Think you need to head to a haunted house to get spooked this Halloween? Think again - some workers report that you don't even have to leave work to get your fill of fright. According to CareerBuilder's Halloween survey conducted among more than 4,000 workers, nearly one-in-five (18 percent) workers describe their workplace as scary.

Some workers think their workplace is scary because their bosses bear a strong resemblance to famous Halloween characters. When asked which popular characters best reflect their boss's behavior, workers said the following:

  --  Glenda the Good Witch, liked and respected by all - 20 percent
  --  The Wolf Man, is fine one minute, howling the next - 11 percent
  --  The Invisible Man, never around - 10 percent
  --  Casper the Friendly Ghost, eager to help, but often misunderstood - 9
      percent
  --  Dracula, constantly sucking the life right out of you - 6 percent
  --  Wicked Witch of the West, always acting conniving and sending out
      minions to do his/her dirty work - 5 percent
  --  The Mummy, slow-moving and has an ancient thought process - 4 percent

  --  Grim Reaper, constantly delivers bad news and inspires fear among
      workers - 3 percent

In addition to spooky bosses, when asked what the scariest part of their job was, workers reported the following fear-inducing activities:

  --  Workload - 18 percent
  --  Performance reviews - 9 percent
  --  Tight deadlines - 9 percent
  --  Hours worked - 8 percent
  --  Their boss or supervisor - 7 percent

  --  Sitting through meetings - 6 percent


  Survey Methodology

This survey was conducted online within the U.S. by Harris Interactive© on behalf of CareerBuilder.com among 4,285 U.S. workers (employed full-time; not self-employed; and non-government); ages 18 and over between August 20 and September 9, 2009 (percentages for some questions are based on a subset, based on their responses to certain questions). With a pure probability sample of 4,285 one could say with a 95 percent probability that the overall results have a sampling error of +/- 1.5 percentage points. Sampling error for data from sub-samples is higher and varies.

About CareerBuilder®

CareerBuilder is the global leader in human capital solutions, helping companies target and attract their most important asset - their people. Its online career site, CareerBuilder.com®, is the largest in the United States with more than 23 million unique visitors, 1 million jobs and 32 million resumes. CareerBuilder works with the world's top employers, providing resources for everything from employment branding and data analysis to HR consulting. More than 9,000 websites, including 140 newspapers and broadband portals such as MSN and AOL, feature CareerBuilder's proprietary job search technology on their career sites. Owned by Gannett Co., Inc. , Tribune Company, The McClatchy Company and Microsoft Corp. , CareerBuilder and its subsidiaries operate in the United States, Europe, Canada and Asia. For more information, visit www.careerbuilder.com.

  Media Contact:
  CareerBuilder
  Allison Nawoj
  773-527-2437
  allison.nawoj@careerbuilder.com
  http://www.twitter.com/CareerBuilderPR

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SOURCE: CareerBuilder