting requests from different stakeholders, or individual values that are incongruent with organizational values. Leaders can help alleviate conflict through role prioritization, helping show employees how to adequately sequence work to avoid conflicts. Leaders can also help coordinate between groups and departments more effectively to ensure stakeholders are aligned on a project’s intent and how to achieve it.

Role Overload is caused by an employee lacking the capability to handle the complexity of their role (See Peter Principle), or when an employee doesn’t have the time required to complete the work. The best thing you can do as a leader to help mitigate role overload is to actively monitor your employees’ workload. Adding a new task without taking something away is never okay. If you give something new, what are you removing to free up their time? As a caveat for leaders, you have to keep an eye on your own role overload, as the Sawhney research found it disproportionately affects senior leaders and high performers.

It’s also important to note that an employee may be experiencing only 1 stressor or they could be experiencing all 3 at the same time. A leader’s job is to uncover the real reason their employees feel stressed. Stress is often easy to spot, even when its causes remain hidden. It becomes easier to observe and mitigate stress once you understand the 3 drivers of role stress. It could be as simple as reprioritizing deadlines on assigned tasks or as complicated as changing the organizational structure of 30,000 employees. Your job is to identify and mitigate stress as much as you can.

After all, leaders exist to make their teams more effective. Reducing stress and protecting employees from new stressors helps them produce better outputs. And in the long run, it only makes your life as a manager easier. Leading people with minimal stress is a heck of a lot easier than leading a high-stress team.

Until next time,

Rick

P.S. Thanks for reading!

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