What happened
Employers are paying more attention to the workplace factors that wear people down, and more are running psychological health and safety programs. But as reported by Talent Canada, many still struggle to turn awareness into action. The article calls this a knowing-to-doing gap.
Its answer is an eight-step method. Assess the risk by likelihood, probability of harm and severity. Rank the hazards and check the ranking with workers and safety reps. Confirm the root cause before choosing a control. Then pick controls from a hierarchy: redesign the work first, change management systems and policies second, and offer individual supports such as counselling last.
The author warns against what they call random acts of wellness, such as a one-off workshop presented as a cure. Controls should pass a reasonableness test, be written in operational language with an owner and start date, and be tracked with leading and lagging indicators. Where risk remains, employers should build a package of controls. The article notes that occupational health and safety legislation requires employers to do what is reasonably practicable.
Why it matters if you are hiring
Most of the high-ranking hazards in the article are about how work is set up: unpredictable leadership, heavy workload, conflicting demands, limited autonomy. Those show up as turnover, sick leave and hard-to-fill roles. A counselling benefit does not fix them.
For hiring managers, this changes a few decisions. Caseload limits and staffing levels are controls, so an overloaded team may need another hire more than another workshop. Manager capability is also a control, so supervisors who give feedback and handle conflict well are worth hiring for and promoting. Roles in HR, health and safety and operations will increasingly be asked to run risk assessments and track indicators, not just run programs.
Candidates notice this too. People who have left poorly run teams ask how workload is managed and what happens when a manager is the problem. Clear answers help you close offers.
One thing to do this week
Pick the one team with the highest turnover or sick leave and write a single control for it using the article's template: what changes, who owns it, when it starts and how you will measure it. If the honest answer is a staffing gap, start that requisition now.
Traverse helps Canadian employers find the operations, HR and management talent who can build and run these controls, on both contract and permanent terms.