NSWBusiness StudiesSyllabus dot point

What are the key influences on human resource management?

Stakeholders - employers, employees, employer associations, unions, government organisations, society; legal - the current legal framework (employment contracts, awards, minimum employment standards, enterprise agreements, work health and safety, anti-discrimination, EEO); economic; technological; social - changing work patterns, living standards; ethics and corporate social responsibility

A focused answer to the HSC Business Studies dot point on key influences on HRM. Stakeholders, the Australian legal framework (Fair Work Act, NES, awards, enterprise agreements, WHS, anti-discrimination), economic and technological influences, social trends and CSR, with worked examples from Qantas, the BHP enterprise agreement and Atlassian.

Generated by Claude OpusReviewed by Better Tuition Academy10 min answerUpdated 2026-05-20

Have a quick question? Jump to the Q&A page

Quick answer

Six influences on HRM in the syllabus - stakeholders (employers, employees, employer associations, unions, government, society), legal (Fair Work Act, NES, awards, enterprise agreements, WHS, anti-discrimination, EEO, Closing Loopholes), economic (labour market, inflation, skills, globalisation), technological (automation, HR tech, remote-work tech), social (hybrid work, demographics, diversity expectations), ethics and CSR (modern slavery, gender pay equity, Indigenous employment, wellbeing). The legal framework is the most-examined subset - the NES, BOOT-tested enterprise agreements, the Closing Loopholes "same job same pay" reforms, and state WHS are all required content. Apply with a real Australian business such as Qantas's labour-hire response or BHP's BMA enterprise-agreement negotiation.

What this dot point is asking

NESA wants you to identify the six categories of influence on HRM (stakeholders, legal, economic, technological, social, ethics/CSR), explain what each contributes, and apply them to a real Australian business. The legal framework is by far the most-examined subset; have the Fair Work Act and the NES rock solid.

The answer

Stakeholder influences

Stakeholders are the parties with an interest in HRM decisions.

Employers. Set strategic direction, allocate the HR budget, and ultimately control hiring and firing.
Employees. Bring skills, expectations and (collectively) bargaining power.
Employer associations (Australian Industry Group, Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry, BCA). Lobby on industrial relations policy, represent employers in award reviews.
Unions. Negotiate enterprise agreements, lobby government, represent members in disputes. Major unions in HSC examples include the SDA (retail), ASU (services), AMWU (manufacturing), NTEU (universities) and the MUA/CFMEU/MEU (mining, maritime, construction).
Government organisations. Fair Work Commission (the workplace relations tribunal), Fair Work Ombudsman (enforcement), Safe Work Australia (model WHS law), state WHS regulators.
Society. Broader expectations about ethical employment, modern slavery in supply chains, gender pay equity, Indigenous employment, climate action.

Legal framework

The most-examined category. Get this rock solid.

Fair Work Act 2009. The umbrella federal law governing employment in the national workplace relations system (covering most Australian employees).

National Employment Standards (NES). Ten minimum standards that apply to every employee in the system. Cannot be reduced by award or enterprise agreement.

NES standard	Headline detail
Maximum weekly hours	38 hours plus reasonable additional
Right to request flexible work	Parents, carers, 55+, family violence
Parental leave	12 months unpaid, with 12 months extension on request
Annual leave	4 weeks per year (5 for shift workers)
Personal/carer's and compassionate leave	10 days personal/carer's, 2 days compassionate
Community service leave	Jury duty and emergency services
Long service leave	Set by state long service leave laws
Public holidays	Right to be absent and to refuse unreasonable work
Notice and redundancy	Notice scaled with service; redundancy pay scaled
Information statements	Fair Work and Casual Employment statements

Awards: Industry- or occupation-specific minimum standards above the NES. Modern Awards cover most industries (Retail, Hospitality, Manufacturing, Banking and Finance, General Retail).
Enterprise agreements: Negotiated collectively between an employer and its employees (often with union representation) for an agreement period (commonly 3-4 years). Must pass the Fair Work Commission's "better off overall test" (BOOT) compared to the underlying award.
Work Health and Safety: State-based WHS Acts based on the Model WHS Act. Duty to provide a safe workplace, consult workers on WHS, manage hazards. Maximum penalties for serious breaches include imprisonment for officers. Workers' compensation insurance is mandatory.
Anti-discrimination and EEO: Federal and state laws prohibit discrimination on protected grounds (age, sex, race, religion, disability, sexual orientation, marital status, pregnancy, family responsibilities). Equal Employment Opportunity (EEO) obligations exist for larger employers.
Recent legislation: The Fair Work Legislation Amendment (Closing Loopholes No. 1 and 2) Acts of 2023 and 2024 introduced "same job same pay" (labour-hire workers must be paid no less than directly-employed equivalents under the host enterprise agreement), a new definition of casual employment, regulated minimum standards for road-transport contractors and "employee-like" gig workers, and changes to sham contracting penalties.

