A hazard is anything that has the potential to cause harm.
A psychosocial hazard is anything that could cause psychological harm (e.g. harm someone’s mental health) and sometimes their physical health.
In creative workplaces, these might stem from:
- the nature of projects — for example, working with traumatic subject matter
- how people behave at work — including being subjected to bullying, harassment or discrimination or being in a culturally unsafe workplace
- group dynamics and how people interact
- external pressures like audience reactions or media coverage.
Children and young people are particularly vulnerable in a creative workplace. They can be exposed to a combination of psychosocial hazards in their creative work or when making art.
It’s also important to understand the physical hazards for children and young people.
Psychosocial hazards that impact children and young people
For children and young people who participate in creative practices, hazards that are particularly relevant include:
| bullying | This can be from teachers, instructors or managers or from other children and young people. |
| audience scrutiny | This could be following a performance or exhibition. It may be online. This is a major risk where children or young people are sharing personal experiences through their art form. |
| harassment, including sexual harassment | This could be from people in the organisation, audience members or online. The risk is higher in unsupervised environments such as music festivals or post-performance functions. |
| discrimination | On the basis of things including age, sex, gender, sexual orientation, race, religion, and disability. |
| exposure to traumatic material | Children and young people may be exposed to challenging or confronting stories, ideas or experiences. For example, exploring refugee stories or explorations of gender that seek to challenge adult audiences. |
| lack of clarity on expectations | Particularly where children and young people work alongside people over 18. |
| poor organisational support | Where there is limited support from managers, supervisors and adults in leadership or director positions. |
| not being listened to | Where children and young people not being involved in decisions about matters that impact them. |
| unclear processes | Where there are no complaints processes, or it is not treated fairly if a child or young person makes a complaint. |
| lack of recognition | Particularly where a child or young person receives a lot of criticism to improve their skills without acknowledging their strengths. |
In addition, for those working in the creative industries, hazards that are particularly relevant include:
| workplace conflict | Particularly where children and young people are competing with each other or adults for limited positions or roles. |
| low job control | Particularly relevant in the arts sector due to job insecurity and short-term contract work. |
Steps for managing psychosocial hazards
Managing hazards and risks generally involves:
- Identifying hazards
- Assessing the risk of harm
- Eliminating or controlling the risks
- Evaluating the risks and any controls you put in place
In some places, there are also requirements for organisations to consult with workers and to document how they will prevent and respond to hazards.
Work health and safety laws in different states and territories have particular requirements for each step.
Creative businesses and organisation need to understand their duties under work health and safety laws for everyone in the workplace.
Learn more about:
- managing workplace hazards and risks and
- identifying, assessing and controlling psychosocial hazards in the workplace.
Talking about safety
A big part of identifying hazards is consultation. Children and young people should be part of discussions about safety at every step.
Consult them on matters that affect them.
Organisations may need to adapt consultation processes so that they work for children and young people. They may be nervous about raising safety concerns, or not experienced enough to understand what issues they can and should raise. Make sure your processes help them to talk to you about safety. For example:
- adults may need to initiate conversations about safety rather than expecting a child or young person to do so
- organisations can have a particular person who has experience with children or young people, or have a modified or simpler process, for children or young people to ask questions or raise concerns.
Remember: Not all children and young people are the same. Make sure consultation also works for children and young people from diverse backgrounds and who have diverse needs. For example, by:
- having structured check-ins with children with disability to understand if they are disproportionately impacted by any hazards
- considering whether a different approach should be taken to gather feedback from children from a particular cultural group.
Tips for creative organisations
- Consult with children and young people about their creative practice. They make the art and they can tell you what is hard about the things they are required to do. This will also help to meet obligations under the National Principles for Child Safe Organisations. Learn more about child safety standards and principles.
- Implement a child safety policy. This will help you minimise some of the psychosocial hazards relevant to children. If your organisation doesn’t have one, learn more about creating a safe workplace for children and young people.
