ISO 45003 Evidence Collection Guide

ISO 45003, published in 2021, is the international standard for managing psychosocial risks in the workplace. It's become essential for medium-to-large enterprises seeking to prevent burnout, stress, and workplace misconduct while protecting employee wellbeing. But implementing ISO 45003 isn't just about policy documents; it's about collecting robust evidence that demonstrates compliance. This guide shows how Solas Technologies' SolasOS platform transforms ISO 45003 evidence collection from labour-intensive manual processes into continuous, automated insights.

Who Needs ISO 45003 and Why It Matters

ISO 45003 applies to any organisation managing occupational health and safety (OHS) risks, particularly psychosocial hazards. For enterprises with 2,000+ employees, especially in financial services, the regulation landscape is complex. Auditors expect concrete evidence that your organisation has:

• Identified psychosocial risks specific to your workplace

• Consulted workers meaningfully

• Implemented controls proportionate to the risks

• Monitored the effectiveness of those controls

• Analysed trends and adjusted your approach

The challenge? Most organisations still collect this evidence manually, through sporadic surveys, anecdotal feedback, and paperwork. That approach is time-consuming, often incomplete, and vulnerable to bias.

Clause-by-Clause Evidence Collection: Manual vs SolasOS

Let's explore the key clauses where evidence collection differs dramatically between traditional approaches and SolasOS.

Clause 4.2: Understanding the Needs and Expectations of Workers

What the requirement asks for in plain language: Your organisation must understand what matters to workers; their expectations around wellbeing, safety, support, and working conditions.

What evidence auditors expect: Documented evidence that you've asked workers what they need and expect, and that you've analysed this feedback to identify patterns and themes.

Collecting evidence manually: Most organisations use annual surveys or periodic focus groups. HR sends out a questionnaire, receives a 40-50% response rate, manually tallies results, and produces a summary report. The data is months old by the time it's analysed. You capture snapshots, not the lived experience of your workforce.

Collecting evidence with SolasOS: SolasOS continuously analyses communication data across your organisation, measuring sentiment, emotional tone, and emerging concerns in real time. When workers express frustrations, hopes, or needs in emails, chat messages, and meetings, the platform identifies these themes automatically. You can pull reports showing how worker sentiment and expectations have evolved over the past quarter, with specific examples and trend lines. For auditors, you have continuous, timestamped evidence rather than a single survey from six months ago.

Clause 5.4: Consultation and Participation of Workers

What the requirement asks for in plain language: Workers must have a genuine voice in decisions affecting their health and safety, and your organisation must show that this participation has influenced outcomes.

What evidence auditors expect: Records of consultation forums, attendance, topics discussed, worker input, and demonstrated actions taken as a result.

Collecting evidence manually: You schedule town halls, circulate agendas, collect minutes. Participation is often patchy; employees don't show up or, if they do, only senior staff speak. You document what was said, but proving that worker voices actually shaped decisions is difficult. Six months later, you're struggling to remember what was discussed and what changed because of it.

Collecting evidence with SolasOS: The platform maps your organisational network and identifies who is contributing to discussions, who feels heard, and where communication silos exist. After a consultation forum, SolasOS can analyse sentiment in subsequent internal communications to show whether workers felt their input was valued. It identifies pockets of disengagement and flags which business units have low consultation participation. You can demonstrate not just that consultation happened, but that it was inclusive and genuinely influenced workplace decisions.

Clause 6.1.2: Hazard Identification and Assessment of Psychosocial Risks

What the requirement asks for in plain language: You must identify psychosocial hazards specific to your workplace (workload, role ambiguity, change management stress, interpersonal conflict, etc.) and assess the level of risk each poses to workers.

What evidence auditors expect: A documented risk assessment showing which psychosocial hazards are present, how they were identified, what the risks are, who is affected, and what controls are in place.

Collecting evidence manually: You run a dedicated psychosocial risk assessment survey or workshop, perhaps annually. You ask generic questions about stress, workload, and support. The assessment is based on self-reported data and is only as good as workers' self-awareness in that moment. By the time results come back, the situation has often changed. You might miss emerging risks entirely until someone escalates a crisis.

Collecting evidence with SolasOS: The platform's core function is identifying psychosocial risks from communication data. It analyses patterns of language, timing, and sentiment that correlate with burnout, disengagement, and misconduct risk. If workload stress is increasing, you see it in the rising frequency of late-night emails and stressed language. If role ambiguity is creating confusion, SolasOS detects it in cross-team questions and frustration patterns. If interpersonal conflict is building, sentiment analysis between specific individuals or teams flags tension early. You have continuous, granular, real-time evidence of psychosocial hazards, not a snapshot from six months ago.

Clause 7.2: Competence

What the requirement asks for in plain language: Your organisation must ensure that workers and those managing health and safety have the knowledge, skills, and experience needed for their roles, particularly around psychosocial risk management.

What evidence auditors expect: Records showing that relevant personnel have received training, that their competence has been assessed, and that gaps have been addressed.

