Celebrating our Project Launch
The Cultivating Systemic Safety to Prevent Workplace Sexual Harassment project was formally launched on 18 February 2025, with an online hub and face-to-face hubs in Adelaide and Brisbane. We heard from Project Lead Professor Michelle Tuckey that for workers, particularly those in high-risk industries—such as male-dominated fields, customer-facing roles, and hierarchical workplaces—this research has the potential to create meaningful protections and cultural change. By addressing the structural and cultural drivers of harassment, this project aims to create workplaces where all employees feel safe, respected, and empowered to thrive.
As part of the launch event, we worked together to establish some foundational principles for how we will work together in this project, shared what each of us would be contributing into the project, and what we hoped our organisations, and us personally, would get out of the project. We then spent some time starting to map the complex environment in which we are working, generating fascinating insights and uncovering some incredible synergies and opportunities.
As a research team, we were thrilled to have the opportunity to meet like-minded and committed individuals working toward the same goal from different parts of the system. We heard from delegates from partner organisations that are committed to the project and implementing outcomes: Australian Human Rights Commission, Safe Work Australia, Comcare, Our Watch, Queensland Corrective Services, Queensland Human Rights Commission, Equal Opportunity SA, Return to Work SA, SafeWork SA, Working Women’s Centre South Australia, Working Women Queensland, and Teamgage.
As workplace sexual harassment remains a pervasive and deeply entrenched issue across industries in Australia, we have an opportunity to develop and test practical, evidence-based solutions to this widespread problem. We have a shared ambition to enable workplaces to meet and move beyond compliance with the latest positive duty legislation, and prevent sexual harassment before it occurs.
At the end of the workshop, we even managed to take a photograph all together across multiple cities.
Some of our partners have already started sharing their experience of engaging with the project, including Working Women Queensland who highlighted:
‘Sexual harassment at work is not just an individual experience—it is shaped by organisational systems, cultures, and structures. While policies, training, and reporting mechanisms play an important role, they often operate in isolation and fail to address the root causes of harassment. This project aims to shift the focus from reactive measures to proactive prevention, creating workplaces where sexual harassment is less likely to occur in the first place…Working Women Queensland is proud to be a key partner in a ground-breaking national research project designed to cultivate systemic safety and inclusion in workplaces, ultimately preventing sexual harassment before it occurs’ (WWQ)
The launch is just the first step in enabling national participation and engagement with partner organisations (industry and non-government) and researchers. We’re thrilled to have such rich and meaningful discussions around the concepts underpinning the project, and while this is an ambitious project with an innovative research design and methodology, we are more confident than ever that we can create something groundbreaking for gender equality and safety in industry together.
