From Swearing to Safety: Who owns psychosocial hazards at work?
Traditionally the HR department has set the standard for workplace behavior through policy and induction; IR specialists have managed grievances and disciplinary procedures; and Health and safety professionals have focused on physical risks to keep workers safe. This siloed approach has allowed workers to be neatly passed between departments through established incident, investigation, rehabilitation, return to work or disciplinary workflows.
How are workplaces changing in response to the behavioral inclusions in WHS laws, and are they responding fast enough? Psychosocial safety can be considered a blend of disciplines, including safety, HR, IR and psychology. Effective management of these issues requires a whole-of-business approach, led from the top and trained from the bottom.
Let’s look at a recent regulatory development.
Swearing in the workplace found to be a psychosocial safety hazard.
The Australian Institute of Health and Safety has this week reported on a Fair Work Commission ruling that found aggressive swearing and verbal abuse in the workplace is a WHS hazard (Fair Work Commission rules workplace abuse as constructive dismissal). The fact that it was delivered by an employer to an employee during a performance review (and had occurred before), left the employee with “no effective or real choice but to resign” according to the Commission. Known as constructive dismal or forced resignation, the employer’s conduct makes continued employment intolerable due to the power imbalance. The employee was also found through independent medical examination to have suffered mental injury.
With reference to the WA Code of Practice, the following groups of recognized psychosocial hazards can be identified:
- Workplace culture (Inappropriate behaviour or poor leadership)
- Role-related issues (lack of clarity, control or support; high work demands)
- Work environment factors (remote or isolated work, traumatic events)
Given that swearing and verbal abuse can be considered as a broad spectrum, and the outcome is the culmination of multiple factors (vocabulary, volume, tone, speech rate, body language and facial expression), there is a significant challenge for the business support functions of WHS, HR and IR to come together and define reasonable or acceptable standards for an organisation. We know that culture varies by industry, geography and other socio-economic demographics, so the “professional standards” or “code of conduct” expectations will vary by workplace.
What organisational controls can be put in place to define and enforce the ‘acceptable’, or does the onus remain on the individual to defend themselves from injury, prove it has occurred, and then incur a recovery process? That is certainly not the intent of risk-based safety management and the hierarchy of controls, which seeks to change the organisation or the work before changing the worker. What checks and balances can be put in place so that the occasional ‘mild’ swear word does not incur the same response as repeated and aggressive ‘bombs’.
Below we have overlaid models from APS Australian Psychological Services and The APPEA Journal to show the cycle of addressing psychosocial hazards which realise in the workplace. The question for organisations is delegating responsibility for each of the quadrants. While promotion and training may be undertaken by HR, and prevention processes may be captured by health and safety, are leaders appropriately skilled to conduct early intervention, and are there resources for recovery support? What happens in small to medium organisation without an HR or WHS specialist, or both?
In this time of rapid workplace change, growing compliance burden, and increasing prosecutions – combined with productivity and efficiency drivers – organisations need specialised and scalable partnership arrangements. WCA Solutions provides an integrated approach with experienced HR, IR and WHS professionals under one roof, and routinely provide outsourced managed services, project or ad-hoc support in one or all of these functions. Whether you’ve experienced incidents, organisational change, or simply want peace of mind regarding preparedness, WCA Solutions is here to help. We invite you to schedule a complimentary and confidential discovery call.