Collecting evidence manually: HR tracks training attendance via spreadsheets or learning management systems. You have lists of who attended what course and when. But proving that the training actually changed behaviour or understanding? That requires post-training assessments, which are rarely done thoroughly. You assume attendance equals competence, which is often not the case.

Collecting evidence with SolasOS: After a psychosocial risk training programme, SolasOS can analyse whether communication patterns changed. For example, if managers have been trained to recognise stress signals, does their language when engaging with struggling team members become more supportive? Does the tone of one-on-one check-ins shift? The platform measures whether awareness training translated into actual behaviour change. You have evidence not just that training happened, but that it worked.

Clause 7.3: Awareness

What the requirement asks for in plain language: Your organisation must ensure that all workers are aware of psychosocial risks, their role in managing them, and the support available.

What evidence auditors expect: Evidence that awareness campaigns were conducted, the message reached the intended audience, and workers understood and retained the information.

Collecting evidence manually: You launch a mental health awareness campaign, send emails, post intranet articles, maybe hold a webinar. You measure success by email open rates or intranet clicks. Beyond that, you have no idea whether workers actually read the content, understood it, or remember it. You assume high visibility equals high awareness, which it often doesn't.

Collecting evidence with SolasOS: The platform monitors how your awareness messages are discussed and referenced in internal communications. If you've launched a campaign on burnout prevention, SolasOS can track whether workers mention key concepts from that campaign in subsequent emails and chat. It can identify which business units are engaging with the message and which aren't. Over time, you build a picture of whether awareness is increasing. You have data on message retention and behaviour change, not guesswork.

Clause 7.5.2: Confidentiality

What the requirement asks for in plain language: Your organisation must protect the confidentiality of health information and ensure that workers are not penalised for raising psychosocial concerns.

What evidence auditors expect: Documentation of confidentiality policies, proof that information is protected, and evidence that workers trust the system enough to raise concerns without fear.

Collecting evidence with SolasOS: Solas Technologies has built privacy-by-design into SolasOS. The platform analyses communication data at the aggregate and trend level, not the individual level. Auditors see dashboards showing psychosocial risk trends across teams and departments, but no personal data is exposed. Workers know that SolasOS is analysing their wellbeing without reading individual emails or monitoring specific conversations. The platform itself demonstrates to auditors that you can gather powerful psychosocial insights while protecting individual confidentiality. This is critical evidence that workers can trust your systems and feel safe raising concerns.

Clause 8.1: Operational Planning and Control

What the requirement asks for in plain language: Your organisation must plan and control operations to manage psychosocial risks on an ongoing basis, not just react to crises.

What evidence auditors expect: Documented processes showing how psychosocial risks are monitored continuously and how controls are maintained and adjusted over time.

Collecting evidence manually: Most organisations rely on annual or biannual surveys. The rest of the year, you respond reactively when someone escalates a problem. You have evidence of control points, but gaps exist between measurement cycles, and you often don't know about emerging risks until someone is on the verge of burnout or has already left.

Collecting evidence with SolasOS: The platform provides continuous operational control. Dashboards show psychosocial risk metrics in real time. You can spot emerging burnout before it becomes critical, identify disengagement trends before talent leaves, and detect misconduct signals early. Your operational controls are active 24/7, and auditors see timestamped evidence of ongoing monitoring, not a single annual assessment with months of inactivity in between.

Clause 8.3: Rehabilitation and Return to Work

What the requirement asks for in plain language: When a worker has experienced stress-related absence or mental health challenges, your organisation must support their return to work and manage the transition carefully.

What evidence auditors expect: Individual case records showing that return-to-work plans were created, that the worker's wellbeing was monitored during transition, and that appropriate adjustments were made.

Collecting evidence manually: HR maintains return-to-work files. Managers check in occasionally and document conversations. But how do you know whether the worker genuinely feels supported and is recovering, versus just going through the motions? You rely on periodic check-ins and trust that managers notice problems.

Collecting evidence with SolasOS: As the worker returns to activity, SolasOS monitors their communication patterns and emotional tone. Are they sounding less stressed? Are they re-engaging with team discussions? Is their language becoming more positive and confident? The platform detects whether the transition is genuinely working or whether the worker is still struggling silently. Managers have objective feedback on recovery progress, and you have timestamped evidence in your return-to-work file showing that ongoing monitoring happened and the worker's wellbeing was prioritised.

Clause 9.1: Monitoring, Measurement, Analysis and Evaluation

What the requirement asks for in plain language: Your organisation must regularly measure whether psychosocial risk management is working. This includes monitoring hazard levels, control effectiveness, and worker wellbeing trends.

What evidence auditors expect: Records of monitoring activities, measurement data, analysis of that data, and evidence of trends being identified and acted upon.

Collecting evidence manually: Annual engagement surveys, occasional focus groups, maybe pulse surveys if you're proactive. You compile data manually, analyse it in spreadsheets, and produce a report. By the time you've finished the analysis, the data is weeks or months old, and the situation has already moved on. Trends are hard to spot because you only have 1-2 data points per year.

