What are ramifications for not identifying the Psychosocial hazards in your workplace?
What are ramifications for not identifying the Psychosocial hazards in your workplace?As an employer, it is important to provide a safe and healthy work environment for your employees. This includes identifying and addressing psychosocial hazards in the workplace, which can negatively impact the mental and physical well-being of employees. Failure to identify and address psychosocial hazards can have serious legal ramifications for employers in Australia. The Model WHS laws in Australia require employers to take reasonable steps to provide and maintain a safe and healthy work environment for their employees.
This includes identifying and addressing psychosocial hazards, such as stress, bullying, and harassment, that can negatively impact the health and well-being of employees. Failure to comply with these laws can result in fines, legal action, and negative publicity for the organisation.
In addition, the Fair Work Act 2009 and other anti-discrimination and anti-bullying laws in Australia provide employees with protection against bullying and harassment in the workplace. Employers who fail to address such behavior can face legal action and liability for any harm that is suffered by employees. Therefore, it is important for employers in Australia to take their legal obligations seriously and proactively identify and address psychosocial hazards in the workplace. By doing so, they can create a safe and supportive work environment that promotes the well-being of employees and reduces the risk of legal action.
In this blog, we will explore some of the ramifications for not identifying psychosocial hazards in the workplace in Australia and the importance of complying with WHS laws and other relevant legislation.
What are some of the drivers for identifying and addressing psychosocial hazards in the workplace?
Broadly there are a number of legislative and community outrage issues organisations should be aware of and more importantly ensure that they are compliant with any legislation that applies to them. These include:
- Model WHS laws: Employers are required to comply with WHS laws, which require them to take reasonable steps to provide and maintain a safe and healthy work environment for their employees. Failure to comply with these laws, including failure to identify and address psychosocial hazards, can result in fines and legal action.
- Fair Work Act 2009: The Fair Work Act provides protection against bullying and harassment in the workplace. Employers who fail to address such behavior can face legal action and liability for any harm that is suffered by employees.
- Anti-Discrimination and Anti-Bullying Laws: Employers in Australia are required to comply with anti-discrimination and anti-bullying laws, which provide employees with protection against harassment and bullying in the workplace. Failure to address such behavior can result in legal action and liability for the organisation.
- Workers’ Compensation Claims: This is a State by State (and territory) requirement. Employees who are affected by psychosocial hazards in the workplace, such as stress, burnout, and bullying, may be eligible for workers’ compensation. Employers who fail to identify and address these hazards may face increased claims for workers’ compensation.
- Negative Publicity: Failure to identify and address psychosocial hazards in the workplace can result in negative publicity for the organisation, which can harm its reputation and organisation.
It is important for employers in Australia to take their legal obligations seriously and proactively identify and address psychosocial hazards in the workplace to reduce the risk of legal action and negative outcomes for their employees and the organisation. Engaging a Safety Consultant to assist in this journey will provide an external perspective on the process prompting the organisation to consider all aspects of its operation.
What is the process for conducting a comprehensive assessment of the workplace to identify any potential psychosocial hazards?
Employers should commence with identifying the persons at risk. This requires a wider view that just the workplace but considering the wider aspects of the organisation where contractors and customers interact with the workers.
Having a good project management focus managed by the organisation but lead by the workers in the workplace. Health and safety Representatives (where elected) should be involved as they represent workgroups and can be a conduit for communication to other team members.
Having an external person such as engaging a Safety Consultant can also greatly assist the process to ensure that as many aspects of the organisation and its functions are included. They will also be able to ask questions of the team as an outsider often prompting answers to questions not thought of.
The team should begin to collect information about the workplace, including policies and procedures, job descriptions, and information on employee experiences and concerns. This can be done through a review of workplace documentation, observations of the physical work environment, and consultation with employees and management. Some information may be anecdotal or obtained through an anonymous survey.
A properly constructed survey is an excellent method of gathering large amounts data that can be categorised and translated into charts and numbers. Care must be taken to not exclude any one person’s opinions on any matter being discussed as all views are important in the process.
Once all the information has been collected the potential psychosocial hazards and risk factors will need to be identified. Usually this is an open brainstorming process with a team broken into smaller teams to discuss issues then adjourning to present outcomes.
The review should include work organisation culture and practices and evaluating the support and resources available to employees.
It is not uncommon for the team to become overwhelmed at this point as the wall will fill with ‘Post it’ notes listing the various psychosocial hazards and risk factors. This is normal as the next part of the process is to assist in identifying the primary psychosocial hazards and risk factors to focus on.
At this point the Safety Consultant can assist the team to commence prioritising the psychosocial hazards and risk factors based on their potential impact and the likelihood of harm. This can help to focus attention and resources on the most pressing issues. Using a simple High Medium and Low scale helps make the process easier and often the low risks are taken off the wall once a larger picture of the psychosocial hazards and risk factors is obtained.
Understanding that some of the psychosocial hazards and risk factors that land in the Low pile are often easily fixed, once the higher risk factors have suitable controls implemented the flow on often encompasses the lower risk psychosocial hazards and risk factors. A report should be created to document the findings and presenting recommendations for addressing the identified psychosocial hazards. The Safety Consultant can assist by ensuring the recommendations look at the hierarchy of control and initially consider elimination then the remainder of the controls to effectively reduce the risk to the lowest level so far as reasonably practicable.
This report should be shared with management, employees, and relevant stakeholders. The project plan must include a process to ensure that once the report is in place and the recommendations agreed upon planned and actioned, specific milestones are agreed to stop and check that the controls are reducing the risk of identified psychosocial hazards and risk factors and that no new issues have arisen.
Ultimately Employers have a duty to provide a safe and healthy work environment for your workers. To do this in relation to psychosocial hazards requires the implementation of systems to identify and address those psychosocial issues which can negatively impact the mental and physical well-being of employees. Though there is no entrenched case law presently available, the Regulators across Australia have made clear their intention to ensure that Employers mitigate their psychosocial hazards. Our Safety consultants are available to steer you through this process or to provide a basic start to your safety team. We can also revisit the organisation and complete an audit of the systems to validate their efficiency and to offer recommendations for improvement.
If you are interested in our WHS Consultancy services, you can contact David, Andrew or Mark to discuss your Health and Safety Issues.
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