The Impact of Work Stress on Employee Performance: Empirical Evidence from Private Universities in Iraq

Abstract

The aim of this study is to investigate the impact of work stress dimensions (workload, role ambiguity, and role conflict) on employee performance collecting data via an electronic questionnaire distributed to a sample of employees working at private universities in Iraq. The total number of questionnaires received and analyzed by SmartPLS 3.0 was 267 questionnaires. The results showed that workload and role conflict had insignificant impact on employee performance while role ambiguity had exerted a significant impact on employee performance. Based on these results, it was concluded that role ambiguity is the most critical predictor of employee performance, hence, universities were recommended to lessen work stress through reducing role ambiguity by developing a clear job description for each job, and providing employees with information that is useful in completing work tasks according to instructions and performance standards. Further studies are required to be conducted using samples from other sectors using different dimensions of work stress such as job insecurity and work relationships as well as wages.