Victoria's psychological health regulations: a practical guide for small employers
Since 1 December 2025, Victoria's Occupational Health and Safety (Psychological Health) Regulations have made it explicit: psychosocial hazards must be managed like any other workplace hazard. Here's what that means for a small business.
What counts as a psychosocial hazard
A psychosocial hazard is something about how work is designed, managed or experienced that can cause psychological harm. Common examples:
- high job demands, or long and unpredictable hours
- low control over how work is done
- poor support, unclear roles or poorly managed change
- bullying, sexual harassment and gendered violence
- aggression or violence, including from clients, families or the public
- exposure to traumatic events or distressing content
- working alone or in isolation
Care, early learning and community services are often exposed to several of these at once.
A four-step approach
- Identify: ask your team what makes work hard, and look at sick leave, turnover, complaints and incidents.
- Assess: how often and how long are people exposed, and how serious could the harm be?
- Control at the source: rebalance workloads and rosters, clarify roles, plan for aggression, act on poor behaviour early, and debrief after distressing events. Training and wellbeing apps help, but they don't replace fixing the work.
- Review: check that the controls work, and review after incidents, complaints or changes.
Consult your workers at each step. It's required, and it's how you find the real problems.
Keep a record
Write down the hazards you found, what you decided and why, and when you'll review. If WorkSafe ever asks, that record shows how you approached it.
How EJN-HR can help
EJN-HR's Psychosocial Safety for Managers course gives your managers the basics, and our HR health check includes a psychosocial safety version. Book your free HR review.
Related reading
- Employment and compliance changes in 2025–26: what small employers and care providers need to know
- HR policies and contracts
- Outsourced HR for small businesses
- Staff training and the Learning Hub
Not sure where your business stands? Get an HR health check, see plans and pricing, or book your free HR review.
General information only, current at October 2026. It isn't legal advice; see WorkSafe Victoria for the regulations and compliance code.