- Have a complaints or reporting channel that encourages – not discourages – children and young people to tell you when things are not working well.
- Make sure children and young people know what their rights and obligations are in the workplace. Sometimes this depends on what their relationship is with your organisation. For example, junior employees have different rights and obligations to work experience students. Learn more about different arrangements and employing children and young people. All children and young people have human rights under the Convention on the Rights of the Child.
- Make your safety training age-appropriate.
- Be comfortable discussing mental health and wellbeing with children and young people. It’s important they know this is not a taboo topic and something that organisations take seriously.
In practice:
Case study: Stress and bullying at a drama school
You own and run a small local drama school for young people. One of the young people, Jay, has recently let you and the other group members know that they are non-binary and prefer they/them pronouns. Jay has also said that their parents do not support them in this. Some students continue to use Jay’s previous pronouns on purpose. Jay has shared with you that they are quite upset about the lack of support from their family situation. They have also said that the intentional misuse of their pronouns at drama school is making things even harder.
What to do
- Identify the hazards — The behaviour of the other students is a psychosocial hazard. It is stressful for Jay which is harmful. The behaviour is a form of bullying.
- Assess the risk — You assess that Jay is at risk of harm from both the stress and bullying. The risk of harm is increased because of their situation at home.
- Eliminate or control the risk — You may not be able to eliminate the risk entirely for Jay. If they stay in the group, they will continue to be exposed to other young people and you don’t control their behaviours. You can however implement strategies to control and minimise the risk, including: communicating a zero-tolerance bullying, reminding everyone to respect each other’s genders and pronouns, ensuring that instructors and other adults are vigilant in modelling and correcting these behaviours, and providing check-ins and support to Jay including directing them to external supports if possible.
- Evaluate the risks and controls — You do this regularly to make sure they are working and see what might need to be adjusted.
Case study: Workload and body image risks at a new ballet company
You are the artistic director of a new contemporary ballet company. The lead in your upcoming show is 16 year old Tori. Tori is one of the youngest performers in your company. She has been chosen for the lead because she is physically strong, which the role demands. Her strength is apparent in her physique. During rehearsal, the choreographer often comments on her physical features. Tori overhears other dancers echoing these comments outside of rehearsals but in ways unrelated to her performance. Tori participates in demanding rehearsals that go for several hours at a time.
Tori says that she doesn’t mind the hard work and is honoured to have such an important role. However, she's lost a noticeable amount of weight in recent weeks and has been seen crying backstage on a number of occasions.
What to do
- Identify the hazards — You identify that the high workload is a factor. You also identify that she is under significant pressure as a young lead, and she’s being affected by ideas about what a dancer ‘should’ look like and the commentary she’s hearing about her body.
- Assess the risk — Tori’s weight loss and crying suggest the risk to her mental and physical health may be quite high and could have significant lasting impacts for her beyond this show.
- Eliminate or control the risk — To help with workload, you and the choreographer restructure rehearsals so that Tori is not required onstage for the full length of each rehearsal. You build appropriate breaks into rehearsals and make sure these are honoured. This benefits all the dancers. You also talk to the choreographer about limiting commentary on the dancers’ bodies to only those comments relating to how the dancers are to move their bodies. Across the company you take more proactive steps to address negative body discourse, including by communicating body positive messages and asking all staff and dancers to call out negative comments and circulating resources about disordered eating and information on where to get help. Given the high risk associated with eating disorders and because Tori is under 18, you decide you’d like to talk to Tori’s parents and alert them to your concerns – but as she is 16, you decide it’s appropriate to check in with Tori first before doing this.
- Evaluate the risks and controls — You review the rehearsal and break schedule several times up to the performance and apply similar approaches to future shows. After the show closes, you check in with Tori to understand if these supports have been sufficient or whether further steps were required. You keep up positive messaging in the company about bodies and are open about eating disorder risks as part of talking about safety.
