The Linkage between Emotional Labor and Stress Effects on Retail Sales Workers

Abstract

Purpose: Retail workers have a role in attending to customers better, not only making sales to them. In this regard, this research focuses on having a clear understanding of the effects of emotional factors and job stress on mental health for retail sales workers. Research design, data and methodology: The present research conducted both a qualitative textual analysis and interview. This research method is quite useful because it relates the information collected with the research gap. Qualitative data is time-consuming type of data to analyze since it involves interpreting words rather than numbers. Results: The findings showed that emotional labor and stress may not only cause mental harm to the employees but can result in adverse reaction to the customers. Retail employees need to express their true emotions and avoid pretending to be helped with a clear understanding of their needs. Conclusion: This study conclude that motional labor and stress to the retail workers is a real issue that has affected many people around the globe and there is a need to conduct more research on the issue to help employees serve customers much better. Stress among sales workers results to poor working morale and thus affects the entire organization at large.

1. Introduction

Retail workers in various parts of the globe play an essential role in ensuring that customers get the products they need (Vaja, 2015). Organizations have a duty to ensure that their emotional well-being is taken care of and stress to facilitate their work efficiency (Trinkner, Tyler, & Goff, 2016). Organizations have a critical role in ensuring that the emotional well-being of their employees is taken care of. They have a duty to monitor the emotions of their employee to ensure that they perform their tasks efficiently. Several factors may stress retail sales workers. Some of these factors may include overworking and poor pay, just to mention a few in this regard. For workers to perform their duties well, they need to have good health first among and ready in their state of mind. Employees who interact with customers regularly are more likely to have job burnout. Retail workers are likely to suffer fatigue, depression, and other health problems like insomnia (Kim & Yoon, 2017).

Employees who have emotional challenges and stress are also likely to deteriorate in their families and other social aspects. Employees are likely to be absent at the place of work and low commitment to what they perform. Organizations have a responsibility to manage their employees’ emotions. Literature regarding the feelings of the salespersons has been overlooked for a period of time (Singh & Glavin, 2017). Research about employee emotions is an area that is underdeveloped and thus needs much research. Sales workers have a role in attending to customers better, not only making sales to them. In this regard, this research focuses on having a clear understanding of the effects of emotional factors and job stress on mental health for retail sales workers.

Employees who are stressed and have emotional challenges are likely to have a reduced motivation together with low levels of esteem. Growth in the service industry has drawn attention to the importance of employee emotions and issues that may result in inefficiency. Based on various studies that have been conducted, it is clear that emotional labor may affect the well-being of the employees (Sarraf, 2018). Employees need counseling sessions to ensure they are able to handle their emotions and stress and thus perform their duties in the best way possible. This will provide the organizations' benefits also through better job performance. Training workshop is essential to facilitate employees in managing their stress and emotional concerns. Emotional exhaustion can be damaging to the employees and result in poor job performance (Chung, Jung, Kim, & Cho, 2017).

Thus there is need for managers to ensure that there is a favorable environment that favors retailers; this can be ensured by employee assessments where employee gaps can be identified and bridged, listening to employees' views and issues (Westcott, 2006). Through effective management of the employee emotions and stress, customers are likely to get better services and thus result in organizational growth. Service encounter is a term that is used in most cases to refer to face-to-face interaction between the employees and customers. The exchange is critical as it can result in better or even poor customer satisfaction (Cho & Song, 2017). The period in which the buyer and seller interact is so critical and thus has a significant impact to the client. The communication that exists between the worker and buyer has a significant meaning and therefore is needs to be strengthened.

There have been numerous studies conducted in the past linking emotions to work output in that emotional labor related to employees ill-health and poor work outcomes. Emotional labor has had different definition from early psychologists. However, today, there are several frameworks that have been put in place assisting in the research of the effect of emotional labor in a workplace environment and its relationship to employee burnout and work-related stress (Philipp & Schüpbach, 2010). Thus emotional labor can be defined as the act of expressing emotions desired by the workplace and exists as the difference between real emotions and the organizational desired emotions (Karimi, Leggat, Donohue, Farrell, & Couper, 2014). However, unlike other work stressors, emotional labor is not influenced by culture as it is experienced in equal measure despite cultural backgrounds. And with the increased development of the service industry, the need of prioritizing studies on emotional labor and its effects on employee output. Thus competition of many service industries has been instrumental in understanding human emotional behavior.

