Dive Brief:

• Unpredictability ranks as the biggest source of work stress, according to a survey from CareerCast. Business travel is the least likely work stress source.
• The online opinion poll, a new supplement to CareerCast's annual Most and Least Stressful Jobs report, found 62% of participants rated their jobs as highly stressful, while 11% felt the amount of job stress was low.
• The most common factors influencing job stress levels included unpredictability (26%), workplace environment (21%), deadlines (20%) and safety of others (16%). Few employees felt that length of work day/week (7%), personal well being in danger (5%), potential for promotion (3%) and business travel (1%) were major job stressors.

Dive Insight:

When broken out by industry, 40% in academia, 33% in engineering and 30% in customer service rated unpredictability as their top stressor. Not surprisingly, ensuring the safety of others was the biggest stressor for transportation (41%) and healthcare (50%). Professional and business services workers rated deadlines the most stressful part of their job (31%), and workers in information technology said workplace environment was their biggest stressor (30%).

Kyle Kensing, Online Content editor at CareerCast explained that life is filled with stressors – from worrying about losing a job because the company lost a big account to having a sick child at home – and much of the pressure people experience occurs in the eight or so hours they spend at work. Seems like a good survey for HR leaders to consider when looking to reduce stress in workplaces across the entire organization.