How SMEs Can Turn the Right to Disconnect Into a Talent Magnet

For Australian SMEs, the Right to Disconnect is a chance to reset boundaries, fight burnout, and win the war for talent.

For years smaller businesses have heavily relied on hustle, flexibility and out of work hours spent building close client relationships to compete. This always-on culture inevitably blurs the boundary between work and personal life, particularly in smaller teams where everyone wears multiple hats. Australia’s new Right to Disconnect laws were created to reset those boundaries.

What can sound like a speeding fine for smaller businesses that are trying to move fast and break stuff, but seen differently it’s actually a chance for small and medium-sized employers to stand out on retention.

What the Right to Disconnect law is, and what it isn’t

The Right to Disconnect laws, which have been in place for companies with 15 or more employees since 26 August 2024, started applying to small businesses (with fewer than 15 employees) from 26 August 2025

The laws give employees the right to refuse to monitor, read or respond to contact outside working hours, including attempted contact, unless refusing could be proven to be unreasonable. Factors for reasonableness include why the contact is happening, how disruptive it is, whether the employee is compensated to be available, the seniority of the role and the person’s circumstances, like caring responsibilities.

The Right to Disconnect doesn’t ban managers from contacting staff. It just says employees can refuse to engage with contact outside hours where refusal isn’t unreasonable, and it applies to contact from third parties about work, too. 

• It is: Your employees’ right to not reply to calls, emails, or messages outside their work hours, as long as it’s reasonable for them to say no.
• What it isn’t: The law looks at common-sense factors to decide what “reasonable” means in any role. Is it a real emergency? Are they paid to be on-call? How senior is their role? What’s their personal situation (e.g., family duties)?

What happens if an employer ignores the Right to Disconnect Laws

The law is now a protected workplace right under the Fair Work Act. That means if an employee is disadvantaged because they exercised it, the business could face general protections claims, including penalties. 

If there’s a dispute about whether after-hours contact is reasonable, it must first be tried internally. If unresolved, the Fair Work Commission can step in, hold hearings, and issue legally binding “stop” orders to prevent unreasonable conduct from either side.

For SMEs, the risk isn’t just legal. Ignoring the law can fuel churn in already tight labour markets. Anthony, who works for a digital publisher with only eight staff, says he is contacted after hours, “Constantly. It’s awful and a lot of people have left. I think the lines of what was okay got really confused during lockdown when we were all just working 24/7, and things never went back.”

According to data from the Centre for Future Work unpaid overtime dropped over 33 percent after Right to Disconnect laws came into effect, from 5.4 to 3.6 hours/week of unpaid work on average. Before the change, the average worker was estimated to do around 280 hours of unpaid overtime per year.

Switching off helps keep people switched on

Employment Hero’s Annual Jobs Report revealed that across Australia, New Zealand, the UK and Canada, 38 percent report working extra hours and one in three hold more than one job. More than half of respondents said they would choose a job they saw as having less pressure. In a market where everyone’s feeling stressed and overworked, championing this law can help build the kind of workplace culture that keeps good people around.

Caitlin, who works at a Sydney SaaS startup, says her team has already adopted the principle: “We have quite a few staff offshore so it’s not uncommon for Slack chats to go into the night. If it’s serious I’ll jump on, but usually I just mute Slack once I wrap up. The system is that we only email if it’s important, so if you get an email you know it’s worth looking at.”

She adds that her current employer’s stance on time off is a big shift from her last job: “My previous boss would be messaging us until 11pm at night multiple times a week. She openly praised people for answering after hours and made comments about people who didn’t. That was the exact reason I left.”

Businesses that have already embraced the Right to Disconnect are reporting happier, more productive teams and lower stress levels. By simply respecting the boundary between work and home life, you’re building loyalty and showing your team you value them as people.

Sam Sidney, founder of Melbourne social agency Milkbar Digital, says setting limits is already part of how they work with clients: “We intentionally do not share personal phone numbers with clients and put in guardrails to ensure communication is done in respect to working hours.”

She believes SMEs that get ahead of the law can turn it into a magnet for talent: “Particularly in an industry like ours where top talent is highly competitive, it’s important that there are clear boundaries. That’s why we also offer our team members Disconnection Days each quarter – an additional paid day of leave to give them some extra breathing space.”

How SMEs can make Right to Disconnect work for them

So how do SMEs get value out of the new guardrails? set expectations and reward availability when you truly need it, and protect the quiet hours that make the busy ones productive.

1. Publish ‘contact windows’ and escalation rules – Make it explicit what counts as urgent and who is on point after hours. 
2. Roster availability and pay for it: Rotate on-call duties with allowances or TOIL. This ticks the legal box and shows fairness.
3. Use your tools better: Encourage scheduled send, quiet hours and auto-replies so clients know when to expect a response.
4. Update contracts, policies and inductions: Add clear Right to Disconnect clauses and rehearse scenarios in manager training.
5. Measure the upside: Track sick leave, turnover and after-hours message volume. Expect calmer comms and sharper focus.

The Right to Disconnect creates guardrails; it’s not a handbrake on hustle. In a labour market where 57 percent of Australians value security over ambition, honouring basic boundaries can help you create the kind of culture edge that keeps good people around for longer.