According to Safe Work Australia workers compensation claims for mental health conditions skyrocketed in their last report up a shocking 36.9%. Mental health claims now make up over 9% of all workers’ compensation claims and are the fifth largest category of claims.
The famous image above called; ‘Lunch atop a Skyscraper’ depicts just how unsafe workplaces were in the 1920s. While you would never see this on building sites today as firms are held to higher standards of accountability by our courts and law makers, perhaps this is what our current workplaces look like from a psychological safety perspective.
The invisibility of non-physical injury risk is one of the biggest challenges for managers in a modern workplace. Workers will mask, hiding stress and anxiety for fear of being ostracized by coworkers or being perceived as less capable, making it almost impossible for managers to understand the manifestation of mental health risk.
Neurodiverse employees are particularly good at masking their emotions to fit into the workplace. In the auticon Impact Report (2022) only 30% of employees had previously disclosed their autism to HR whilst being employed by an organisaton. Most autistic people tend to only disclose their autism to a line manager once they are comfortable enough to do so and not before. It also tends to be older more experienced workers that will take this step, while the younger ones continue to mask.
It is well documented that autistic people experience higher levels of anxiety and stress at work, making them more prone to psychological injury. This potentially creates a cohort of people that are at greater risk of psychological injury claims hiding within an organisation. If there are not established workplace practices that address psychological safety this group pose a higher claims risk.
This cohort is larger than most people think, it is estimated that 15-20% of any group of employees are neurodiverse. As can be seen by the sharp rise in psychological injury claims and the prevalence of neurodiversity within our organisations their considerable scope for claims to continue to rise if organisations are not putting in place appropriate mitigating actions.
Shortly after the 1920s, to mitigate the physical risk on building sites, all workers were require to wear safety harnesses and to always be roped in. No one in the construction industry would select a group that has poor balance and only give them a harness. The same is true for non-physical injury, the entire organisation needs to be treated for it to be safe, everyone needs a harness.
Training an organisation in creating an autism friendly environment or deploying neurodiversity training is akin to a psychological safety harness. It helps individuals to feel comfortable enough to talk about mental health challenges and destigmatizes neurodiverse conditions in an organisation. This training is not only helpful for neurodivergent workers, but it can help all workers as it openly promotes talking about and understanding different ways of thinking and builds greater acceptance with the workplace.
This in turn reduces the likelihood of psychological injury claims ultimately saving the organisation not only money but also costs associated with lost productivity and repairing any reputational damage associated with psychological injury claims.
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