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Is your organisation ready for regulatory change? — the ‘what’ of psychosocial risk assessment and control

Lauren Finestone

This is Part 1 of a 2-part article that summarises a presentation by Professor Angela Martin at the 2022 Workplace Mental Health Symposium. It looks at the ‘what’ about how organisations can prevent harm to people's mental health at work’.

Safe Work Australia has published a model Code of practice on how to manage psychosocial hazards at work. Legislative and regulatory changes are afoot across Australia to make it clear to employers what they are expected to do to manage psychosocial risks. 

This is Part 1 of a 2-part article that summarises a presentation by Professor Angela Martin at the 2022 Workplace Mental Health Symposium. It looks at the ‘what’ about how organisations can prevent harm to people's mental health at work. 

What are ‘psychosocial’ hazards?

People working in the mental health field will be familiar with the biopsychosocial model of mental health. 

The term ‘biopsychosocial refers to 3 interconnected aspects of human health and well-being: biology, psychology and social factors. 

The ‘bio’ bit is about our body — its structure, organs, hormones and genetic predispositions to certain conditions or diseases.

The ‘psychosocial’ bit refers to the combination of psychological (thoughts, emotions and behaviours) and social factors (relationships and social interactions and environments) that influence a person’s mental well-being. 

Workplace environments can be a minefield for sources of psychological harm. They are the hazards that arise from:

  • how work is designed and managed
  • the working environment
  • equipment at a workplace
  • workplace interactions or behaviours.

And a lot of these workplace psychosocial hazards have also been shown to cause both psychological and physical harm. For example, some of the early research looked at cardiovascular disease outcomes from being exposed to these psychosocial risks.

What does Safe Work Australia define as a psychosocial hazard?

The psychosocial hazards that Safe Work Australia suggests should be assessed and controlled include:

  • job demands
  • low job control
  • poor support 
  • lack of role clarity
  • poor organisational change management
  • inadequate reward and recognition
  • poor organisational justice
  • traumatic events or material
  • remote or isolated work 
  • poor physical environment 
  • violence and aggression 
  • bullying 
  • harassment, including sexual harassment, and
  • conflict or poor workplace relationships and interactions

These are all known hazards that the evidence shows can affect our mental health at work. In future articles we’ll dig more deeply into what each of these 14 factors looks like and how to manage or mitigate them.

Many of them relate to our basic human needs. For example, our need for belonging and connection. If we're being harassed and bullied at work, or even treated in an uncivil or rude manner, over time that can wear away our sense of comfort in the workplace and affect our mental health at work. 

Or our need to feel that systems and processes are fair can be violated if we feel someone else was promoted over us because they are friends with the boss.

What does the code of practice expect employers to do?

In a nutshell, consultation and management commitment is central. Employers need to identify what the hazards are for their workforce — to assess the risks, how catastrophic each risk might be and the potential impact on people in the business. 

And they need to think about how to control those risks — what can they do to try to eliminate them or reduce their impact on people. And then monitor how well that's going. 

Some of the signs that workers are being exposed to psychosocial risk include:

  • changes in behaviour
  • social isolation, refusing help, withdrawing or neglecting personal well-being
  • increased absenteeism or presenteeism
  • lack of engagement or reduced energy
  • high staff turnover
  • performance problems
  • a lot of conflict or unwillingness to collaborate 
  • increased errors

In Part 2 we look at how we got here (the ‘why’) and what organisations can do to assess and control psychosocial hazards (the ‘how’).

Published 27 June, 2023 | Updated 04 July, 2023