Browsing: Psychosocial issues | Page 7

Two related companies, and a director who s-xually harassed teenage employees, have been fined a total of $290,000 for workplace safety breaches, with their failings including the absence of a specific reporting process in their online bullying and harassment policy.

• Effective anti-burnout strategy identified; and
  
• Advisory group "key" to eliminating harassment in NSW workplaces.

An employer has been reprimanded for failing to properly discipline a bully and allowing further "reprehensible" conduct to occur, but the victim has been refused stop-bullying orders, after the company made a number of changes to the workplace to make it safe for him to return to work.

A court has rejected a CEO's claim that her employer engaged in a "witch hunt" to find reasons to sack her because she raised safety concerns at a board meeting. It also found that requiring her to obtain a medical certificate to show she was fit for work after she disclosed mental health issues did not constitute adverse action.

Employers need to be more strategic when planning work schedules and rest times to "reduce physical and mental overload", according to safety experts, who found the widespread problem of lower back pain tends to build up across consecutive work days.

Court Services Victoria (CSV) has been convicted and ordered to pay nearly $400,000 in penalties, in relation to a toxic workplace culture that contributed to the suicide death of a lawyer and to other workers taking stress leave.

SafeWork NSW has outlined a range of workplace factors that increase the risk of s-xual harassment, and explained what businesses can do to prevent it, in its inaugural four-year Respect at Work Strategy.

A worker suffered psychological injuries from bored colleagues targeting her to "pass the time", according to a judgment that also condemns a major employer for traumatising the vulnerable worker in a liability "witch hunt".

A worker's bid for stop-bullying orders has been dismissed after the alleged bullies - from a safety regulator - agreed to 13 "restrictions" preventing them from interacting with him in future.

Unsafe job demands are the most common psychosocial hazards in Australian workplaces, and employers must explore multiple measures to safeguard against the risk to a reasonably practicable extent, a Comcare director says.