Job insecurity
The perceived threat of losing one’s job, or valued parts of it, while still employed. It is worry about a future loss, and research finds it can harm wellbeing even when no one is laid off.
What drives it
Watching for the axe keeps a person alert to warnings and ready to act. For identification it explains overwork, presenteeism, silence in meetings and irritability at home in someone whose job still exists on paper.
How it shows
Work
Staying late to be seen, refreshing the company news page, reading meaning into every calendar invite from HR, not taking leave, keeping quiet about mistakes and disagreements. Rumours of a restructure travel faster than any memo.
Relationships
Snapping at home after a vague all-hands, reluctance to commit to a holiday or a lease, keeping the worry from a partner or talking about nothing else.
Self
Notice whether an unscheduled meeting with your manager makes your stomach drop, whether you hold back ideas to avoid attention, and how much of your evening goes on imagining the conversation where you are let go.
What tells it apart
Latent deprivation: Latent deprivation is what actual job loss takes away beyond income: routine, status, contact. Job insecurity is the threat while the job is still there.
Burnout: Burnout comes from chronic overload and shows as exhaustion and cynicism. Job insecurity comes from threat, and the overwork it drives may lead to burnout but begins as fear.
Vulnerability to harm or illness schema: The schema expects disaster across life, including in secure jobs. Job insecurity is more likely when there are real signals at work, such as cuts, contracts ending or a sector in trouble.
A test
Ask what specific signals at work the person has seen. Concrete signals point to job insecurity, while fear that persists in a job with every sign of security points more likely to a schema or general anxiety.
Questions to carry
- After the last vague message from management, what did the person do differently that week?
- What would I lose first if this job went, and is it the money?
How strong the research is
strong. A meta-analysis by Sverke, Hellgren and Näswall (2002) links perceived job insecurity with poorer health and worse attitudes to the job and the employer, with effects on behaviour found only to some extent. Later work separates thinking the job may go (cognitive insecurity) from worrying about it (affective insecurity).
Where it comes from
Leonard Greenhalgh and Zehava Rosenblatt, 1984 (Job insecurity: toward conceptual clarity). Magnus Sverke, Johnny Hellgren and Katharina Näswall, 2002 (No security, meta-analysis)