24-25 May 2023, Stamford Plaza Hotel, Melbourne
Conference Day One – Wednesday 24 May 2023
8.30 Registration
9.00 Opening remarks from the chair
9.10 Transforming Psychosocial Risk Management principles into practical safety initiatives
- Reviewing lessons learnt from introducing psychosocial risk principles to an organisation
- Outlining challenges and opportunities of psychosocial risk management in practice
- Establishing a framework for psychosocial risk management around your strategic goals
- Building on existing safety policies to promote rapid program maturity
Fiona Andrew, Head of Mental Health and Wellbeing, Australia Post
9.55 Developing a mentally healthy culture in your organisation
- Challenging mental health stigma and stereotypes in your culture
- Encouraging leaders to take an active role in directing psychologically safe cultural change
- Engaging directly with your workforce for authentic and reciprocal team development
- Designing effective psychological wellbeing initiatives to motivate future conversations
Kim Grady, Chief Health and Safety Officer, University of Sydney
10.40 Morning Coffee
11.10 Creating a psychological safety culture of help-seeking and early intervention
- Building a trusting relationship between leaders and employees at all levels of the business
- Identifying person-centric indicators of mental ill-health in each team member
- Ensuring a respectful early intervention in potential psychological injury cases
- Developing constructive peer-to-peer psychological support between colleagues
Chris White, Assistant Secretary Staff Health and Wellbeing, Department of Home Affairs
11.55 Producing effective psychological health management outcomes in remote communities
- Generating a psychological safety strategy in an office without locational benefits
- Accessing relevant and up-to-date information on psychological injury management
- Applying the challenges and opportunities in remote workplaces to inform your own organisational projects
- Utilising modern technological supports for psychological wellbeing
Rachel de Montemas, Senior WHS Project Officer, Department of Planning and Environment NSW
12.40 Lunch
13.40 Mitigating the risk of psychological injury from Occupational Violence and Aggression
- Providing resources and support in a vulnerable workforce
- Leading by example with a zero tolerance attitude to OVA
- Developing essential worker resilience and help-seeking capacities in a psychologically hazardous environment
- Building relationships between stakeholders to reduce mental health risks
Dr Ainslie Senz, Director Footscray Emergency Department, Western Health
Lisa Sprong, Director Safety, Risk, and Emergency Management, Western Health
14.25 Ensuring buy-in from executive leaders in psychological wellbeing
- Communicating effectively with your leaders on the importance of mental health
- Motivating your senior leaders to share their mental health experiences
- Designing training programs on psychological wellbeing for your senior leaders
Danielle Odd, Group Head of Safety Strategy, Nine Entertainment
15.10 Afternoon Tea
15.40 Developing a comprehensive psychological safety and wellbeing program over multiple offices
- Anticipating the psychosocial risks and care requirements of your teams
- Establishing multiple locations for mental health wellbeing and care
- Building allied health capability for psychological care within your organisation
- Measuring the success of psychological health and wellbeing projects
Dr. Alison Money, Chief Medical Officer, Australian Federal Police
16.20 Addressing the psychosocial risks of bullying and harassment in your organisation
- Developing your response to WHS harassment risks in the context of recent legislation
- Designing your safety control measures to target less visible bullying incidences
- Accounting for leader obligations in preventing and addressing bullying and harassment
- Addressing psychological injuries from bullying and harassment justly and effectively
Andrew Douglas, Managing Principal, FCW Lawyers
17.00 Closing remarks from the chair
17.10 End of conference day one & networking event
Conference Day Two – Thursday 25 May 2023
9.00 Opening remarks from the chair
9.10 Improving data collection and analysis to improve your psychological WHS strategy
- Seeking data from diverse sources in various branches of your organisation
- Collecting accurate information from your workforce with respect for privacy and time-cost
- Conducting evidence-based and root cause analyses to identify and prioritise risk profiles
- Developing your data analysis outcomes into effective psychological safety initiatives
- Utilising technology and automation for complex WHS data analysis
Shailendra Tripathi, Senior Director Work Health and Safety, Optus
9.55 Preventing psychological injuries in the workplace of tomorrow
- Utilising forward-facing approaches to psychosocial wellbeing
- Designing interventions within a rapidly changing regulatory landscape and expectations
- Centring psychological safety principles in the future of work
- Identifying the key areas for effective mental health interventions
- Embedding psychological safety as ‘business as usual’ throughout the organisation
Margo Lydon, Chief Wellbeing Advisor, The Wellbeing Outfit
10.40 Morning Coffee
11.10 Minimising the psychosocial risks of organisational change
- Identifying the potential hazards of organisational transformation and restructuring
- Preparing your workforce for the challenges and opportunities of an incoming change
- Minimising the flow-on psychological risks from changes beyond your control
- Promoting agile change management and safety in an increasingly dynamic environment
Dr Laura Kirby, Chief Mental Health Officer, Commonwealth Bank
11.55
Developing an overall organisational communications strategy around mental health
- Simplifying the frequency and complexity of communications to reduce cognitive overload
- Allocating resources and information for efficient internal communications
- Utilising relevant platforms and tools to maximise engagement in WHS communications
- Complementing your approach to internal communications with leader behaviour
- Evaluating the impact of safety communications through feedback and data collection
David Gaul, Coordinator (Manager) Health and Safety, Wyndham City Council
12.40 Lunch
13.40 Positioning your line managers as strategic partners in all aspects of psychological safety
- Challenging any assumptions around mental health within your frontline leadership team
- Motivating your line managers to actively engage with employee psychological wellbeing
- Providing tools for your line managers to constructively support their teams
- Directing upskilling of direct supervisors to meet the opportunities and obligations of their position
Bridget Miles, Lead Psychologist, Fire Rescue Victoria
Heidi Mitchell, Manager Recovery Support Services, Fire Rescue Victoria
14.25 Utilising best-practice work design to achieve key psychological safety outcomes
- Implementing Human Factors concepts in design to support worker mental health
- Improving work task design to affect safer human behaviours
- Integrating workload considerations into psychosocial risk management in the workplace
- Influencing leaders and stakeholders to pursue an integrative Human Factors approach in work design
Rachal Smart, Human Factors Advisor, Public Transport Authority WA
15.10 Afternoon Tea
15.40 Embedding continuous improvement in your ongoing psychosocial safety strategy
- Reviewing existing controls and policies around psychological safety regularly
- Determining areas for further development based on key organisational objectives
- Identifying feasible opportunities for incremental improvements in WHS operations
- Building on successful improvements with more ambitious WHS mental health initiatives
Janja Bojanic, Allied Health Manager Richmond Hospital, St John of God Health Services
16.20 Ensuring an effective RTW following a psychological injury
- Addressing hazards early to prevent or minimise the impact of psychological injuries
- Collaborating with treating doctors, unions, and other parties in the RTW process
- Making reasonable adjustments for injured workers without draining operational resourcing
- Communicating effectively with psychologically injured workers during the recovery process
- Ensuring an amicable and compliant termination process in the worst case
Dr Jennifer Ward, Senior Consultant/Facilitator, AP Psychology and Consulting Services
17.00 Closing remarks from the chair
17.10 End of conference day two