Long working hours and the billable hours structure received some attention in the prominent business newspaper. the Australian Financial Review, on November 11,2023. Unsurprisingly the article, by Edmund Tadros, about former Sex Discrimination Commissioner, Elizabeth Broderick has garnered attention in the business social media. The article reinforces the unsafe nature of the dominant management practices in white-collar workplaces.
Late last week, it was announced that prominent lawyer Michael Tooma was leaving Clyde & Co for a position with Hamilton Locke, focussing on environment, social, and governance matters. This is interesting in one way, as lawyers move firms regularly, but his comments about the social harm from law firms’ reliance on billable hours was more interesting.
Victoria’s coronial services has been found guilty of breaching its occupational health and safety (OHS) obligations after one of its employees died by suicide, identifying work issues as a major factor in her death. WorkSafe Victoria has released the best source of information on this case. Most of the mainstream media is relying on a newswire report,which is based on WorkSafe’s information.
Significantly none of the prevention strategies identified by WorkSafe are included in the media reports even though this is perhaps the most vital information for preventing recurrences.
This article looks at the advice offered by WorkSafe Victoria in its media release on what actions it believes could prevent the occupational factors that resulted in this suicide from emerging, or not being addressed, in your workplaces.
Plain speaking is one of the greatest challenges of any profession. Many professionals struggle to communicate their excellent work and knowledge which has created the moves for Research-To-Practice and specialised communicators (as opposed to public relations advisers). Human Resources (HR) and Occupational Health and Safety (OHS) need communications specialists, or perhaps just interpreters, if a recent article on workers compensation and mental health is anything to go by.
If we are going to achieve a successful and effective change on workplace mental health, we need to start to understand each other.
Recently on LinkedIn Audrey McGibbon wrote this about an online article discussing working hours in Europe:
“Working excessively long hours is par for the course in many sectors. The reasons for it are complex. The culture created by the collective leadership shadow makes its presence felt in many ways.”
I am not sure that the reasons are complex but the cultural change may be hard.
I think that the challenge is that there are so many reasons, many that are simple. Some are reasons that are beyond the control of employers but most are not, or at least, those that can have the most effective and positive benefit on the mental health of workers, are not.
The working from home (WFH) phenomenon seems established for white-collar and administration workers but the anger, protests and disappointment from businesses and landlords continues.
The Australian Industry Group (AIGroup) has published an article intended to rebuild trust between workers and employers and is based on a “Tight Loose Tight” concept. It seems to make sense and maybe moreso to its intended audience but it is missing essential integration.
