What Is Trauma-Informed Counselling and Why Is It Relevant to Safety People?

May 22
3 min read

Updated: Jun 3

In safety, we often focus on physical hazards, equipment, procedures, permits, and compliance. But what about the invisible injuries that walk onto site each day?

Trauma-informed counselling is a framework that recognises the widespread impact of trauma and understands how it can affect behaviour, decision-making, relationships, and risk perception.

For safety professionals, understanding this approach isn't just relevant, it’s critical.

What Is Trauma-Informed Counselling?

Trauma-informed counselling doesn’t treat trauma as a one-off event, it views it as a potential underlying factor influencing how people behave, cope, and respond in everyday environments. Whether the trauma stems from workplace incidents, personal life experiences, or prolonged stress, the approach aims to create psychological safety, foster trust, and avoid re-traumatisation.

Key principles of trauma-informed counselling include:

Safety: Prioritising both physical and emotional safety
Trustworthiness and Transparency: Consistency, clear communication, and honesty
Empowerment: Supporting autonomy, choice, and control
Peer Support: Encouraging connection and mutual understanding
Cultural Awareness: Recognising the impact of cultural, historical, and gender-based trauma

This isn’t about becoming a psychologist, it’s about seeing people differently and interacting in ways that reduce harm.

Why Should Safety Professionals Care?

Many of the behaviours we try to ‘control’ in safety—rushing, risk-taking, non-compliance—can actually be coping mechanisms developed in response to trauma or chronic stress.

Here's why trauma-informed approaches belong in the toolkit of every safety leader:

People bring their whole selves to work: Past trauma can affect concentration, memory, judgement, and the ability to speak up or ask for help - key components of safe work environments.
Post-incident support matters: After a serious incident or fatality, workers and first responders may experience acute stress responses. Trauma-informed approaches help reduce long-term psychological harm and build trust in safety systems.
Trauma can be a workplace hazard: First responders, healthcare workers, emergency services, FIFO workers, and those in high-risk or emotionally charged roles are routinely exposed to traumatic events. A safety system that ignores this reality isn’t complete.
Leadership sets the tone: How leaders respond to near misses, investigations, and safety breaches can either build psychological safety or destroy it. Trauma-informed leadership helps foster accountability without shame.

What Does It Look Like in Practice?

Incorporating trauma-informed principles doesn’t require overhauling your safety systems, but it does require a shift in mindset.

Avoid ‘blame and shame’ language in investigations.
Prioritise emotional debriefs as well as factual ones after incidents.
Train supervisors to recognise signs of distress or trauma.
Ensure EAP providers or support services are genuinely accessible and trauma-informed themselves.
Consider how your controls and procedures support (or undermine) psychological safety.

Being trauma-informed is not about lowering standards, it’s about lifting the standard of care we provide to our teams.

Trauma-Informed = Risk-Informed

Trauma doesn’t just affect mental health, it affects safety performance. Workers dealing with unresolved trauma are more likely to experience fatigue, distraction, disengagement, and heightened stress responses. All of these increase the risk of incidents on site.

A trauma-informed approach is part of a mature, proactive, and person-centred safety culture.

Our Psychological First Aid and Peer Support workshops are designed for safety leaders who want to lead with strength and empathy.

If you are looking for more education or certification in self-improvement, trauma support, root-cause therapy, trauma-informed certification or practitioner courses, we highly reccommend The Centre for Healing.