Previous studies however, had the limitations of ignoring the difference that existed between organizational desired emotions and personal emotions and had resorted to studying external variables as influencing emotional labor (Dahling, & Johnson, 2013). Besides, today’s studies have highlighted on the factors that causes the gap such as lack of employee motivation, skill gap, and lack of a standard organizational culture. all the aforementioned factors constitute to an individual’s emotions getting detached from the organizational-required emotions due to lack of satisfaction and conflicting emotions is bound to affect an employee’s performance. The study further highlights on the recommendations to be put in place to reduce the emotional challenges faced by retail sales.

Figure 1: The Overall Procedure of the Research

2. Literature Review

Recently in the United States, manufacturing has been replaced by the service industry. The United States was the first service economy in the world. The decline in manufacturing jobs and a surge in service employment have led to increased emotional labor cases. Emotional labor results to control to the workers and thus has negative psychological impacts.

Emotional labor is defined as the expressing of desired emotion within an organization in the process of service interaction. It is different from that of the organization, and thus a retail sales worker has a role in ensuring that they meet the set standards and rules. Emotional labor workers tend to express specific emotions in the workplace. Job demands may harm the mental health of the sales workers. Some of the jobs might be so demanding to the employees and have a negative effect on the health (Shin & Hur, 2019). Employees need to be in a position to express sincere emotions to the customers. Emotions vary from sadness to, guilt and they have the power to either lift one or even lower the job performance of any given worker. It is hard to assume the emotional aspect in the organization it affects employees on a day to day running of the organization. Different researchers define emotions differently (Han, Shim, & Choi, 2018). This is mainly because of their difference in levels of expertise, through some view them as a chain of reactions. They have cognitive, behavioral, and psychological elements. Threatening situations at the workplace may make sales employees be stressed and result in inferior results. I such cases, they are not able to express their genuine emotions and thus end up pretending.

Employees need to be motivated to ensure they feel essential at the workplace as it affects their emotions. Employees respond differently to various situations and incentives, and thus what is suitable for one may be very different for another. Emotional labor has been widespread recently as has emerged a new area of research that is under study. Emotional work has other form of regulation from various researchers (Chun, Cho, Choi, & Cho, 2020). Emotional labor is of importance, and organizations need to address the issue to be able to help employees in the sales environments (Zou & Dahling, 2017). Stressed employees cannot be able to perform their duties effectively and thus the need to address the emotional factors which affect them.

Sales employees have high emotion and able to make people calm down and thus help the co-workers. This can help bring calm to the organization and thus help achieve much success. Employees have a duty to employ the best skills to ensure that they are able to serve customers better. Employees that have fewer skills are likely to benefit customers somewhat while the best to be excellent (Moreo, Cain, & Chang, 2020). Human needs to be satisfied and help employees be emotionally well (Kim, Kang, & Han, 2019). Employee behavior is critical for the success of their respective duties. Employees need to be supported emotionally in their workplaces to perform their obligations to the best level.

Surface acting by employees has a negative impact and thus needs to be discouraged. A good example is a case where an employee provides services to a customer while smiling, but inside, they have negative feelings. In this case, an emotional conflict arises and result to a negative impact to job satisfaction. Deep and surface acting are artificial behaviors, and thus they do not put the actual picture to the situation itself. Deep acting enables employees to be in line with the needs of the organization. The best thing with deep acting is the fact that the employees are not able to act at this they perform their duties without pretending at all. The type of emotion strategy used by an organization may result in different results (Zhou & Li, 2018).

Communication is one factor that links the relationships between many business stakeholders. Communication has got both verbal and non-verbal aspects and they affect customer satisfaction. A communication between sales workers and customers may result in mental challenges, especially in cases where the customer talks rudely to the sales worker. In the process of customers choosing their desired products then they interact with the company front line workers (Gaddam, 2008). They represent the company itself, and they can make or damage the image of the firm. The verbal and non-verbal communications between the present salesperson and thus the emotional labor depend on the standpoint of the employee. Linguistic communication can never be underrated as it plays an essential role in the sales process. Through the use of language, employees can communicate with customers and thus responding to their needs. Reliable communication may result in better results in regard to product sales. Studies have proven that nonverbal communication delivers meaning better than through the use of words. It narrows the psychological distance that exists between the employees and their customers.

