For the past few years, there has been an increased focus on 'positive duty' and the role organisations play in preventing workplace sexual harassment.
It's an important shift.
Rather than simply responding when something goes wrong, positive duty requires organisations to take reasonable and proportionate steps to prevent unlawful conduct before it occurs. The 2022 introduction of positive duty to the Sex Discrimination Act 1984 (Cth) has moved the focus from complaint management to prevention, culture, accountability and organisational oversight.
For boards and executive teams, that means asking different questions.
Not just:
"Do we have a policy?"
But:
"How do we know our people are safe?"
Not just:
"Have there been any complaints?"
But:
"What emerging issues are we seeing, and what are we doing to address them before harm occurs?"
The more I listen to conversations about positive duty, the more I find myself thinking about domestic and family violence.
Because when you step back, the principles behind positive duty are bigger than compliance.
They're about recognising foreseeable harm, understanding where vulnerabilities exist, and creating the conditions that help prevent them.
And that's where domestic and family violence deserves greater attention.
The workplace may not create the risk, but it can be exposed to it
One of the reasons domestic and family violence can sit outside governance discussions is because it typically originates outside the workplace.
But the impacts don't stop at the office door.
In my work with organisations across local government, government agencies, community services and the corporate sector, I've seen significant variation in how prepared workplaces are to respond to domestic and family violence.
Some organisations have invested heavily in leadership capability, workplace training, support pathways and safety planning. Others are only beginning the conversation.
What I see consistently, however, is a growing recognition that domestic and family violence is not solely a personal issue. Its impacts can extend into the workplace, affecting employees, teams and organisational performance.
It may present as anxiety, fatigue, declining wellbeing, increased absenteeism, difficulty concentrating, safety concerns or disengagement. In some cases, perpetrators target workplaces directly through repeated contact, stalking, threats or technology-facilitated abuse.
For many organisations, the greatest challenge isn't that domestic and family violence exists.
The challenge is failing to recognise the impact it is having on employees, teams and workplaces until harm has already occurred.
That's the thinking that underpins positive duty.
This approach encourages organisations to identify and address concerns before they escalate. It challenges leaders to think beyond individual incidents and consider the conditions that allow harm to occur in the first place.
While positive duty does not specifically require organisations to address domestic and family violence, its prevention-focused approach provides a valuable lens through which organisations can consider DFV-related workplace impacts and preparedness.
Looking beyond policies
One of the most powerful aspects of this shift is that it challenges organisations to look beyond compliance.
Policy matters.
Reporting pathways matters.
Training matters.
But none of those things, on their own, tell us whether people feel safe enough to seek support.
That's why culture is such an important part of the conversation.
Because culture is often the earliest indicator of whether prevention efforts are working.
When people trust their leaders, understand available supports and believe they will be treated with dignity and respect, they are more likely to seek help early.
When they don't, concerns often remain hidden until they become far more difficult to address.
At a practical level, boards should be asking:
Do employees feel safe to speak up?
Are leaders equipped to respond appropriately when concerns are raised?
Do managers understand their role in positive duty, prevention and early intervention?
Are support pathways visible, accessible and trusted?
These aren't simply people and culture questions.
They're questions about organisational capability, preparedness and oversight.
From workplace culture to workplace risk
One of the strongest themes emerging from the positive duty conversation is the expectation that boards actively oversee workplace culture rather than treating it as a passive compliance issue.
And rightly so.
Culture influences behaviour. Behaviour influences outcomes.
And poor outcomes can have significant consequences for people and organisations alike.
Boards routinely oversee financial risk, operational risk, cyber risk and workplace safety risk. Increasingly, they are also expected to understand psychosocial hazards and the factors that contribute to psychological harm.
Domestic and family violence can intersect with many of these areas.
It can contribute to safety concerns, psychosocial hazards, workforce disruption, absenteeism, turnover, reduced productivity, leadership challenges and broader impacts on employee wellbeing.
This is not because organisations are responsible for violence occurring in an employee's private life.
Rather, it is because organisations have responsibilities for the health, safety and wellbeing of their workers, and domestic and family violence can create foreseeable workplace impacts that affect people and organisations.
That raises an important governance issue:
How can a board effectively oversee something it isn't discussing, measuring or preparing for?
