Managing psychosocial hazards at work - Small trucking company

Persons conducting a business or undertaking, or PCBU for short, must ensure the health and safety of workers and others. This includes managing psychosocial hazards and risks at work as much as managing physical hazards and risks. PCBUs must manage psychosocial risks in accordance with Part 3.1 of the work health and safety regulation. This includes eliminating psychosocial hazards as far as reasonably practical. Psychosocial hazards must be identified and their risks assessed, controlled, and continually reviewed to protect workers' health and safety. A psychosocial hazard arises from, or relates to, the design or management of work, a work environment, plant at a workplace, or workplace interactions and behaviours. It may cause psychological harm, whether or not it also causes physical harm. PCBUs must consult with their workers about psychosocial hazards relevant to their work. Workers often have valuable insights about the impact of psychosocial hazards and potential ways to control the risks.

In this video, we're exploring a case study from the transport industry. We will review how this workplace identifies, assesses, controls, and reviews the psychosocial hazards and risks in their workplace. See if you can spot them all before we give you the answers.

Bob has been a truck driver for over 10 years. He generally enjoys driving. He and two other drivers are the sole contractors to a large transport company. The transport company has customers across Northern New South Wales and Queensland, all small retail businesses. Over the last two years, the transport company has grown, and the demand for more frequent and faster deliveries has increased. However, the number of drivers in Bob's company has not changed. Bob worries about the delivery schedule, longer shifts, and often skips rest breaks to deliver goods on time. On occasion, he and other drivers have been delayed due to heavy traffic and abused by angry business owners who have then complained to the dispatch manager. Bob has tried raising scheduling concerns with the dispatch manager without success and thinks if he raises them again, he might lose the contract. He would like to have a say in how deliveries are scheduled, but these are arranged between the transport company and their customers.

Let's take a look at what psychosocial hazards and risks are present. Delivery deadlines are unachievable, and the truck driver is working long hours and skipping rest breaks to meet deadlines. Workers have no influence over the delivery schedules despite their experience and understanding of the regular reasons for delays. Raising concerns with management has seen no change in the increasing demands of the work. Workers are experiencing verbal aggression as customer expectations about the supply of goods have not been managed.

After consulting with the drivers and customers, the transport company takes the following steps to control the risks. They manage customer expectations by incorporating revised delivery timeframes into their customer, online, and phone ordering processes. They communicate the company's delivery timeframes policy to customers. They contract additional drivers and distribute interstate deliveries across all drivers to manage the risk of fatigue. They provide fatigue management information to all workers. They consult with the trucking company manager regarding the scheduling of deliveries. They provide drivers with training and de-escalation techniques for dealing with aggressive customers. They notify customers in writing that verbal aggression is not acceptable and goods may not be delivered if truck drivers are exposed to such behaviours. Additionally, they request that customer delivery concerns should be directed to the transport company to address. They check with drivers before agreeing to delivery schedules to ensure these are realistic and encourage early feedback on delivery issues. They introduce a system to alert the dispatch manager and retail business if delivery delays are likely to ensure customer expectations are clear. They introduce systems for fatigue management and violence and aggression, including training and support systems. They include a truck driver representative in the relevant work health and safety committee discussions. They train all dispatch managers in consolidating orders so that unnecessary trips are eliminated or minimised. They require the trucking company manager to complete training on fatigue management and the effects of psychosocial hazards and introduce a system to monitor driver safety.

In this example, we saw how to identify psychosocial hazards in a small trucking company. Often these hazards will interact, and if exposure is frequent, prolonged, or severe, it can lead to work-related stress and subsequently psychological harm. The identified hazards in this example include high job demands and fatigue, low job control, poor support, and violence and aggression. Control measures were used at multiple levels to eliminate, as well as minimise the risk. This example shows that psychosocial hazards, the types of control measures implemented, and the monitoring and review strategies can differ widely for organisations in different industries and of different sizes. It is important to consider the unique context of your organisation, including your organisation-wide systems, work practices, work environment, workplace behaviours, and types of tasks and roles.

For more information, download the Managing the Risk of Psychosocial Hazards At Work Code of Practice 2022.

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