False acting by employees can also be defined as emotional dissonance and happens when one a worker expresses the wrong emotions. It leads to exhaustion emotionally, which has a harmful impact on the mental health of the salesperson, which may attract other problems like depression. This is facilitated by excessive emotional demands and has a negative effect at the place of work. Workers may end up struggling as they try to achieve emotional dissonance. Workers may feel hypocritical when they experience this kind of struggle in their minds. A worker needs independence to be able to do the designed functions. Emotional labor has a negative effect on employees, and thus there is a need for employers to address the issue using the best mechanisms. Organizations have a responsibility to manage their employees’ emotions (Grandey, 2003).

Basing on the research that was conducted by Jin (2007), findings were able to identify that job boasting was also a factor in worker's burnout. Guy and Newman (2008) argued that emotional labor resulted in pride as employees to their work. Pride, on the other hand, can be termed as the level of commitment as the place of work (Zhao, Li, & Shields, 2019). Many organizations that offer services are developing strategies that enable them to attract many customers to their premises. Absenteeism is associated with job dissatisfaction and indicates that the worker is not contented with the work he or she is doing.

Holman and Totterdell (2003) argued that deep acting had an impact on the quality of performance. Employees who have great pride view their employees as important members of the community. Employees are likely to go beyond their required levels of performance, and this is of great help to the organization (Khairy, 2020). According to Howard Johnson, pride played a significant role in the growth and development of his hotel business (Guo, 2021). Organizations need to make their sales workers feel proud about what they do as this may result in even better performance than the expected levels.

Emotional labor supports the view of emotional labor discussed and has psychological hazards for the worker, and thus such effects need to be solved. With the growing need of employees to work in various organizations, there is a need to help address their issues that may result in ineffectiveness or even mental stigma (Wu & Shie, 2017). When one has mental problems, it is hard to deal with internal and external needs. Such roles may include roles in the work that they do and thus affecting the productivity levels. There are several mental disorders that are likely to affect employees who have emotional labor and stress. Workplace challenges may result in disability and other cognitive challenges. Workplace stress is higher in developing countries when compared to developing countries (Wang, 2020). The working conditions may also be a source of anxiety for the employees. Some environmental factors affect the health of the workers. Workers need to be subjected to fairness concerning any issue. When this is done, then the chances of mental health and stress issues are expected to reduce drastically.

Employee experiences vary from one to another and are translated into customer experiences. Today organizations compete to equip their employees with the best skills that will enable them to serve the customers better (Walsh, Yang, Dahling, Schaarschmidt, & Takahashi, 2019). They are determined to minimize the emotional factors and stress of the salespersons and make their work much more manageable. Gesserand (2005) defined emotional labor as the process which focuses on regulating the emotion of a person. Emotions have been recognized as an essential part of any given workforce (Wang, 2020). Emotional factors are caused by many factors at the workplace, like stress, among many others. They play a critical role in influencing job outcomes. They need to be managed well and thus help achieve better results. Emotional labor needs to be addressed better to ensure it does not significantly harm the organization. It is clear that most of the researchers were able to link emotional labor and stress in the roles undertaken by various workers, and this has a negative impact on mental health.

Stress at the workplace may be due to many reasons, some of which may be linked to the employees themselves. The stress at the workplace may make employees have strange behaviors. Workers who are less skilled may be strained as they struggle to perform their duties in their respective stations. Psychological stress is associated with job strain at the workplace, which has high chances of negatively impacting the person's health (Pandey, 2019). In other cases, psychological stress is associated with rewards that do not match the work done, identifying anxiety and depression employees (Moon, Hur, & Choi, 2019). The study conducted in the United States showed that employees who had mental disorders were less likely to participate in their designated duties at the places of work. A stressed individual is expected to perform poorly in their areas of work.

