Occupational Psychology and Risk Assessment: Identifying Stress Factors Early

A key field of action for AUVA in the area of mental health is occupational and organisational psychology. It focuses on how working conditions affect employees and how work can be designed to prevent health risks as early as possible. Key influencing factors include work organisation, leadership, collaboration, communication, work processes, and organisational culture.

Particularly important is the assessment of work-related psychosocial risks. Employers are legally required to consider psychological stress and strain as part of workplace risk assessment. The assessment focuses on the conditions under which work is performed, including job tasks, work organisation, the work environment and organisational climate. It is not concerned with evaluating individual employees, but with creating safe and healthy working conditions.

AUVA supports organisations in selecting appropriate assessment methods, systematically identifying psychosocial risk factors, deriving preventive measures and evaluating their effectiveness. In this way, mental health becomes a consideration not only when problems arise, but already during the proactive design of work.

Healthy Digital Work: Identify Risks, Seize Opportunities

Building on this preventive approach, the digital working environment has become increasingly important. Digital technologies are changing not only work tools and processes but also communication, availability, collaboration, and perceptions of workload.

A key AUVA initiative at this intersection is the “Healthy Digital Work” programme. As part of AUVAfit, it supports work design and is implemented in cooperation with the FORBA Research and Consulting Institute for Working Life. Its objective is to reduce psychosocial risks associated with digital technologies while harnessing the positive potential of digital work.

Digital applications, information and communication technologies, and AI can make work easier, increase flexibility, and reduce routine tasks. However, depending on how they are implemented, they may also contribute to interruptions, time pressure, work intensification, uncertainty regarding new tools, or feelings of constant monitoring.

The programme therefore focuses directly on working conditions. Employees document their everyday work experiences, followed by interviews and focus groups. The results are anonymized, consolidated and discussed with company stakeholders in a results workshop. This process leads to tailored interventions, while AUVA provides workshops, training programmes, and consulting support to facilitate implementation.

Technostress and Extended Availability

An important issue in digital work is technostress, referring to the strain that can arise from the use of digital technologies. What is intended to simplify work can itself become a source of stress under unfavorable conditions: continuously changing software, information overload, digital interruptions, multiple communication channels, or expectations of permanent availability.

AUVA addresses this topic, among other initiatives, through the prevention campaign “Safe Digital Together.” The campaign provides companies with guidance and practical support for consciously designing healthy digital working environments.

Clear priorities, binding communication guidelines, training for commonly used applications, well-planned hybrid collaboration, and health-oriented leadership can all help reduce strain. Closely linked to this issue is extended availability. Through mobile working and remote work, the boundaries between work and private life often become blurred.

When recovery periods are repeatedly interrupted by work-related messages or tasks, employees may struggle to recuperate adequately. Potential consequences include sleep disorders, restlessness, fatigue, concentration difficulties and physical complaints. AUVA therefore recommends establishing clear periods of non-availability, structured substitution arrangements, respect for leisure and recovery time and team agreements regarding which communications are genuinely urgent.

Age-Appropriate Work Design in Times of Demographic Change

Mental health and well-being are not solely issues of digital work. Demographic change also has a major impact on health and work ability. The population is aging, the proportion of older employees is increasing and many organisations must prepare for waves of retirement, knowledge loss and changing requirements within age-diverse teams.

Age-appropriate work design is not aimed exclusively at older employees. Rather, it seeks to make work healthy, safe and manageable throughout all stages of life. This includes suitable working conditions, effective intergenerational collaboration, knowledge transfer, opportunities for development and work organisation that takes different resources and capabilities into account.

A key digital AUVA service is the free Age Structure Check. Based on workforce data, the tool analyses the current and future age distribution within an organisation and presents the results graphically. This enables companies to identify areas requiring action at an early stage, such as upcoming retirements, knowledge management challenges, workforce planning needs or the design of age-appropriate workplaces.

By increasing transparency and predictability, the tool also contributes to mental health by helping organisations avoid uncertainty, excessive workload and conflicts.

Reintegration Part-Time Work: A Gradual Return to Working Life

Another important building block of healthy work is support for reintegration part-time work arrangements. After a prolonged period of illness-related absence, returning to work can be challenging. Reasons may include physical or mental health conditions, workplace accidents, sudden illness or temporary deterioration of a chronic condition.

Following completion of treatment and stabilisation, a gradual return to work can help prevent excessive demands and health setbacks.

Reintegration part-time work allows for a temporary reduction in working hours and can be combined with task-related or workplace-related accommodations. It is based on a voluntary agreement between employer and employee. The process is guided by a reintegration plan developed with occupational health expertise.

The first point of contact is the team of specialists at fit2work. In addition, or as an alternative, small and medium-sized enterprises can make use of AUVAsicher’s occupational health expertise free of charge.

Through AUVAsicher, AUVA provides occupational health and safety services to approximately 115,000 small and medium-sized enterprises throughout Austria. Within the framework of case-based support, organisations can receive general guidance on reintegration part-time work, assistance in developing a reintegration plan, and support when a medically necessary extension is required.

For employees, this can facilitate a gradual and sustainable return to work. For employers, structured reintegration can help retain experienced staff, maintain work ability, and strengthen the workplace climate.

Emergency Psychology: Support After Critical Incidents

Mental health also plays a crucial role following exceptionally stressful workplace events. After serious occupational accidents, robberies, fatalities or other critical incidents, rapid psychological support can help prevent negative consequences for health and safety.

With the support of AUVA experts, companies and educational institutions can develop psychological emergency response concepts to prepare for such situations.

Emergency psychology therefore complements AUVA’s preventive services by providing support in acute stress situations. At the same time, it demonstrates that employee protection requires both proactive work design and clearly defined structures for managing crises.

Conclusion: Mental Health Requires Good Work Design

These examples demonstrate that AUVA does not view mental health in isolation. Psychological well-being emerges through the interaction of organisation, technology, leadership, communication, age, health, and collaboration.

Through occupational and organisational psychology services, support with psychosocial risk assessments, initiatives such as “Healthy Digital Work,” information on technostress and extended availability, the AUVA Age Structure Check, reintegration part-time support, and emergency psychological assistance, AUVA makes an important contribution to creating safer, healthier, and more human-centered workplaces.

Against the backdrop of digitalisation, artificial intelligence, demographic change, and longer working lives, prevention is becoming a central pillar of well-being, work ability, and sustainable employment. The key is to ensure that mental health is not only addressed when problems arise, but is understood as a continuous responsibility of modern prevention. ●