Comply with the Occupational Health and Safety Act – Efficiently and with High Quality
Risk Assessment of Psychological Stress in the Workplace
Implementation of the legal requirements for psychological risk assessment in the workplace as part of an employee survey with strategic information gain.
Psychological Risk Assessment According to the Occupational Safety and Health Act
Psychological stress and risks are not always recognizable and visible in everyday working life. An anonymous employee survey with selected questions and scientifically based evaluation can adequately assess the risk posed by psychological stress in companies.
According to the Occupational Safety and Health Act, employers are obliged to determine the risks associated with the work of their employees through an assessment and to derive the necessary measures. Every employee has the right to safe working conditions and a safe working environment to protect their health, regardless of the size of the company. According to Sections 5 and 6 of the Occupational Safety and Health Act, this should be ensured by means of a risk assessment by the employer or other specialist staff and documented in writing. Sections 3, 4 and 6, which describe the requirements for the risk assessment process, are also relevant here.
When determining and classifying the relevant psychological stress, all common guides (e.g. the BAuA, the BDA or the VBG) refer to DIN EN ISO 10075, Parts 1-3. The information found there is not legally binding, but orientation definitely makes it easier to justify the procedure in the event of any inspections by the supervisory authorities.
Structured Employee Survey According to DIN EN ISO 10075
Classification of Psychological Stress
In order to carry out an assessment, the possible hazards in the company must first be analyzed and listed. Since the end of 2013, in addition to physical hazards, the nature of the work environment and work equipment, or inadequate qualifications and training of employees, psychological stress at work has also been one of the possible hazards.
Our questionnaire for risk assessment of psychological stress is based on DIN EN ISO 10075, which divides psychological stress into seven main categories:
- Work equipment/work environment
- Work task
- Work organization
- Social aspects
- Experienced stress
- Personal well-being
- General questions
- Open question(s)
This structure enables a detailed analysis of the relevant stressors that can lead to health risks regardless of individual conditions.
Assessing Stress in the Workplace Among Employees
Since psychological stress and risks are not always recognizable and visible in everyday working life, they sometimes never come to light or only come to light when someone falls ill or is fired. An employee survey that guarantees anonymity, data protection and data security offers the ideal basis and opportunity to ask your employees the right questions and obtain relevant information about existing risks.
Utilizing Synergy Effects
Combining Risk Assessment and Employee Survey
Many questions on psychological risk assessment are also used in employee surveys. For this reason, a combined implementation is recommended. This leads to synergy effects, saves time and effort, and increases the quality of the results. A well-developed questionnaire for employee surveys and risk assessment of psychological stress in the workplace takes company-specific circumstances into account in order to deliver meaningful results. Existing questionnaire dimensions such as working conditions or health & stress can be expanded with topic-specific questions on risk assessment. Another option is to dedicate a separate section to the topic with additional questions and information, e.g. on the working time model (day shift, night shift) at the end of the questionnaire. Additional questions or a sole survey for a specific topic area are just as possible as in-depth analyses in specific areas in order to derive targeted measures for organizational development. We will be happy to support you in developing an individual questionnaire for your risk assessment or in expanding the questionnaire as part of an employee survey.
Use a Tried-and-Tested Risk Assessment Questionnaire
Our scientific partners have been able to identify relevant core questions on the basis of scientific research and discussions with local companies. These have been incorporated into a standard risk assessment questionnaire that has been tried and tested in practice and can be offered at a lower cost than a custom-made questionnaire. This ensures that legal requirements are met and that occupational safety and stress factors are recorded and analyzed.
Compliance with Legal Requirements
Determine the Stress Levels of Your Employees
Take advantage of legal requirements and your own goals to improve your work situation and organizational development.
Our Services for Psychological Risk Assessment:
- Full implementation and operational support
- Tested questionnaire: online and/or on paper
- Scientific advice and evaluation
- Workshops for follow-up measures
- Risk assessment as an individual project with individual or standard questionnaire
- Risk assessment as part of an employee survey / organizational development
What is Meant by Psychological Stress in the Context of a Risk Assessment?
- The ArbSchG is about recording and evaluating the objective psychological stress of an activity and not the resulting subjective stress on individual employees.
- “The aim of the risk assessment is to filter out those stresses that lead to negative stress consequences and health risks for the majority of people, regardless of their prerequisites.” (VBG)
- From an occupational psychology perspective, relieving and promoting conditions (resources) must always be recorded, as they help determine the effect of incorrect stress.
Further Information
Further specific information on the topic of risk assessment of psychological stress can be found in the article: Gefährdungsbeurteilung psychischer Belastung – Pflichtübung oder Chance zum KulturwandelOpen in new tab on our specialist portal Mitarbeiterbefragungen.comOpen in new tab.