Table 1: Summary of Prior Literature

3. Research Design

Research has been the culmination of the vast knowledge and information presently available to students and scholars, respectively. However, the enormous amount of information available has increasingly made it difficult to analyze the data due to the consumption of too much time. This challenge has instigated the need for better and less time consuming methods for handling and analyzing content. The quest for successful content analysis produced one of the best approaches known as qualitative content analysis. This type of analysis emphasizes the quality of data presented through words and themes (Flick, 2017). Although this method of analyzing data focuses on quality, various applications such as the research approach, objectives, and examples produce a more solid definition of qualitative content analysis (Lee, 2021; Sung, 2021; Richard & Kang, 2018; Woo, 2020).

The intricate process involved in research insights is what is referred to as data collection. The tally sticks are the earliest data collection forms in human civilization from the 18, 000 BCE (Marr, 2015). These sticks were symbolic for tracking the trading supplies; hence, they would analyze the data to forecast how long the supplies would last them. The abacus was the second notable form of collecting data used by Babylonians (Marr, 2015). This discovery was followed by the Alexandrian library, which held the most collected data in that period (Marr, 2015). It was also the birth of modern research and more complex data collection processes. There are currently many data collection processes, all of which involve gathering research, measuring, and analyzing the collected data.

The first approach applied in data collection is the actual gathering of information which is an essential step of any research since it will affect the collected data. The process implemented for collecting data may vary depending on the study and the kind of information needed. Different tasks have different data collection methods. For example, clinical studies may not employ the same methodologies as art studies. However, regardless of the method used, the main objective, which is to collect rich and reliable information that will eventually help in analysis, should not be ignored. The various forms of qualitative data collection include visual and textual analysis, observations (Bengtsson, 2016). Textual and visual analysis is the scrutiny derived from videos or books. It involves sampling various sources related to the research questions at a broad angle and merging related content to analyze the information collected. Researchers may also apply observations in the collection of qualitative data (Bengtsson, 2016). These approaches involve observation; however, it is the research subject that may determine the most suitable.

Measuring research is the second process after collecting all relevant information. In quantitative textual analysis, data measurement helps control the various variables controllable (Bengtsson, 2016). Also, data collection is analyzing the collected and measured data. This step is the most useful because it relates the information collected with the research gap. Sense and meaning have to be found in the content compiled. Qualitative data is the most time consuming type of data to analyze since it involves interpreting words rather than numbers (Lebied, 2018; Kang, 2020).

Figure 2: The Overall Procedure of Literature Content Analysis

This research has majored on secondary data from different past sources for example the data produced from experiment conducted by Boucher (2016). According to Jeung, Kim, and Chang (2018), burnout is one of the major influencers of emotional labor (Brotheridge & Grandey, 2002). as retailers are the direct contact between production and consumption, most retailers suppress their personal emotions for the satisfaction of an angry or rude customer. According to secondary data findings from their experiment retailers suffer immense emotional labor as they at most times mask their emotions for the satisfaction of their clients; at this point they are not their real selves.

Besides the secondary textual data, an interview was conducted and additional extra questions were answered through reference from previous studies. All participants were noticed by which this interview is totally anonymous. One of the interviews we conducted encompassed 18 employees, six individuals each from different types of business entities; Hotel industry, healthcare institutions, and Financial institutions (banks) among employees of between (20-40) years. Out of the six restaurant employees interviewed three worked regular shifts of between (8-10) hours on the weekends while the other three worked (12-15) hours. The outcomes of the questionnaire indicated that the employees who worked for several hours without expressed dissatisfaction with their work environment due to minimal motivation (Kim, 2008). Besides, out of the three employees who worked longer shifts, two of them have a tendency of causing minor errors as compared to the other employees who worked for shorter shifts.

The outcomes of this questionnaire suggested that too much working hours without proper motivation is a causative agent of the gap that exists between employee’s individual emotional state and the emotions an organization dictates for efficient output. Increased working hours without reciprocating employees' output leads to demoralization thus employee burnout (Hsieh, Yang, & Fu, 2012). Given that research on emotional labor is ongoing due to further studies this interview only catered for individuals within a 20-year period range thus a limitation for this method however the participants’ ages were equally distributed within the age group. Interviewing the 18 respondents was essential as we were able to take advantage of the additional information gained from face-to-face interaction (Sturges & Hanrahan, 2004).

