Understanding Employment Relations is for undergraduate and postgraduate industrial relations and employment relations students aspiring to, or holding, positions that involve the management of labour. The text addresses workplace governance under the Fair Work Act 2009, as well as the role of trade unions, employer associations, collective bargaining processes, and various laws pertaining to contracts of employment, equal opportunity and occupational health and safety. It also situates these players and processes within a unified theoretical framework and how industrial relations and human resource management practices can be combined.

Australia has one of the most legalistic industrial relations systems in the world: in recognition of Australia unique regulatory environment, employment law features prominently throughout the text to help students to understand the full panoply of laws and regulations governing workplace relations.