If women dominate one field, it’s arguably customer service. In the US alone, only 27.4% of customer service representatives are men—the other 72.6% are women. Why exactly is that? Front Logix Solutions explains that women are more likely to have the soft skills needed to engage customers and address their queries in a compassionate and empathetic manner. That’s not to mention that many companies now offer remote work setups, making customer service jobs even more accessible for stay-at-home moms.
Yet, though customer service companies greatly benefit from employing this kind of workforce, the same can’t be said for the women who keep the industry moving. In fact, this line of work stresses them out so much that they’re more likely to smoke—and expose themselves to the health risks of heavy cigarette use. Here’s more on why that happens and what you can do to stop both the smoking and the stress.
Why women working in customer service smoke more
One of the reasons women in customer service smoke is stress, and working in this industry stresses them out for a number of reasons. The first is the gender pay gap: according to Front Logix, women in customer service can be paid as little as a quarter of a man’s salary. And despite the fact that they comprise the majority of the workforce, they’re not always promoted to leadership positions. That makes them even more vulnerable to the AI boom. They have a 1.5x higher risk of losing their jobs to AI, and those working in women-dominated industries like customer service will be more likely to have to change occupations—meaning one also has to stress about job security.
However, the true root of stress for women working in customer service may be related to how they’re treated by supervisors and customers alike. Even representatives working remotely might be subject to strict monitoring and performance measurements. These sometimes require women to take and completely see calls through, regardless of the verbal abuse flung at them by frustrated customers. The mental and emotional toll required to de-escalate tense calls and fully mollify customers to help them establish positive experiences with certain companies can be exceptionally stressful.
As a result, research from around the globe, conducted everywhere from South Korea to the Philippines and beyond, finds that this puts women in customer service at a higher risk of emotional burnout, making them more likely to smoke and run into various health risks. One study from Turkey even finds that out of the 122 cases of occupational disease, namely vocal cord nodules, present among customer service representatives, 85.2% were female—and 41.7% were caused by a smoking habit. That only serves to highlight how crucial it is for women in this industry in particular to quit smoking, and find ways to more healthily cope with the stress of the job.
How to quit smoking and better cope with stress
Identify your triggers
The first step is to implement healthy habits to deal with your job in order to figure out what aspects of it stress you out so much that you feel you need to pick up a cigarette. Maybe it’s a certain kind of customer, like those who make uncomfortable comments or people who make unkind remarks about your competence as a customer service representative. Maybe it’s the stress brought on by the standards imposed by your supervisor. You might even smoke more when unwinding with coworkers in the middle of or after a shift. Note what “triggers” you to pick up a cigarette the most often when trying these next steps.
Switch away from cigarettes
The next step is to break the mental link you’ve formed between smoking and your triggers by stopping cigarette use. To do so in a way that prevents withdrawal symptoms from making you even more irritable as you work, consider transitioning to alternative nicotine products first.
Nicotine pouches are among the alternatives you may want to try, as they’re discreet oral products you can use even while you’re on calls. Leading e-commerce platform Prilla hosts brands like ZYN, Rogue, and LUCY. They sell them in different flavors and nicotine strengths, so you can easily match your current nicotine consumption and smoking preferences—such as using menthol pouches in lieu of menthol cigarettes.
Nicotine patches are another great alternative you can try. These are similarly discreet and last for up to 24 hours, so you don’t need to worry about them during your shift. Brands like Equate and NicoDerm, which are easily available at major retailers like Walmart, are even designed to stagger the release of the amount of nicotine of your choice to fully prevent withdrawal symptoms.
Regardless of what you choose, you can use these nicotine alternatives to ignore the urge to smoke and instead try the next tip when you run into a trigger at work:
Adopt healthier coping mechanisms
Now that you’ve identified your triggers and found a way to start eliminating the link between them and smoking, it’s time to replace cigarettes altogether. To find the best coping mechanism for you, experiment with a few healthy ways to break the stress barrier. For example, you can use your next break to take a walk around the neighborhood and decompress. You can also try talking to coworkers about the rigors of your latest shift over a cup of coffee instead of a cigarette. You can even try visualization if you can’t get up from your desk so often. When you get stressed on a call, simply picture your “happy place”—a scene you personally find beautiful—and imagine that you’re there experiencing the sights, sounds, and smells it has to offer. All these tricks can help relax you without the need to light up a cigarette, so try them out to see which ones suit you best.
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