Table 2: Tabulated data from the Interview

4. Findings

A major trend was observable from the interview data, the employees who worked several hours’ exhibited immense emotional labor due to more working hours without enough motivation. Besides, one in three surgical nurses experienced employee burnout despite having higher salaries than the waitresses (Ledgerwood, Crotts, & Everett, 1998). This finding reflects the fact that demoralization is a causative factor for emotional labor, with the increase of dissatisfaction with a working environment, there is an increase in the gap between individual emotions and the emotions tailored by the work environments. The pressure to conform to the emotions as defined by the organization leads to ill health such as depression stress and employee contract termination. Additionally, dissatisfaction with work environments was also exhibited by the participants as closely related to emotional labor, participants who exhibited emotional labor were likely to quit their jobs.

We also figured out several key main factors to reduce stressful situations for retail workers based on prior resources that are mostly peer-reviewed articles. To ensure that the retail workers are helped, then several actions need to be undertaken. There is a need for organizations and other stakeholders to put interventions that help improve the employees' health. One way to do this includes conducting medical check-up for the workers and thus helps address their concerns. There is also a need to address the issue and ensure that the employees can work efficiently. In most developed countries, there are health promotion programs to take care of the interests of the employees (Pawłowska, 2020). According to the WHO, there is a need to promote health programs to ensure that the welfare of the employees is promoted. The workplaces also need to be modified to help to serve the employees better. This measure can help improve productivity in the workplace. In this case, we shall focus on several solutions approaches to help solve stress among the sales workers and other employees who work in different organizations around the globe.

Counselling sessions with the workers can be of great help to help employees perform their duties better. This can be done through several approaches, such as through phone counseling. This approach has worked in different parts of the world. Workshops can be used as they have proved efficient in other parts of the world. In the United Kingdom, the use of seminars has proven to be efficient in addressing the workers' concerns (Van, 2019). It is possible to identify the real issues that affect employees when a workshop is conducted to help address the factors that affect them (Pina, 2000). Individual assessment is the best approach to help address the concerns. This may result in a positive impact on the employees and result in better working performance. Sales workers also need to know how they can handle various customers that visit their premises. Today, most organizations have a counseling department to help employees address the concerns they may face concerning their job.

To find the solution to the problem, some of the approaches that can help concerning emotional labor two approaches can effectively solve the challenge. One of the ways is how the workers can control their own emotions (Scott et al., 2020). This is the best solution mechanism to ensure that employees can perform their duties to their level best. Emotional labor and stress may not only cause mental harm to the employees but can result in adverse reaction to the customers (Chung, Jang, & Edelson, 2021). Employees need to express their true emotions and avoid pretending to be helped with a clear understanding of their needs.

Employers need to motivate employees in their organizations to be able to perform their duties better without stress. A motivated sales worker can perform much better compared to demotivated ones. There are many ways through which organizations can motivate employees such as giving gifts. The rewards can be also in the form of promotion several other mechanisms (Han et al., 2018). Studies have proved that motivated employees are likely to perform their tasks much better. Every employee likes to be appreciated and thus recognize his or her importance in the organization (Choy & Kamoche, 2021). Organizations and businesses need to be encouraged to motivate their employees and this has an advantage both mentally as well as their job performance.

Reduction in the working hours for the employees can also help in reduction of emotional labor and stress. When sales workers are exposed to long working hours they are subjected to mental strain and this affects their health negatively (Lu & Guy, 2019). Reduction of working hours can be done through increasing the number of sales employees and thus they can work in shifts. Therefore, there is room to award employees off duty to be able to meet their personal obligations such as socializing. Employees just like other people need to free time to perform their own personal obligations (Wang, Xu, Zhang, & Li, 2020). Employees need free time to visit their friends and family members also. Employers need to focus on the needs of employees and thus help them perform much better.

There is need to develop working skills that take care of both parties in the business environment. There is a good number of employees across the globe who have mental illness that result from the places of work. Some of the countries have effective legislations that take care of the workers welfare. Through development of effective working skills the employees and customers will only be expected to follow the set procedures. The good aspect with working skills is to avoid cases of bias and thus all the employees will be treated equal. Many of the developed countries have developed working skills and they have placed the employees in a better position as they perform their duties. Countries that lack working skills need to have some in place and this will help protect the health of the sales workers and other employees at large.

