Office WHS Consultants for Professional Services Firms
Practical WHS support for accounting, legal, financial, recruitment, consulting and other office-based businesses across Australia, focused on the psychosocial risks a walk-through won't find.
- 25+ years of WHS experience, plus postgraduate study in enterprise risk management and governance
- Focused on psychosocial hazards, hybrid work and officer due diligence
- National support for single offices and multi-office firms
Head Office
100 Barangaroo Avenue, Barangaroo, NSW AU 2000
Office-based businesses often assume WHS is someone else's responsibility, whether that means the building manager or the warehouse down the road. However, WHS laws require every employer to manage psychosocial hazards, including excessive workloads, bullying, harassment and poor support. For many offices, these are significant risks that are least likely to be documented.
- Have you actually assessed psychosocial hazards, or is there just a wellbeing policy?
- Do your directors and senior leaders know what due diligence the WHS Act expects of them personally?
- Is working from home covered by your WHS system, or just a line in the hybrid work policy?
- Would your team know what to do in a fire, a medical emergency or with an aggressive visitor at reception?
As office WHS consultants, we help professional services and office-based businesses meet their WHS duties without unnecessary paperwork. We focus on the risks relevant to your workplace, including psychosocial hazards, hybrid and remote work, workstation setup, emergency planning, client-facing aggression and leadership due diligence obligations.
Our aim is to provide a proportionate approach with enough structure to protect your people and officers, without applying a factory-floor safety manual to an office environment.
What to Expect from
Office WHS Consulting
Psychosocial risk, properly assessed
Workload, deadline, bullying and harassment risks identified and controlled, not just covered by an EAP phone number.
Leaders who can show due diligence
Directors and senior managers equipped to understand WHS risks and check that controls are working, grounded in our guide to the WHS Act and the primary duty of care it sets out.
Hybrid work that's covered
Home-based work brought into your WHS system with sensible checks, clear responsibilities and an easy way to report problems.
A system that fits the size of the risk
Lean documentation your office manager or HR lead can keep current without it becoming a second job.
Our WHS Services for
Professional Services & Office
Most firms start with one service. Some combine them into a single program across every office and remote team.
Low Risk Isn't No Risk
Book a free WHS assessment with our office WHS consultants to identify your firm's psychosocial and compliance gaps and understand what needs attention.
The Cost of Getting Office Work Health and Safety Wrong
In office environments, WHS issues can lead to prolonged psychological injury claims, harassment complaints referred to regulators, or experienced team members taking extended leave or leaving the business.
Psychological injury claims typically keep people off work far longer than physical injuries, and they’re harder to resolve.
Depending on what goes wrong, consequences can include:
- Fines up to $1.5M for individuals and $3.7M for businesses
- Personal liability for officers who fail to exercise due diligence
- Long-running psychological injury claims and rising workers' compensation premiums
- Regulator investigations, improvement notices and enforceable undertakings
- Losing senior people, and the clients who follow them
- Reputational damage with clients, recruits and professional bodies
Prevention in an office is mostly about paying attention early. That’s far cheaper than managing a claim, a complaint or an investigation once it’s under way.
The GSD Safety Process
Our three-stage approach, tailored to office environments, follows Assess, Align and Assure.
1. ASSESS
Two days reviewing your policies, records and day-to-day practice against WHS laws and the psychosocial regulations, including conversations with managers and staff. You get a detailed risk analysis and a reporting dashboard written in plain English.
2. ALIGN
Over 90 days we close the gaps that matter most: psychosocial risk assessments, officer due diligence, hybrid work arrangements and emergency planning. Then we hand the system to the people who'll run it.
3. ASSURE
Ongoing access to a senior WHS consultant on a structure that suits your firm, so you have expert support without adding a full-time safety role to the payroll.
WHAT OUR CLIENTS SAY
Fully Accredited
Companies We Work With
What to Know About
WHS in Office Environments
Does my business need an office WHS consultant?
Every business with workers has duties under WHS laws, offices included. Most office-based firms don’t need a full-time safety manager, but an office WHS consultant can set up a proportionate system, assess psychosocial hazards and give leaders confidence they’re meeting their obligations. See our post on how a workplace safety consultant can help for more on what that involves.
What are psychosocial hazards in an office?
Psychosocial hazards are aspects of work that can cause psychological or physical harm, such as excessive workload, tight deadlines, low job control, poor support, bullying, harassment, conflict and aggressive clients. WHS laws require employers to identify these hazards and control the risks, the same way they manage physical hazards.
What does due diligence mean for directors and senior leaders?
Under the WHS Act, officers such as company directors and senior executives must exercise due diligence to make sure the business meets its WHS duties. That means understanding the risks, making sure resources and processes are in place, and verifying they’re being used. Our team helps officers set up the reporting and checks that show this.
Do WHS obligations cover staff working from home?
Yes. When staff work from home, the home workspace is a workplace, and employers must manage the risks so far as is reasonably practicable. We help firms put practical arrangements in place, such as workstation self-assessments, check-in expectations and clear ways to report hazards or injuries.
Can GSD Safety help prevent workplace sexual harassment?
Sexual harassment is a psychosocial hazard that WHS laws require employers to manage, alongside the separate positive duty under the Sex Discrimination Act. GSD Safety helps firms assess the risk and build prevention controls into their WHS system. For legal advice on your obligations, speak with an employment lawyer.
Is GSD Safety's WHS training accredited?
No. GSD Safety’s training is practical, non-accredited workplace training. Sessions on topics like bullying, emergency management and office hazards are designed to change behaviour in your workplace. For nationally recognised qualifications, we’ll refer you to a Registered Training Organisation.