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Office Ergonomics and Workstation Safety

A practical guide to setting up and using a computer workstation safely, whether in the office or at home. Learn how to adjust your chair, desk, monitor and input devices, manage the risks of sedentary work and eye strain, understand how WHS duties apply to working from home and why reporting discomfort early matters.
Also relevant for: Office and Professional
What You Will Learn
- Set up a chair, desk, monitor, keyboard and mouse using accepted ergonomic principles
- Identify the health risks of prolonged sitting and apply practical strategies to build movement into the workday
- Recognise the causes of digital eye strain and apply sensible screen-break habits
- Explain how WHS duties apply when working from home and what a home workstation check should cover
- Describe why early reporting of discomfort prevents serious musculoskeletal injury
Course Content
- Fit the work to the person, not the person to the work
- By the end of this course, you'll be able to:
- Body stressing is Australia's single biggest cause of serious injury claims
- Five things about desk work quietly damage the body
- The law makes desk-work health your employer's duty, not just your posture problem
- Which law sits behind the ergonomics duty
- The good news: almost every office risk is cheap to control
- Set the chair first, then bring everything else to match it
- Adjust the chair in five moves, top to bottom
- Your elbows should meet the desk at roughly the desk's height
- Arrange your desk by how far you reach for each item
- A sit-stand desk only helps if you actually alternate
- Set the monitor so your eyes fall just below the top of the screen
- Two screens need the same height and distance so your neck stops readjusting
- Keep the keyboard flat and your wrists straight and floating
- A laptop is portable, but the screen and keyboard fight each other
- Even a perfect workstation can't make eight motionless hours safe
- Build movement in with natural triggers, not willpower
- Frequent short breaks protect you more than rare long ones
- Screens tire your eyes two ways: focusing strain and a dropped blink rate
- Protect your eyes with the 20-20-20 habit and a few extras
- Your movement break and your eye break are the same break
- When you work from home, your home office becomes a workplace
- How the working-from-home duty applies where you work
- Good working-from-home arrangements share five ingredients
- MSDs almost always announce themselves early, while they're still easy to fix
- Report a discomfort pattern the moment you notice it
- Now put it all together on a real hybrid week
- The five habits that prevent most desk-work injuries
Who This Course Is For
Office-based employees, hybrid and remote workers, managers of desk-based teams and anyone who spends significant time at a computer.
Written by Kam Askari, Managing Director of Creative Directions Management Consulting Pty Ltd, ISO 9001, ISO 14001 and ISO 45001 Lead Auditor. MBA, Graduate Diploma in Occupational Health and Safety, MAICD. Checked against the sources listed below.
Sources and Legal References
This course is aligned to 19 official sources. Legal and regulatory references checked between 31 August 2026 and 1 November 2026.
Sources and Further Reading
This course draws on the following official sources. Always rely on the current version on the regulator’s website.
- LegislationWork Health and Safety Act 2011 (Cth)As at 31/08/2026
- LegislationWork Health and Safety Act 2011 (NSW)As at 31/08/2026
- LegislationWork Health and Safety Act 2011 (Qld)As at 31/08/2026
- LegislationWork Health and Safety Act 2020 (WA)As at 31/08/2026
- LegislationWork Health and Safety Act 2012 (SA)As at 31/08/2026
- LegislationWork Health and Safety Act 2012 (Tas)As at 31/08/2026
- LegislationWork Health and Safety Act 2011 (ACT)As at 31/08/2026
- LegislationWork Health and Safety (National Uniform Legislation) Act 2011 (NT)As at 31/08/2026
- LegislationOccupational Health and Safety Act 2004 (Vic)As at 31/08/2026
- Regulator guidanceSafe Work Australia, Sitting and standingAs at 31/08/2026
- Regulator guidanceSafe Work Australia, Working from homeAs at 31/08/2026
- LegislationWork Health and Safety Regulation 2011 (ACT)As at 31/10/2026
- LegislationWork Health and Safety Regulation 2025 (NSW)As at 01/11/2026
- LegislationWork Health and Safety (National Uniform Legislation) Regulations 2011 (NT)As at 31/10/2026
- LegislationWork Health and Safety Regulation 2011 (Qld)As at 31/10/2026
- LegislationWork Health and Safety Regulations 2012 (SA)As at 13/09/2026
- LegislationWork Health and Safety Regulations 2022 (Tas)As at 31/10/2026
- LegislationOccupational Health and Safety Regulations 2017 (Vic)As at 01/11/2026
- LegislationWork Health and Safety (General) Regulations 2022 (WA)As at 31/10/2026
Always rely on the current version on the regulator’s website.
Seven day refund if you have not started
Or
For employers and teams
Buy Seats for Your Team
$39.00 per seat, inc GST
Total inc GST$195.00
Or
What You Get
Certificate of Completion
This is to certify that
has successfully completed
All learning modules and the final assessment
Kam Askari
Director, Creative Directions Management Consulting Pty Ltd
This is a certificate of completion of a non-accredited professional development course. It is not a nationally recognised qualification, a VET statement of attainment, a competency card, a licence, or evidence of competency. It is issued by Creative Directions Management Consulting Pty Ltd, which is not a Registered Training Organisation.
Sample layout. Certificate ID WP-SAMPLE-0001 verifies as Hazardous Manual Tasks and Manual Handling Safety.
- Certificate verified by its ID
- 100% online, self-paced
- Six months of access
Bought for yourself: six months of access from the day you pay. Team seat: six months from the day the worker activates their code.
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