Deep and surface acting have an impact to the customer satisfaction. Nonverbal communication was proven to have a positive impact and thus result to better customer service delivery. It I hard to identify customer true feelings in cases where they pretend to be in line with the organization requirements. Customers need to be encouraged to express about the true feelings and thus they need platforms which they can be able to express their issues (Kang, 2020). A good example is through the use of suggestion boxes and complains as well as complements boxes to help serve them better through addressing the issues of concerns. All the stakeholders in the business need to act genuinely and thus help in addressing the real issues to get the best solutions. Emotions are critical in every human being and thus they need to be addressed using the approaches possible.

Participating in games is a good approach for organization to help minimize stress among the employees and also help in their health wellbeing. Games have been effective in helping employees address their stresses for a long period of time. Employees are able to go to the field and do some exercise such as playing soccer where they are able release the work stress and tiredness that they might have faced as they perform their duties (Chun et al., 2020). A good number of organizations around the globe have clubs and teams that they support. They too have internal competitions for the employees that help them to socialize and manage the stress levels that might be affecting the employees (Tams, Ahuja, Thatcher, & Grover, 2020). Games have got some magic in order for one to address the issue of stress among employees who work in various organizations.

The present author strongly believes through addressing the discussed solutions it is possible to address the issue of emotional labor and stress which has an impact to the health wellbeing of the sales workers. This is an area of research that has not been fully researched and thus there is need to continue the work and find the lasting solutions to the issue. Through effecting the named solution measures employees are able to perform their duties effectively are thus results to organizational growth rapidly.

Table 3: Summary of the Research Results

5. Implementation of mechanisms for Retail Workers

The realism in the implementation of mechanisms for wiping the work-oriented stress among retail workers entails the incorporation of profound mechanisms for deserving work environment. The employers are supposed to exercise humanity in the workplace accommodation of the retail shop workers (Van Oort, 2019). The initial step towards the realization of the research findings regarding the emotional care for the retail workers involves the reduction of severe job demand. In the midst of the job involvement and maintaining full control in customer handling, the workers need to be granted regular breaks as a mechanism for relaxation (Sarraf, 2018). Into the bargain, the employer should consider maintaining the consistent breaks for the workers through including the shift working design among the workers. Retaining a single shop retail worker in a small business may result to unprecedented ramifications on their psychological health. The resultant emotional stress may result from the continued maintenance of the working physical environment.

With respect to the dedication in business success while understanding their humanity needs, the employers should consider the profound handling of the emotional crises which come along in their worker's side. The employer should dedicate their role as psychological light for the retail shop workers through encouraging their openness and promising to stand for their stressful times and general wellbeing moments (Lu & Guy, 2019). Considering that majority of the retail workers are youthful individuals striving to survive their hard life orientation, it’s significantly safe for the employers and business managements to profoundly understand their stressful challenges. Furthermore, while trying to cater for the customer better service, organizations should align strategies aimed at mental abuse which they may direct to the retail shop workers (Cho & Song, 2017). The enhancement of equal customer-retail worker respect entails the polite interference which should not stand for the validation of customer traumatizing behaviors towards the organizational workers. Its significant for the realization of the factual understanding that customer complaints should not be generalized to epitome from the organizational retail worker.

The personal responsibility of the retail worker regarding their emotional care necessitates their expression and signaling of their employers when job trauma affects them. They should learn to conceptually align their emotional grievances and related crises like salary delay stress instead of expressing unreal emotions. The personal emotional camouflaging to cover the hidden trauma arising from job orientation is an exemplary depiction of self- embarrassment. Through speaking up, the management's response can not only secure their emotional wellness, but also align their self-worth for understanding. The research findings relate the increasing in build trauma among majority retail shop workers which has resulted from the unreal expression. The emotional labor challenge continues to spread globally, with recent findings expounding on the extreme extent in which job trauma is affecting the retail shop workers (Singh & Glavin, 2017). Majority of the affected have decide to sidelined their jobs for their wellbeing while others continue to sail through emotional trenches for the need of a living. The entire organizational community should focus on provisions which can wipe the situational crisis regarding the workers emotional crisis.