Collecting evidence with SolasOS: SolasOS provides continuous measurement dashboards. Sentiment trends, emotional wellbeing metrics, disengagement indicators, and stress signals are visible in real time. You can pull quarterly or monthly reports showing how psychosocial health has evolved, with concrete data points rather than survey aggregates. Trend analysis is automated; the platform identifies patterns you might miss manually. Your auditors see rich, continuous measurement data, not sparse snapshots.

Clause 9.1.3: Analysis and Evaluation

What the requirement asks for in plain language: Beyond just collecting data, you must analyse it to understand what's driving psychosocial risks and whether your controls are working.

What evidence auditors expect: Analysis showing that you've looked for patterns, identified root causes, understood which groups are affected differently, and drawn conclusions about control effectiveness.

Collecting evidence manually: You manually sort survey responses, look for themes, maybe create a few cross-tabulations. The analysis is limited by time and resources. You might identify obvious patterns, but subtle correlations get missed. Was the stress increase in this department because of the system change, the new manager, or workload increase? Manual analysis often can't answer that question.

Collecting evidence with SolasOS: The platform's analysis is sophisticated and continuous. It identifies correlations between events (e.g., a system implementation) and sentiment shifts. It segments analysis by department, team, job level, and tenure, showing you which groups are most affected by psychosocial risks. It highlights outliers and emerging pockets of concern. Your analysis files contain evidence of patterns identified, root causes explored, and evidence-based conclusions about what's working and what needs adjustment.

Clause 9.3: Management Review

What the requirement asks for in plain language: Senior leadership must review the effectiveness of psychosocial risk management at planned intervals and decide on improvements.

What evidence auditors expect: Records of management review meetings showing what data was presented, what was discussed, and what decisions were made.

Collecting evidence manually: You schedule a management review meeting, bring along printed survey results from the last assessment, discuss them briefly, and document the outcomes. Leaders have limited data to work with, the discussion is often superficial, and follow-up actions are vague. The next review happens a year later.

Collecting evidence with SolasOS: Management reviews become more substantive. You present rich, quarterly dashboards showing psychosocial health trends, emerging risks, and control effectiveness. Leaders can drill into the data, ask questions, and make informed decisions. The frequency of reviews can increase because the data is readily available. Your management review meeting notes reflect evidence-based decisions, and auditors see that leadership is genuinely engaged with psychosocial risk management.

Clause 10.2: Nonconformity and Corrective Action

What the requirement asks for in plain language: When things go wrong, whether a worker is injured, an assault occurs, or a control fails, your organisation must investigate, understand why, and implement corrective actions to prevent recurrence.

What evidence auditors expect: Documentation of incidents, investigation reports, root cause analyses, and records showing that corrective actions were implemented and effective.

Collecting evidence manually: Incidents happen, you investigate, you implement some changes. But early warning signals are often missed. A manager struggling with stress doesn't raise a concern until they take stress leave. Workplace conflict escalates for months before anyone formally reports it. You're always behind the curve, responding after the fact.

Collecting evidence with SolasOS: The platform flags early warning indicators. Rising stress patterns, disengagement trajectories, and conflict signals emerge weeks or months before formal incidents occur. You can take preventative action, not just corrective action. When incidents do occur, your investigation is informed by detailed context; you can see the communication patterns leading up to the incident, understand the psychosocial environment, and identify robust corrective actions. Your nonconformity files show that you acted on early warnings, investigated thoroughly, and learned from near-misses, not just formal incidents.

Evidence Collection: Manual vs SolasOS at a Glance

From Compliance to Culture: What Auditors Really Want to See

Auditors reviewing ISO 45003 compliance aren't just checking boxes. They're looking for evidence that psychosocial risk management is embedded in your organisation's operations and culture. They want to see:

• Continuous, not episodic, measurement

• Evidence that data drives decisions

• Timely, relevant information, not stale snapshots

• Awareness of risks specific to your business and workforce

• Controls that are actually working

• Early warning systems that prevent crises

SolasOS transforms your evidence portfolio from a collection of scattered documents and survey reports into a coherent, continuous narrative. Auditors see that your organisation is genuinely committed to monitoring and managing psychosocial health, supported by real data, not good intentions.

Implementing ISO 45003 with SolasOS

For medium-to-large enterprises, particularly in financial services, SolasOS provides a practical path to robust ISO 45003 compliance. Rather than doubling down on surveys and manual processes, you gain the ability to analyse your entire organisation's communication and emotional wellbeing in real time. You spot risks early, measure the effectiveness of your controls, and demonstrate continuous improvement.

The evidence collection for ISO 45003 shifts from labour-intensive to intelligent, from sporadic to continuous, from subjective to data-driven. Your compliance not only meets auditor expectations; it reflects genuine, ongoing commitment to worker wellbeing.

Start Your ISO 45003 Journey

If you're managing psychosocial risk in a medium-to-large enterprise, the question isn't whether you need ISO 45003 compliance; it's how you'll gather robust evidence that your risk management is effective. Solas Technologies' SolasOS platform automates the evidence collection that once consumed hours of HR and compliance time, giving you richer insights faster.

Ready to transform your ISO 45003 evidence collection? Contact Solas Technologies to learn how SolasOS can support your psychosocial risk management and keep your organisation compliant while genuinely improving worker wellbeing.