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Health, safety and wellbeing for workplaces
Queensland Government agencies play a crucial role in the health, safety and wellbeing (HS&W) of their employees. HS&W workplace programs and practices not only have the potential to positively influence our workforce and their families, they also make good business sense. They can:
- increase employee engagement and morale
- lead to reduced absenteeism
- increase productivity and innovation.
The Queensland public sector’s Be healthy, be safe, be well framework identifies 4 organisational levers that can improve HS&W outcomes in agencies. These are leadership, culture, work design and work environment.
Find out what workplace programs and practices support these organisational levers, and what your agency can do to improve HS&W outcomes . There are also case studies available to show what workplaces have done in this area.
Table of contents
1. Leadership
- Queensland public sector HS&W leadership commitment statement
- Leadership competencies for leaders at all levels
- Leadership programs:
- Leading Well Queensland and Leading Well tools
- Masterclasses, executive dialogues, CEO forums and thought leader seminars
- Work Health Safety Queensland - Safety leadership program
- Human resource practitioners, safety and wellbeing champions
- Mentally healthy workplaces – for frontline managers and supervisors
- Engaging employees:
- HS&W performance reporting
- HS&W network or industry networks—develop your own network, participate in industry networks or contact 1300 362 128 for more information.
2. Culture
- Queensland public sector inclusion and diversity strategy 2015–2020
- Queensland public sector positive and healthy workplace culture
- Healthier. Happier. Workplaces
- Creating active living workplaces
- BeUpstanding toolkit
- Heart Foundation – Walk at Work and Walking Groups in Queensland
- 10,000 Step Challenge
- Active Transport – Travel Smart employers toolkit
- Creating mentally healthy workplaces:
- Creating mentally healthy workplaces
- Mentally healthy workplaces toolkit
- Mentally healthy workplaces workshops run by Office of Industrial Relations across Queensland
- Mentally healthy workplaces guide for leaders and managers from Heads Up
- Indicators of a thriving workplace from Leading well Queensland (partnership between Office of Industrial Relations, WorkCover and Superfriend)
- Queensland Government workplace package for ending domestic and family violence
- Reduce psychosocial hazards in the workplace:
- People at Work: assessment of workplace psychosocial hazards survey (PDF)
- Reducing workplace bullying (PDF)
- Reducing work-related violence (PDF)
- Building respectful relationships and managing conflict
- Managing change
- Reducing the psychosocial risks of change – self assessment tool
- Managing employees through change:
- Managing work demands
- Return on investment tool for developing evidence based programs
- Organisational maturity matrix
- Promoting healthy lifestyle behaviors:
- Rewards and benefits
3. Work design
- Good work design principles
- Risk management (includes hazard identification, risk assessment, risk control and review)
- Flexible work arrangements in the Queensland public sector, and work/life balance and stress management
- Job design
- Role reviews
- Good job design (Superfriend)
- Healthy work design (NIOSH)
- Designing in good work principles (Australasian College of Physicians)
- Reducing work-related disorders
- Psychological risks and musculoskeletal disease webinar
- Making reasonable work adjustments
- for people with an impairment
- for those with a mental health condition (temporary or permanent) plus practical recommendations from Heads Up
- for your ageing workforce (Tasmanian Government)
- for those returning to work after injury or illness (check with your agency about return to work, rehabilitation and injury management programs for employees)
4. Work environment
- Organisational systems benchmarking tool - assess an organisation’s systemic approach to HS&W
- Risk management (includes hazard identification, risk assessment, risk control and review)
- Managing the work environment—Work environment and facilities code of practice (PDF)
- Healthy work environments
- Healthy Eating Guidelines
- End-of-trip facilities
- Space for healthy eating and healthy choice catering and healthy eating strategy (PDF) and guidelines (PDF)
- Safe design of buildings, structures, equipment and vehicles
- Safe design of structures (Queensland) code of practice
- Safe design (SafeWork Australia) with codes, guides, support materials and videos
5. Case studies
- Healthier. Happier. Workplaces (Queensland Government)
- Creating healthier workplaces (Queensland Department of Education)
- Safety and wellbeing improvement plan (Department of Transport and Main Roads)
- Our People matter strategy (Queensland Police)
- OneED program (Gold Coast Health Emergency Department)
- WorkSafe Queensland case studies
- The Work Ability approach (Comcare)
- Promising Practices for Total Worker Health (Centres for Disease Control and Prevention)
6. Resources and reports
- Workplace Safety Futures - Data61 2018
- Keep Queenslanders Healthy
- Queensland Health and Wellbeing Strategic Framework 2017 – 2026
- Characteristics of the Queensland public sector
- Realising the Health Benefits of Good Work (2017) and What is Good Work? (2013) – Royal Australasian College of Physicians
- Workplace Health in Australia – Bupa
- Workplace Wellbeing – Converge International 2017
- Employee Wellbeing Research – Reba 2018
- Work-related psychological health and safety: A systemic approach to meeting your duties – SafeWork Australia 2018
- Future of Work Institute and Transformative Work Design – Curtin University
- 2018 Human Capital Trends (Deloitte)
- Investing to Save: The economic benefits for Australia of investment in mental health reform 2018 (KPMG)
