AACAI WA 2023 Safety Survey Results

At the 2022 AGM AACAI WA established the inaugural Safety and Mental Health Committee. The committee was established with the aim of raising awareness for members and heritage professionals in the industry in relation to key safety hazards in archaeology and provide members with the tools, training and guidance on select topics.

A short five question survey was designed to identify key topics and safety issues of concern to members. The results of the survey are in and AACAI WA will be using these to craft and design our 2023 safety topics into key areas of interest.

The WA Safety and wellbeing sub-committee have put together some graphs to show you the results of the survey.

Most people who responded (49%) felt that they were exposed to some risk in their work on a daily basis. A total of 17% said this occurs often or very often.

Thankfully, over a quarter (33%) of respondents felt risks occur rarely or not very often.

It should be noted this result could reflect the variety of roles and tasks undertaken by cultural heritage professionals, with some being regularly in the field and others focussed on office work.

Any degree of safety risk is concerning and AACAI WA is committed to assisting and supporting members in reducing and managing these risks.

Unsurprisingly driving long distances, heat stroke/dehydration, fatigue management and remote work scored highly on the list of key safety risks for archaeologists.

Dealing with aggressive behaviour and mental health scored highly on the list of topics people were keen to learn more about.

Respondents indicated that they would like to have more safety specific seminars/guest speakers as well as other tools and training on safety topics.

Mental health, work conditions, environment and dealing with aggressive behaviour scored highly as topics that respondents wanted to see addressed.

Based on the resultsfeedback we will start by focusing on fatigue management, followed by heat stress, remote work and dealing with conflict/difficult behaviour. Thanks again to Annabelle Davis and Lucia Clayton for kickstarting such a great initiative. Our team will endeavour to start bringing training and tools to help heritage professionals start to address these issues.

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