Why Great Idiots Still Shape Workplace Harm

As I walk to local cafes for weekend breakfasts or to the gym (yes, I do exercise), I listen to interesting podcasts that may be relevant to occupational health and safety (OHS). (I know, I should turn off, but I can’t) A recent podcast was American Friction, which discussed President Trump (you may have heard of him). Three-quarters through, Mike Duncan discussed the “Great Idiot in History Theory”, which seems to me to offer a useful perspective on corporate executives and their approach to the work health and safety of their employees.

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Three new audio summaries

Short 5- or 6-minute summaries of SafetyAtWorkBlog articles are available on Apple Podcasts and SoundCloud. The three latest episodes discuss working from home, psychosocial regulations and work-related suicide.

I have tried to stay brief, as we are all busy, and more information, quotes, links, and profiles can be found in the original blog articles.

Please let me know if you find these (clearly) home-produced summaries useful.

Kevin Jones

Audio summary on Quad Bike Safety

I have been writing about the safety of quad bikes and all-terrain vehicles for many years. The debate over quad bike safety was one of the most complex and vicious I have ever seen. In some minds, the issue has been resolved in Australia, but farmers continue to die from these vehicles.

Below is a brief 5-minute video about some of the OHS issues associated with these vehicles. I’d love to hear your thoughts on it, especially if you think a book about the issues would be worthwhile.

The audio will be available soon on the SafetyAtWorkBlog SoundCloud feed.

SafetyAtWorkBlog followed the quad bike safety saga, and dozens of exclusive articles are available for subscribers.

On psychosocial hazards, HR and OHS are getting closer……. slowly

In narrow terms, the occupational health and safety (OHS) profession has largely neglected the management of psychological harm in workplaces. Human Resources (HR) has been the “go-to” on this issue, but various government inquiries have identified major shortcomings in the HR approach. In a recent podcast, Tony Morris of law firm Ashurst interviewed an HR and OHS professional on sexual harassment and psychosocial risks at work.

In response to the question of whether these risks are no being accepted as work health and safety risks, Julia Sutherland responded that this reality has been accepted by OHS regulators but implies that the acceptance has not been to the same extent by employers. She reassures employers who have not been approaching these hazards through OHS laws and guidance that they should not be alarmed as the OHS context has only existed for “a couple of years”.

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OHS podcast that analyses academic papers

Two workplace health and safety researchers, David Provan and Drew Rae have teamed up for a weekly podcast called “The Safety of Work”. I haven’t got through all of them yet, but the format seems to be that each episode looks at an interesting occupational health and safety (OHS) research to see how the evidence or findings can be applied in the real world.

Given the recent themes of this blog I paid attention to Episode 11 on Production v Safety. (Episode 12 on Zero Harm is this week’s edition)

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Men’s Health podcast

Day 1 of the Australian Labor Party conference was fascinating but unsatisfying in terms of debate on occupational health and safety matters so I spoke with one of the many exhibitors at the conference.

Glen Poole is the CEO of the Australian Men’s Health Forum and the podcast below includes a brief discussion of the importance of men’s health and the relevance of the workplace in generating and managing workplace mental health.

Kevin Jones

Interview with Dr Gerry Ayers

This weekend is the International Workers Memorial Day.  In Victoria, in particular and in Australia more generally, it is highly likely that the issue of Industrial Manslaughter laws will be raised as part of a trade union campaign.

Dr Gerry Ayers, the OHS&E Manager of one of the branches of the CFMEU, features in an online petition about these laws and it seemed the right time to interview Dr Ayers about these laws but also about workplace health and safety enforcement and practices more generally.

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