Table 4: Implementation of mechanisms for Retail Workers

6. Discussion

Emotional labor and stress to the retail workers is a real issue that has affected many people around the globe. Retail workers face a lot of challenges especially when they are dealing with the customers and thus, they need help. There is a need to conduct more research on the issue to help employees serve customers much better. Stress among sales workers results to poor working morale and thus affects the entire organization at large. There is a need for all the organizations to improve the employee’s welfare and thus help them perform their duties better. Employees are likely to face mental challenges as they perform their duties. Emotional labor has attracted attention to people in all the fields as it affects the psychological wellbeing of the employees. The results from the different organizations show mixed reactions on the issue though majority agree that it has a negative impact to the employees. Emotional labor has a negative impact to the private lives of the employees.

Workers are affected emotionally as they work and result to stress which affects their mental set up. Employees in the sales of any business are like the barometers of the enterprises as they help in providing frontline support. Social support to the employees has played an important role to ensure that employees perform their duties as expected. Interpersonal factors have got different reactions to the employees and thus have a negative impact to their mental health. Employees need advices on how they can be able manage their emotions and be in a position to perform their duties effectively. In this regard emotional labor and stress among the employees and thus need appropriate attention to take care of the mental health of the sales workers.

The importance of this study was to focus on how the emotional labor and stress have an impact on the mental health of the retail workers. The factors that result to emotional labor were examined and proved that as a matter- of-fact sales workers are affected mentally as a result of emotional labor and the stress that they go through and this has a negative effect on their mental health (Moya & Moya- Garófano, 2020). Previous studies that were done on the topic played an important role in focusing on this research. Emotional labor has a direct impact on the mental health of the employees. Several researchers have divergent views in regard to emotional labor and stress among the sales workers. Employees need to work in environments that do not have a mental harm to them. This will help them to perform much better and help the organization to succeed more. Emotional labor varies from one organization to another and thus they have got different outcomes. Thus the results are not similar and other differences are facilitated further by work experiences diversities and the gender.

Experience of the occupational sales workers may result to a negative effect to their health together with their wellbeing at large. There is a need to address the concerns of the workers to ensure they are able to perform their duties without negative effects on their health. Emotional labor is an aspect that involves many aspects which need to be addressed to ensure that the employees are able to perform their duties effectively (Kim et al., 2019). There is need to conduct emotional labor assess among many organizations and thus ensure employees are able to work better. There are many other demands that affect workers in the sales set up and they have an impact to their health (Habel, Alavi, & Linsenmayer, 2021). Workers health should be of first priority to any organization to ensure they are able to perform their duties efficiently.

7. Limitation of the Research

The purpose of qualitative textual approach is to investigate the key phenomenon via numerous prior resources which are mostly peer-reviewed articles and prominent books. This methodology has disadvantages because it might cause an increased error and a high degree of subjective interpretation, dealing with complicated textual data (Moretti, van Vliet, Bensing, Deledda, Mazzi, Rimondini, & Fletcher, 2011). Also, the research interview methodology was not applicable to its full needed exploration since majority of the retail workers have been instilled with the fear of job loss for reporting the reality of emotional considerations in majority of the world organizations. Such limitations and freedom capture for the retail shop workers remains a real-time hindering factor to the findings on regarding workers exploitation (Smith, 2018). Majority of the traumatized retail workers depict a sense of instilled threat which retains their dormancy in the midst of their job emotional stress. The world labor organizational research has neglected the need for data establishment regarding the retail worker emotional needs, a problem that initially challenges further research in regard to the matter. The unavailability of existing efforts towards the information regarding the issue cripples the need for global workers stressful job challenges (Hsieh, Guy, & Wang, 2019). The research was therefore founded on the basis of initial expansion of retail worker emotional challenges.

Furthermore, the research focused not on the social media mobilization, a mechanism that would have boosted the research target population. The exclusion of social media research approach limits the extent of the procedural methodology in reaching the majority views. Therefore, the study profoundly recommends on future expansion in the coverage of the issues which have limited the target exploration of the entire procedural approach.