Webinar: Employment Relations National Seminar Series – Managing Mental Health in the Workplace

Employers are increasingly faced with the challenges of keeping employees “safe” in terms of their mental health and also dealing with the consequences of employees’ mental health challenges in regard to performance and conduct.

With increased penalties in many jurisdictions and model legislation highlighting director and officer individual responsibility, the issues are more important than ever. In the current climate of vast numbers of employees working from home and in a heightened state of anxiety about world events and job security, employers face a very difficult task.

Join Piper Alderman's Erin McCarthy and their national employment relations team for webinar dealing with these issues and in particular:

The law:

• Work health and safety obligations to minimise or eliminate risks to mental health in the workplace;
• When and how the workplace extends to the home, and managing the unusual risks of remote working;
• Assessing capacity and when an employee may not be mentally “fit” for the inherent requirements of the job;
• The interplay between mental health and performance/misconduct concerns – what the Fair Work Commission has said about procedural fairness and mental health;
• Compensability of stress claims under the various state and territory workers compensation schemes; and
• Industrial manslaughter and deaths by suicide where there may be workplace risks to mental health

The practical issues:

• Signs to look out for that an employee may have compromised mental health
• Having difficult conversations with employees who have mental health issues or may be under significant stress and anxiety
• When you may be ‘on notice’ of a risk but not have recognised it;
• Managing mental health while employees are working remotely including domestic violence; and
• What will you point to as a measure implemented to manage mental health risks?