ISO 45003 vs Code of Practice: Psychosocial Hazards at Work

Original article published by FEFO

Psychosocial Recent Trends

In recent years, the attention on mental health in the workplace and community has increased substantially. Greater levels of attention is a positive step to improving a very challenging and often stigmatised topic. The Health and Safety Index benchmark results 2020 vs 2021, reported improvements in responses to “I feel comfortable talking about mental health” ↑ up 5%. This was the greatest positive improvement of all 55 benchmark questions.

Despite this improvement, the actual Health and Safety Index benchmark results for “feeling comfortable talking about mental health” are in the bottom quartile, indicating we have a long way to improve compared to other health and safety behaviours, conditions and practices.

We have also seen the introduction of several international and domestic guidance materials from regulators to assist with managing psychosocial factors in the workplace, e.g.

• ISO 45003: International standard for managing psychosocial risk at work
• SafeWork NSW: Code of Practice for Managing psychosocial hazards at work
• Western Australia Department of Mines: Code of Practice: Psychosocial hazards in the workplace
• WorkSafe Victoria: Proposed OHS Amendment (Psychological Health) Regulations
• SafeWork Australia: Model Code of Practice on managing psychosocial hazards at work (Code of Practice).

This article specifically provides a comparison between:

• ISO 45003: Occupational health and safety management – Psychological health and safety at work – gives guidance on managing psychological health and safety risks; and
• SafeWork Australia: Model Code of Practice: Managing psychosocial hazards at work.