Safe Work Australia’s Big Bet on an Expanded OHS System

The release of Safe Work Australia’s Best Practice review left me wondering whether Australian work health and safety policy has reached regulatory overreach, or whether it is finally catching up with the realities of contemporary work.

Much of the discussion has focused on the report’s individual recommendations. What interests me more is an assumption that seems to underlie almost every recommendation: that occupational health and safety (OHS) should become the nation’s principal framework for preventing workplace harm in all its forms, not merely physical and psychological injury.

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Why don’t US employers focus on preventing psychosocial hazards?

Many Australian employers, managers and executives take inspiration from counterparts in the United States. When it comes to occupational mental health, they are looking in the wrong direction and could benefit from looking more locally. But there is merit in evaluating the US perspectives.

Below are responses provided by several Artificial Intelligence (AI) agents on my own PC to the question in this article’s title. There is considerable overlap in many, but I start off with the most confronting response, provided by the World Socialist Web Site‘s Socialism AI:

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Psychosocial Conflict & Confusion

Michael Plowright and I have launched a new limited-series podcast in support of National Safe Work Month.

Safe Work, Real Talk offers a plain-English discussion of the major issues around managing psychosocial hazards and psychological safety at work, bridging the HR and OH&S silos.

We bring together OHS practice, bullying research and real workplace stories to unpack how mental harm happens and how organisations can prevent it.

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When Psychosocial Harm Meets Pub Philosophy

Occupational health and safety (OHS) people talk a lot, but often they preach to the choir when they need to reach a new audience. Last night, philosophy academic Dr Peter Brace provided a lecture on psychosocial hazards and psychological safety to over 50 members of a diverse audience in an upstairs room of a Richmond pub. This is what he said and what I learned.

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New psychosocial podcast series

Australian employers continue to struggle to understand #psychosocial hazards and psychological harm. A lot of advice competes, conflicts and confuses. So, Michael Plowright and I are joining the effort to make sense of this #mentalhealthatwork challenge in a lively, plain-English way.

You may already follow me through this blog’s SoundCloud account, but this new four-episode podcast series – Safe Work, Real Talk – offers new plain-English perspectives and, we hope,m solutions, or at least pathways.

We’ll talk about #Leadership, what went wrong, what went right, the unhelpful conflict between #HR and #OHS, and return-to-work.

The first episode will be out shortly, with the remaining three episodes rolled out in support of National Safe Work Month.

If you have any questions about work-related psychosocial and psychological issues, email them to this link, and we will try to answer them “on-air”.

Kevin Jones

Think Big About Psychosocial Hazards

Occupational health and safety (OHS) has a habit of discovering a useful idea and then asking it to explain everything. (We are desperate for silver bullets.) Systems thinking seems to be the latest candidate. It offers a valuable way to examine how work is organised and how psychosocial harm emerges, but enthusiasm is beginning to blur an important boundary. Systems thinking is a method of seeing how workplaces operate, but Sociology helps explain what is being seen, who shaped it and why it persists.

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What Cobb’s New Book Reveals About Leadership, Culture and Psychosocial Risk

Every book by Ellen Pinkos Cobb deserves close attention, as her perspective and approach to examining sexual harassment and psychosocial hazards in the workplace are unique and valuable. Her new book, “The Global Evolution of Bullying, Harassment, and Discrimination Laws” is a great addition to one’s library.

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