Why boards should pay attention
For boards, the issue is not whether domestic and family violence falls neatly within positive duty legislation.
The issue is whether domestic and family violence creates foreseeable organisational challenges that require consideration.
In my experience, boards are increasingly recognising that the impacts can extend far beyond individual employees and create broader organisational consequences.
These may include:
Risks to employee health, safety and wellbeing
Psychosocial hazards and psychological injury
Workplace safety and security concerns
Workforce disruption and absenteeism
Retention and engagement challenges
Leadership capability gaps
Reputational impacts arising from poor organisational responses
The organisations leading this conversation recognise that while they cannot prevent domestic and family violence from occurring, they can play an important role in reducing the impact on employees and creating safer pathways to support.
That is fundamentally a governance, safety and prevention conversation.
The questions boards should be asking
When directors are encouraged to challenge management on workplace culture, they're often encouraged to look for indicators of emerging issues rather than waiting for complaints or incidents.
The same approach can be applied to domestic and family violence.
Boards might ask:
Are our leaders equipped to recognise signs that an employee may be experiencing domestic and family violence?
Are referral pathways understood and regularly communicated?
Have we considered how workplace practices might reduce or unintentionally increase vulnerability?
How are we measuring employee confidence in seeking support?
What indicators help us understand whether our safeguards are actually working?
These questions aren't about turning workplaces into specialist DFV services.
They're about understanding whether the organisation has created the conditions that allow people to seek help – early and safely.
Because prevention is almost always more effective than crisis response.
The next evolution of positive duty
For me, positive duty is about much more than compliance.
It's about recognising that waiting for harm to occur is no longer enough.
The shift we're seeing is from response to prevention, from policies to culture, and from reactive leadership to proactive management of workplace harm.
When viewed through that lens, domestic and family violence becomes more than a wellbeing issue.
It becomes a workplace issue.
Not because organisations are responsible for conduct that occurs outside the workplace.
But because organisations have an opportunity, and arguably a responsibility, to identify foreseeable impacts, strengthen safety and support people before a crisis occurs.
The organisations leading this conversation are no longer asking:
"Do we have a policy?"
They're asking:
"What challenges exist for our people, and what are we doing about them before harm occurs?"
Domestic and family violence may not originate in the workplace.
But its impacts are often felt there.
Positive duty means that waiting until harm occurs is not enough.
The organisations leading this shift aren't simply focused on compliance. They're focused on prevention.
They're asking harder questions about culture, capability and accountability.
They're looking beyond policies and considering whether employees genuinely feel safe seeking support.
And they're recognising that creating safer workplaces isn't just about responding well when someone asks for help.
It's about building the conditions that make it safe for them to ask in the first place.
Because when organisations invest in awareness, education, early intervention and prevention, they're doing more than reducing organisational risk.
They're creating workplaces where people feel safe, supported and valued.
Workplaces where people know they will be listened to, believed and connected with support when they need it most.
And ultimately, that's what a truly respectful workplace should be about.
Find out more
Challenge DV offers programs and services that ensure your organisation is not just compliant, but truly equipped.
Get a quick training quote or contact me, Lizzy Edwards, Corporate Solutions Manager, to find out how we can work together: lizzy@challengedv.org
Article sources:
This article draws on guidance and research from the Australian Human Rights Commission, Safe Work Australia, ANROWS, Our Watch, the Australian Bureau of Statistics and the Monash Gender and Family Violence Prevention Centre.
Australian Bureau of Statistics. (2023). Personal Safety, Australia, 2021–22 financial year. Australian Bureau of Statistics. [abs.gov.au]
Australian Human Rights Commission. (2023). Guidelines for Complying with the Positive Duty under the Sex Discrimination Act 1984 (Cth). [humanrights.gov.au], [humanrights.gov.au]
Our Watch. (2026). Workplace Equality and Respect. Available at: Workplace Equality and Respect [ourwatch.org.au]
Our Watch Institute. (2024). How can workplaces prevent violence against women? Available at: Primary Prevention in Workplaces [ourwatchinstitute.org.au]
Monash Gender and Family Violence Prevention Centre. (2023). The Impact of Domestic and Family Violence Across the Australian Workplace. [dca.org.au]
