Stress levels for IT professionals have decreased sharply since 2014, according to TEKsystems’ third annual IT stress and pride survey.

“This year certainly paints a much rosier picture than last year — we’ve seen a significant drop in stress and a positive swing in pride and satisfaction,” said TEKsystems Research Manager Jason Hayman. “While it’s encouraging, organizations still need to ensure that their talent management and workforce strategies are aligned to avoid overworked staff, unrealistic workloads or internal discord if they want to continue this positive momentum.”

According to the survey, 11% of entry- to mid-level IT professionals and 13% of senior IT professionals consider the work they are currently doing to be the most stressful of their career, a significant decrease from the 30% and 32%, respectively, that said the same in another survey 2014. Additionally, 51% of entry- to mid-level IT workers and 59% of senior IT professionals said that stress is causing them to initiate a job search, down from 81% and 65%, respectively, in last years’ survey.

The survey found 41% of entry- to mid-level IT professionals consider keeping up with technological advancements to be the most stressful part of their career, up significantly from the 29% that said the same in 2014. The top stressors for entry- to mid-level IT professionals included:

1. Keeping up with technology: 41%, up from 29% in the 2014 survey
2. Keeping up with organizational requests/workload: 27%, down from 30%
3. Impact on work-life balance: 23%, no change from 2014
4. Coordinating, interacting with co-workers/supervisors: 9%, down from 18%

The top stressors for senior-level IT professionals included:

1. Keeping up with technology: 30%, up from 27%
2. Keeping up with organizational requests/workload: 28%, down from 32%
3. Impact on work-life balance: 28%, up from 24%
4. Coordinating, interacting with co-workers/supervisors: 14%, down from 17%

 The survey also found organizations no longer tend to abuse senior IT professionals’ downtime. Just 13% of senior IT professionals report they are expected to be accessible 24/7, down from 61% in 2014. For entry- to mid-level IT professionals, 15% reported they are expected to be accessible at all times, down from 27% in 2014.

The percentage of IT professionals who would still choose to pursue a career in IT rose to 91% from 76% for entry to mid-level professionals, and to 85% from 79% for senior-level execs.

The findings represent the views of more than 1,000 IT professionals. TEKsystems, part of the Allegis Group, is the largest IT staffing firm in the US.