1 Coping with Job Uncertainty A Survey of Employed and Unemployed High Technology Workers Janet Mantler, Kim Matheson, Amanda Matejicek, & Hymie Anisman Centre for Research in Stress, Coping, and Well-being Carleton University Over the past three years, the meltdown in the high technology industry has resulted in a large number of high technology organizations laying off considerable numbers of their employees, or shutting down completely, leaving people with a great deal of job uncertainty and relatively few job alternatives. The uncertainty for workers in this industry affects both the unemployed people who cannot foresee when they will regain employment and the employed people who cannot predict if or when they will be laid off. In organizations that have clear layoff decision rules, such as reverse seniority (last in, first out), uncertainty may be reduced because employees can count seniority numbers and make a relatively accurate guess as to “when their number will come up.” By contrast, companies that make layoff decisions on an ad hoc basis with no clear decision rules deny employees the power to predict their future and take action to protect themselves (Dunlap, 1994). Research questions The purpose of this research was to explore the effect of job uncertainty on stress and to determine strategies that employed and unemployed high technology workers use to cope successfully with job uncertainty. Even if overall levels of distress are similar for these two groups, the causes of the stress may be different. In particular, workers who remain employed in an uncertain market live with the anticipation of a potential layoff, whereas unemployed workers have already experienced a serious disruption to their lives and must cope with re-establishing stability (Kaplan, 1996). If this is the case, employed and unemployed workers may benefit from different coping strategies to effectively reduce distress. Research procedure Employed and unemployed high technology workers across Canada were recruited through email and media advertising. Participants were asked to respond to an anonymous web-based survey that took 20 - 30 minutes to complete. Survey respondents Participants included 140 employed and 215 unemployed high technology workers. The general characteristics for people in these two groups were similar. The sample included:  69% men, 31% women  average age of 39 (range 23 - 61; SD = 9)  71% married or in long-term relationships  59% had children  84% spoke English, 5% spoke French as their first language