Closing the safety gap: 3 actions every business must take now

The data is in, and the message is loud and clear: too many Australian workers don’t feel safe, writes Nathan Halliday.

Sonder’s newly released Safety Gap Report 2025, based on insights from over 2,000 workers, paints a stark picture of physical, psychological, and emotional insecurity in our workplaces. Two in three workers have experienced customer aggression. Nearly one in three feels unsafe during their commute. Most telling of all, only 37 per cent rate their employer’s commitment to safety as “very good”.

These are not isolated concerns. They signal a widening chasm between employee expectations and organisational action. If businesses don’t act now to close this gap, they risk losing the trust, wellbeing, and productivity of their people.

Here are three key ways businesses can, and must, step up.

1. Make safety personal, not just procedural

Traditional safety measures have focused on physical hazards, hard hats, handrails, and hazard signage. These remain important, but in today’s workplaces, the real risks are often invisible.

Psychosocial hazards like job stress, bullying, and customer aggression are now among the top threats to worker wellbeing. Sonder data shows that job demands, poor support, conflict, bullying, and exposure to traumatic events make up the five most common psychosocial hazards cited by workers. Alarmingly, 11 per cent of mental health cases we see can be directly linked to these workplace hazards.

Yet many businesses still treat mental health and safety as separate concerns. That’s no longer tenable. With new legislation requiring businesses to identify and control psychosocial risks, safety can no longer be just about procedures; it must be personal.

Start by listening. Run regular wellbeing check-ins. Conduct psychosocial risk assessments. Create space for workers to speak up without fear. Safety culture begins with psychological safety: the belief that people can raise concerns, make mistakes, and challenge ideas without retaliation.

2. Equip leaders to lead with care

The Safety Gap Report uncovered a disconnect between senior leaders and the rest of the workforce. While more than 80 per cent of executives say they feel safe and supported at work, only around 65 per cent of middle managers and frontline staff agree. Even more concerning, just 8 per cent of less senior workers think the world is becoming safer, compared to a quarter of executives.

This gap in perception matters. It means leaders may be out of touch with the daily experiences of their teams, and therefore slow to act on real issues.

Closing this leadership gap requires training, accountability, and empathy. Leaders must be equipped not just to hit KPIs but also to notice when someone is struggling, to have supportive conversations, and to create environments where safety isn’t just compliance, it’s care.

Businesses should also empower people managers with tools and data. For example, real-time incident response dashboards, psychological hazard reports, or access to multidisciplinary support teams can make a huge difference in how leaders respond when something goes wrong.

3. Prioritise support after incidents – not just before

Proactive prevention is crucial, but how businesses respond after a safety incident is just as important. And right now, too many are falling short.

Our report shows that 35 per cent of workers who experienced customer aggression received no support at all, a rise from 29 per cent in 2023. For older women, that figure is even higher: 49 per cent received no support. This lack of care sends a damaging message to workers that their experiences don’t matter and that they are alone in managing the fallout.

Businesses must improve their post-incident response. That means having protocols in place to check in with affected staff, offering access to professional support, and following up, not just once, but over time. Sonder’s own platform, for instance, offers critical incident support and safety check-ins that continue well beyond the moment of crisis.

Support should also be tailored. Lone workers, shift staff, younger employees, and older women face different safety challenges and will need different kinds of care.

Safety is no longer just about avoiding injury. It’s about creating environments where people feel safe to speak, to show up as themselves, and to do their best work.

With unannounced compliance checks underway and a workforce increasingly willing to vote with their feet, the time for action is now.

Let’s close the safety gap before it becomes a chasm we can’t cross.

Nathan Halliday is the chief of member operations at Sonder.