Who wants to leave?

Look around you. Are your colleagues looking a bit furtive? Do they snatch pieces of paper off the printer before you can read them, or scrabble to hide things on their computer screens when you walk past?

According to our online survey of construction professionals, one in three of you are looking for a new job, so it's a fair bet that there's quite a bit of this behaviour going on in offices up and down the land.

One of the main reasons why people change jobs is for more pay

Main contractors and civil engineers are the most disgruntled - nearly half the respondents were looking to leave. At the other end of the scale, only a quarter of architects, QSs and technicians said they had itchy feet.

If you're trying to spot who's going to leave next, it's most likely to be someone who's been in their job between three and four years. Keep an eye on your female colleagues - slightly more women than men said they wanted a new job. And don't be deceived into thinking youth equals flightiness - less than a quarter of respondents between 16 and 24 were looking to move, the peak age is between 35 and 54. Low pay does though - nearly half of respondents earning less than £15,000 had their CVs primed and ready to go.

We asked what would make you want to leave your job. The top answer was not earning enough money, with the need for a fresh challenge and stress or work/life balance issues closely following. Interestingly though, for those who were actively job hunting, stress came further down the list, below not getting promoted - perhaps a sign that while we all moan about overwork, we'll grin and bear it until other gripes become too unbearable.

Main contractors and project managers were the least bothered about a friendly working environment - only slightly more than 10% said not getting on with colleagues would make them want to leave. This rose to over 15% for more sensitive architects and engineers, and to a fifth for women as a whole and 16-24 year olds. The youngest respondents also had the least problem with travelling for work.

The survey also revealed that those furtive dashes to the printer may soon be a thing of the past - internet job applications are on the up, with the web becoming a more important job seeking tool the younger respondents were. For example, while not a single respondent over 55 got their job in this way, nearly 8% of 16-24 year olds did. Applying directly is still the most common way of securing a job, with recruitment consultancies and recommendations following.