Economic influences

The state of the economy materially shapes HRM.

Labour market tightness. Low unemployment (Australia in 2022-2023 ran around 3.5 percent unemployment, near 50-year lows) raises wages and reduces employer bargaining power. The labour market has loosened slightly in 2024-2025 as RBA rate rises cool the economy.
Inflation and cost of living. High CPI inflation pressures wage demands. The Fair Work Commission's annual wage review explicitly considers cost-of-living impact.
Skill shortages. Identified through the Jobs and Skills Australia Skills Priority List. Affects nursing, engineering, ICT, construction trades, and aged care.
Globalisation. Offshoring and migration policies (the post-Covid skilled migration recovery, the 2023-2024 visa-system reforms) shape labour supply.

Technological influences

Automation. Coles's automated DCs, ATM and self-checkout deployments, AI-driven document processing in legal and accounting. Each reshapes the workforce.
HR technology. Cloud HR platforms (Workday, SAP SuccessFactors, Employment Hero) digitise recruitment, performance management and engagement. AI-assisted screening (used by Hudson, Hays and others) speeds candidate triage.
Remote and hybrid work technology. Zoom, Microsoft Teams, Slack and the Atlassian product suite are the enabling layer for distributed work.

Social influences

Changing work patterns. Hybrid and remote work post-Covid; rising labour-force participation by women and over-55s; growth of casual, contracting and gig work.
Living standards and demographic shift. The ageing workforce, increased focus on workplace wellbeing, mental-health awareness, increased focus on First Nations employment.
Generational expectations. Gen Z and younger millennials prioritise purpose, flexibility and development; older workers prioritise security and progression.
Diversity and inclusion expectations. Society and customers expect employers to make tangible diversity progress on gender, race, sexual orientation and disability.

Ethics and corporate social responsibility

CSR in HRM goes beyond legal compliance.

Modern slavery in supply chains. The Modern Slavery Act 2018 requires reporting; ethical businesses actively audit suppliers (Bunnings, Wesfarmers, Woolworths all publish modern slavery statements).
Gender pay equity. The Workplace Gender Equality Agency (WGEA) reports public pay-gap data for employers with 100+ employees from FY24 onwards. Public reporting raises the reputational stakes.
Indigenous employment and Reconciliation Action Plans. Many large employers (BHP, Wesfarmers, Telstra, ANZ) publish RAPs with measurable Indigenous-employment targets.
Wellbeing and mental health. Programs beyond the legal floor - EAP access, mental-health-first-aid training, leadership training on psychological safety.

Worked example

"Assess two influences on the HRM of a large Australian business. (8 marks)"

Plan. Pick Qantas; cover the legal influence and the social influence (changing work patterns).

Intro. Qantas has around 25,000 employees across Australia, the US, the UK, and Asia. Two influences have most shaped its recent HRM - the Australian legal framework (especially post the Closing Loopholes Acts) and changing work patterns post-Covid.

Legal influence. The 2023 Federal Court case in which the High Court upheld the original Federal Court ruling that Qantas had unlawfully outsourced 1,700 baggage handlers in 2020 has reshaped Qantas's HRM. Damages settlements approached $120 million by 2024. The Closing Loopholes Act 2023 "same job same pay" provisions now require labour-hire workers used at Qantas to be paid no less than directly-employed equivalents. Qantas HR has rebuilt its outsourcing decision-process to incorporate higher legal review and stakeholder consultation.

Social influence. Hybrid and remote work expectations have reshaped Qantas's corporate-office workforce. The Mascot head office runs a 3-day in-office policy; technical functions (pilots, cabin crew, engineers) cannot work remotely but back-office and IT roles can. The HRM consequence is a redesigned performance-management framework focused on outcomes rather than presence, plus continued investment in collaboration technology.

