A new standard, ISO 45003:2021 ‘Occupational health and safety management - Psychological health and safety at work - Guidelines for managing psychosocial risks’ is now available. ISO 45003 provides guidelines for managing psychosocial risk within an occupational health and safety management system based on ISO 45001. It is applicable to organizations of all sizes and in all sectors, for the development, implementation, maintenance, and continual improvement of healthy and safe workplaces.
According to ISO 45003:2021:
- Psychosocial hazards are increasingly recognized as major challenges to health, safety, and well-being at work.
- Psychosocial hazards relate to how work is organized, social factors at work and aspects of the work environment, equipment, and hazardous tasks. Psychosocial hazards can be present in all organizations and sectors, and from all kinds of work tasks, equipment, and employment arrangements.
- Psychosocial hazards can occur in combination with one another and can influence and be influenced by other hazards. Psychosocial risk relates to the potential of these types of hazards to cause several types of outcomes on individual health, safety, and well-being and on organizational performance and sustainability.
- It is important that psychosocial risks are managed in a manner consistent with other occupational health and safety risks, through a management system, and integrated into the organization’s broader business processes.
- Although numerous factors can determine the nature and severity of outcomes of psychosocial risks, organizations have a significant role to play in eliminating hazards or minimizing risks. Both the organization and workers have a shared responsibility for maintaining and improving health, safety, and well-being at work.
- For the organization, the impact of psychosocial risks includes increased costs due to absence from work, turnover, reduced product or service quality, recruitment and training, workplace investigations and litigation, as well as damage to the organization’s reputation.
- Effective management of psychosocial risk can lead to benefits such as improved worker engagement, enhanced productivity, increased innovation, and organizational sustainability.
