Addressing work related violence in city councils

Addressing work related violence in city councils

Imagine experiencing the following while at work:

• Repeated abusive phone calls from someone who was issued a fine.
• Sexual harassment while performing carer’s duties within a client’s home.
• Verbal abuse and intimidation after issuing a parking fine.

These are just some of the work-related violence experiences documented as case studies that City of Greater Dandenong council workers have suffered.

Many complex problems have system-level factors that need to be addressed — in this case to manage and prevent work-related violence.

The Monash University Accident Research Centre (MUARC) in collaboration with the City of Greater Dandenong, WorkSafe Victoria and ISCRR, aimed to develop a prototype ‘systems-thinking’ tool to review and revise control measures to prevent and manage work related violence in Victorian City Councils.

Pilot application of the tool illustrated that the tool helped guide a systems-thinking approach to the investigation of work-related violence incidents.

The end-goal of this project was to help stakeholders identify strategic interventions to drive systemic change to prevent work-related violence incidents. The next steps in achieving this goal include:

• Training in applying the tool within Victorian City Councils. Training could also be provided to WSV inspectors to educate on the system of factors contributing to work-related violence incidents.
• Evaluation of using the tool within Victorian City Councils.