Examples of psychosocial hazards and risk factors that should be assessed during the risk management process. While this is not an exhaustive list, these are common areas to consider.
Organisational factors
- Poor leadership practices and workplace culture: Leadership styles or resource allocation that negatively impact workplace culture, which includes shared beliefs, norms, and values.
- Inadequate policies and procedures: Policies that fail to meet legislative or business needs and are developed with little or no worker consultation.
- Poor organisational change management: Uncertainty about organisational changes or job roles due to an unstructured change process.
- Low recognition and reward: Lack of positive feedback, skills development, or utilisation of worker abilities.
- Poor organisational justice: Perceived unfairness, inconsistency, bias, or lack of transparency in decision-making or treatment of workers.
Work design and demands
- Excessive work demands: Jobs requiring substantial physical, mental, or emotional effort.
- Low control: Limited autonomy over tasks, schedules, or accommodation arrangements.
- Inadequate support: Insufficient feedback, problem-solving assistance, practical help, or resources.
- Lack of role clarity: Unclear, inconsistent, or conflicting job expectations or demands from different stakeholders.
- Insecure work: Employment types such as casual, freelance, or seasonal work that lack job security.
Environmental factors
- Adverse environmental conditions: Poor workplace conditions affecting comfort or performance, including natural disasters.
- Remote work: Work with limited access to resources, communication difficulties, or long travel times.
- Isolated work: Tasks performed alone or without nearby colleagues, including working from home.
Individual factors
- Fatigue: Physical and mental exhaustion from excessive work demands.
- Burnout: A response to chronic workplace stress, causing emotional, mental, and physical exhaustion.
- Traumatic events: Exposure to deeply distressing events or threats, leading to acute or lasting harm.
- Vicarious trauma: Cumulative harm from repeated exposure to others' traumatic experiences.
- Secondary trauma: Sudden emotional distress caused by indirect exposure to another person’s trauma, mimicking post-traumatic stress disorder symptoms.
Harmful workplace behaviours
- Bullying: Repeated, unreasonable behaviour directed at workers that causes psychological or physical harm.
- Violence and aggression: Abuse, threats, or assaults that occur at work.
- Harassment including sexual and gender-based harassment: Unreasonable behaviour, including physical, verbal, or visual actions, such as sexual or racial harassment, gender discrimination or gendered violence. May also involve indirect behaviours like overhearing inappropriate conversations or seeing explicit images.
- Family and domestic violence: Behaviour intended to coerce, control, or instil fear within a family or intimate relationship.