Of Davide Dionisi
Stress, bullying and impossible hours kill 840,000 workers a year. This is what emerges from the latest world report from the International Labor Organization (ILO) published on the occasion of the World Day for Safety and Health at Work, which is celebrated today.
«Psychosocial risks, but also other risks to health and safety at work, must be addressed in the context of work environments which are real systems characterized by a series of elements that interact with each other», explains Gianni Rosas, director of the Oil Office for Italy and San Marino. «These risks are not the result of an individual fragility of the worker, nor the product of a single factor. They must be understood in relation to how work is designed, organized and governed as a whole. This is why to improve psychosocial health it is necessary to invest in systems, rather than intervening on individuals.” The document analyzes risks on three levels: the work itself, management and broader policies. Which of these levels is the most neglected today? For Rosas «it is not so much the risks of one or three levels that are more or less neglected, but the approach to risk prevention at each level. Anxiety, depression and other manifestations of exposure to psychosocial risks are often stigmatized and associated with the private life of workers with less attention to the causes linked to the characteristics of the work and tasks; to ways of organizing and managing, and to wider organizational policies and practices (e.g. contracts, working hours and technology)”. What more concrete recommendations, therefore, emerge from the report for employers? «The main message of the report is that psychosocial risks are a central but entirely preventable challenge, with the knowledge and tools to address them already available. The report highlights that the most effective approaches are those that directly address psychosocial risks and their causes, integrating them into national legislation and companies’ organizational practices, also in response to the challenges of digitalisation” replies the director of the Oil Office for Italy and San Marino. «However, it underlines that the rules are not enough. The contribution and dialogue between workers and their representatives and company management is essential, through continuous evaluation and prevention processes. Among the priorities emerge the strengthening of data, the coherence of policies for health and safety at work and a more solid and participatory corporate governance”. In all of this, does the lack of fairness and transparency in organizational processes weigh on the psychological health of workers? “Fairness and transparency in organizational processes are considered fundamental structural factors for psychological health”, underlines Rosas, adding that the report highlights that elements such as performance evaluation systems, remuneration methods, career management and decision-making processes directly impact the well-being of male and female workers, influencing the perception of justice and stress levels. There is a direct relationship between processes that are unclear or perceived as arbitrary and increased psychosocial risks, such as effort-reward imbalance, job insecurity and organizational conflicts. On the contrary, he concludes, «contexts characterized by fairness and transparency strengthen trust, a sense of control and recognition, while their absence is associated with chronic stress, demotivation and internal tensions. In this sense, equity and transparency represent central levers of organizational governance. Ultimately, improving psychological health requires above all fair, coherent and understandable work processes.”
