HR professionals have emerged as the happiest lot in the country, even as they face mounting workload, a latest study says.

According to the latest Happiness at Work Index survey by international recruitment consultancy Badenoch & Clark, about 94 per cent of human resource professionals insist they are still happy in their role, despite facing mounting workload and bleak career outlooks.

The current level of optimism at 94 per cent is much higher compared to 76 per cent seen three months ago, the study states, but does not mention the reason for it.

Interestingly, it states that the optimism persists despite the fact that the sector has witnessed the highest increase in work pressure since the start of 2008 among all other industries surveyed.

Work has increase manifold primarily due to the current global credit crunch. Within the HR sector itself the high workload forced many to put in their papers.

According to the report, about 88 per cent of HR respondents believe their workload had gone up, with one in four (25 per cent) saying it had increased by the equivalent of an extra day per week.

Meanwhile, nearly one in three (29 per cent) have handed in their notice as a direct result of rising workloads. But almost as many are taking a more pragmatic approach by delegating a lot more tasks in an attempt to deal with the situation, the survey revealed.

According to the report, the rising workloads may be one of the key drivers behind plummeting levels of career confidence among HR professionals, as over half (56 per cent) of the respondents said they were less confident about their career than at the start of the year.

"The results of the Index this time around are particularly revealing for HR workers. It seems the job is becoming very labour intensive. When it comes to career prospects, confidence is dropping fast,"  Badenoch & Clark's Allison Gray said.

The key message for employers is to not misread the unprecedented high levels of happiness for long-term genuine engagement. HR as a profession is facing some very serious challenges at the moment, and employers need to be seen to be tackling those challenges head on," Gray added.

Happiness at Work Index was launched in early 2007 as a quarterly survey of UK office workers. It is used to track happiness at work over time based upon a series of standard questions. In addition, each quarter questions are asked about various aspects of working life.

The sample for this version of the index was 1,086 workers in the UK.