Assessment. The legal influence has imposed direct cost and process change - the $120 million settlement and ongoing labour-hire model redesign. The social influence is shaping employer branding and competition for talent against tech employers like Atlassian and Canva. Both influences require continuous monitoring; the legal landscape is evolving (Closing Loopholes Acts, gender-pay-gap reporting) and social expectations on flexibility are not reverting to a pre-Covid baseline.

Common traps

Listing legal instruments without explaining what they require: Marks come from explaining the NES, the BOOT test, or the Closing Loopholes provisions, not just naming them.
Forgetting state-based WHS law: WHS is state-based but harmonised. New South Wales businesses sit under the NSW WHS Act; Queensland under the QLD WHS Act; all derived from the Model WHS Act.
Using outdated terminology: It is the Fair Work Act (2009), not WorkChoices (2005, repealed). Awards exist under the Modern Award system.
Conflating EEO with anti-discrimination: Anti-discrimination is the prohibition; EEO is the positive obligation to promote equal opportunity. Both exist; they are not identical.
Generic stakeholder lists: Markers want stakeholders with influence and worked examples - "the SDA negotiated the 2024 Coles enterprise agreement" not "unions are a stakeholder".

Past exam questions, worked

Real questions from past NESA papers on this dot point, with our answer explainer.

2023 HSC6 marksExplain how the Australian legal framework influences human resource management.

Show worked answer →

A 6-mark answer needs the key legal instruments, what they require, and a worked example.

The framework: Federal employment law sits in the Fair Work Act 2009. WHS sits in state-based Acts modelled on the Model WHS Act. Anti-discrimination sits in the Australian Human Rights Commission Act and state equivalents. Modern slavery reporting sits in the Modern Slavery Act 2018.
NES (National Employment Standards): Ten minimum standards that apply to every employee in the national system - maximum weekly hours, requests for flexible work, parental leave, annual leave, personal/carer's and compassionate leave, community service leave, long service leave, public holidays, notice of termination and redundancy pay, and the information statements. The NES is the floor.
Awards: Industry- or occupation-specific minimum standards above the NES (General Retail Industry Award, Manufacturing Award, Hospitality Industry General Award). Set minimum wages, classifications, allowances and penalty rates.
Enterprise agreements: Collectively negotiated between an employer and its employees (often via a union). Must pass the FWC's BOOT test (better off overall than the award). Once approved, the agreement replaces the award for the relevant employees.
WHS, anti-discrimination, EEO: Mandatory obligations to provide a safe workplace, prevent discrimination on protected grounds, and promote equal employment opportunity.
Worked example: BHP's 2023-2024 BMA enterprise-agreement renegotiation set wages and conditions for around 7,000 coal-operations employees in Central Queensland. The agreement passed BOOT against the Black Coal Mining Industry Award. Negotiations covered base pay, roster patterns and the use of labour-hire workers - the last contentious under the "same job same pay" reforms of the 2023 Closing Loopholes Act.

Markers reward (1) the major legal instruments named, (2) what each requires, (3) a worked example showing the framework in action.

2018 HSC4 marksOutline two social influences on HRM and explain how a business has responded to each.

Show worked answer →

A 4-mark answer needs two distinct social influences and the business response to each.

1. Changing work patterns - the shift to hybrid and remote work. The Covid-19 disruption accelerated a trend toward hybrid work that has not reversed. White-collar employees now expect 2-3 days of remote work per week as a default; mandating 5-day office attendance has become an employer-branding liability.

Business response: Atlassian formalised its "Team Anywhere" policy in 2021, allowing employees to work from anywhere within their existing country. Office attendance became opt-in for most roles. HRM redesigned performance management around outcomes rather than presence.

2. Living standards and cost of living - the wage and benefit response. The 2022-2024 RBA rate-rise cycle and high cost-of-living inflation put real wages under pressure. Workers responded by demanding higher base pay and a wider set of benefits.

Business response: many large Australian employers have offered larger nominal wage increases, cost-of-living payments and expanded benefits (paid parental leave extensions, additional annual leave purchase, wellbeing budgets). The 2023-2024 BHP, Woolworths and ANZ enterprise-agreement renegotiations all included larger than usual nominal wage increases.

Markers reward two distinct social influences and a clearly linked business response in each case.