Earlier this year, a Comcare psychosocial risk investigation resulted in three charges against the ADF. These were:
- Not ensuring regular welfare checks
- Failure to refer an individual for a formal mental health assessment
- Pause or delay of a mental health intake assessment
In assessing psychosocial cases, there's a common theme that leads to a charge. Inaction. Rarely, are you penalised for a well intentioned mistake. So what stops organisations taking action and what action should they take? We examine this below and share CommBank's psychosocial risk strategy.
Blockers to action
The main blocker is usually lack of leadership buy-in. We believe there's two ways to shift this:
- Amplify the cost of inaction: Highlight immediate consequences for not taking action. Martyn Campbell's 'Due Diligence' workshop with senior leaders is great for this.
- Present a viable solution: A practical solution that leadership see value in. Focus on 'zero disruption' and 'works within budget'.
Many leaders now see it as at least a minor problem. If there's a viable solution, they should act. Below is CommBank's approach and I'd like to highlight two key insights from this approach.
How CommBank does it
Prof Carlo Caponecchia and Dr Vanessa Huron from UNSW did a case study on CommBank's Psychosocial Risk Strategy.
Here is a quick summary of CommBank's approach:
- An owner: Led by Laura Kirby (Chief Mental Health Officer).
- Education: A session with leaders to build psychosocial understanding.
- Gather data/consult: Custom psychosocial survey combined with other data sources such as culture surveys and incident reports.
- Update risk register/assessment: Use data from worker consultation above to inform risk scores and control plans for risks.
- Review: An annual re-assessment date (repeating the above).
CommBank designed their own psychosocial survey. Below is a template you could use:
Key insights from CommBank's approach
There's two insights from CommBank's approach:
- Dedicated Psychosocial Risk Survey: CommBank separates their culture survey from their psychosocial risk survey.
- "Standard practice" can be simple: CommBank describes their process as "standard practice" given it follows Safe Work's Code of Practice. When broken down, it shows how achievable effective risk management can be.
One challenge might be going from knowing "standard practice" to implementing it in your workplace. Psychosocial risk management doesn't need to be as complicated as it might initially seem. Here is an approach you could take:
