Labour Relations Fundamentals for Human Resources Training Course

Course overview

Labour relations issues rarely arrive as neat policy questions. HR professionals must respond when a union requests recognition, employees raise a collective grievance, a manager proposes changes to terms and conditions, or bargaining reaches an impasse. Poorly handled consultation, inconsistent documentation, or an avoidable procedural error can damage trust, delay operational change, and expose the organisation to disputes. This course gives HR practitioners a structured way to manage these situations fairly, lawfully, and with a clear record of decisions.

Participants examine the labour relations framework from representation and collective bargaining through grievance handling, discipline, consultation, dispute resolution, and industrial action planning. They practise preparing bargaining mandates, analysing union proposals, using interest-based negotiation techniques, drafting consultation communications, and documenting cases for internal review or external proceedings. The course also addresses the respective roles of HR, line managers, employee representatives, unions, and senior leaders.

Instructor-led teaching is combined with realistic workplace cases, bargaining simulations, document reviews, and facilitated peer critique. Participants work with a labour relations case file throughout the week and leave with a practical Labour Relations Action Pack: a stakeholder map, bargaining preparation template, consultation plan, grievance investigation checklist, meeting-record format, and 90-day application plan tailored to their organisation. This makes the course suitable for professionals who need to move from supporting individual employee relations cases to managing collective workplace issues with greater confidence and control.

The programme is designed for intermediate HR and people-management professionals who already understand basic HR policies and now need a practical foundation in unionised or employee-representative environments.

Course objectives

By the end of this course, participants will be able to:

• Interpret core labour relations principles, including freedom of association, collective representation, good-faith bargaining, and procedural fairness
• Map labour relations stakeholders using an influence-interest matrix and engagement plan
• Prepare a collective bargaining mandate using issue logs, costed proposals, reservation points, and approval routes
• Apply interest-based negotiation techniques to respond to union claims and develop workable trade-offs
• Design a consultation process for organisational change, including timelines, representative meetings, communications, and records
• Investigate collective grievances using an evidence checklist, interview plan, findings format, and escalation criteria
• Document labour relations meetings through accurate agendas, minutes, action logs, and without-prejudice negotiation records
• Build a 90-day labour relations action plan that prioritises policy gaps, relationship risks, and management capability needs

Benefits of attending

Target competencies

Who should attend

• HR Business Partners — who advise managers on workforce change, union engagement, and employee-representative issues
• Employee Relations Specialists — who manage grievances, discipline, consultation, and collective dispute cases
• HR Managers — who need consistent processes for labour relations governance and escalation
• Industrial Relations Officers — who support bargaining preparation and union-management meetings
• People Operations Managers — who maintain employment policies and must coordinate representative consultation
• Line Managers in Unionised Workplaces — who lead teams affected by collective agreements or representative structures

Requirements and prerequisites

Participants should have working experience in an HR, people operations, employee relations, or line-management role and understand basic employment concepts such as contracts of employment, workplace policies, disciplinary procedures, grievances, and confidentiality. Familiarity with their organisation’s employee handbook, collective agreement, recognition arrangement, or consultation policy is useful but not essential. Participants should be able to read workplace case material and contribute to role-play discussions. No prior union-negotiation experience, legal qualification, specialist labour-law software, or advanced spreadsheet skills are required; this is a fundamentals course for practitioners entering labour relations work.

Training methodology

The course uses short instructor-led briefings to establish labour relations principles, followed by structured analysis of realistic case files. Participants assess recognition and consultation scenarios, prepare bargaining positions in small teams, negotiate against a union brief, and review grievance evidence using practical templates. Facilitated debriefs focus on the decisions, language, records, and escalation routes that make a process defensible. Each participant progressively assembles a Labour Relations Action Pack and completes an end-of-course application plan for a current or anticipated workplace issue.

Course outline

Day 1: Labour Relations Framework and Workplace Representation

• Purpose and scope of labour relations within the HR function
• Freedom of association and employee representation principles
• Trade union recognition models and representative structures
• Collective agreements, custom and practice, and workplace policies
• Roles of HR, line managers, unions, employee representatives, and senior leaders
• Labour relations risk indicators and early-warning signals
• Stakeholder influence-interest mapping for representative relationships

Workshop: Participants analyse a workplace representation case and produce a stakeholder map with engagement priorities and escalation risks.

Day 2: Collective Bargaining Preparation and Negotiation

• Bargaining cycles, bargaining units, and negotiating protocols
• Building a bargaining mandate and internal approval process
• Issue logs, proposal comparison tables, and negotiation trackers
• Costing pay, benefits, working-time, and productivity proposals
• Interest-based bargaining and positional bargaining techniques
• Reservation points, concessions, package deals, and settlement authority
• Meeting agendas, caucus planning, minutes, and action records

Workshop: Teams prepare a costed bargaining mandate and negotiate a first-round pay and working-time proposal against an employee-representative brief.

Day 3: Consultation, Organisational Change, and Communication

• Information-sharing and meaningful consultation requirements
• Consultation planning for restructuring, schedule changes, and policy revisions
• Representative briefing packs and management question-and-answer preparation
• Change-impact assessment for terms, conditions, and workforce groups
• Consultation timelines, milestones, feedback channels, and decision logs
• Managing disagreement while preserving representative relationships
• Drafting consultation communications and meeting follow-up notices

Workshop: Participants design a consultation plan for a proposed shift-pattern change and produce a representative briefing note, timeline, and action log.

Day 4: Collective Grievances, Discipline, and Dispute Resolution

• Distinguishing individual grievances from collective grievances
• Collective grievance intake, scoping, and terms of reference
• Evidence gathering, witness interviews, and confidentiality controls
• Procedural fairness and consistent treatment in disciplinary cases
• Mediation, conciliation, arbitration, and internal dispute-resolution routes
• Handling deadlock, impasse, and potential industrial action indicators
• Case files, findings reports, outcome letters, and appeal records

Workshop: Participants investigate a collective grievance case file and produce an evidence plan, findings structure, and recommended resolution route.

Day 5: Labour Relations Governance and Workplace Application

• Labour relations operating models and decision-rights matrices
• Policy audits for recognition, bargaining, consultation, and grievances
• Labour relations dashboards and recurring issue analysis
• Escalation thresholds for legal advice and senior leadership decisions
• Manager capability requirements for representative-facing conversations
• Relationship-building routines with unions and employee forums
• Ninety-day labour relations improvement planning

Workshop: Participants complete and present a 90-day Labour Relations Action Pack containing their stakeholder map, process improvements, priority risks, and implementation milestones.

Tools & standards covered

Microsoft Excel, Microsoft Word, ILO Convention No. 87, ILO Convention No. 98

A typical training day

Live online deliveries follow the same structure in the East Africa Time zone, with shorter screen blocks and longer breaks.

What the fee includes

How you can take this course

Certification

Participants who complete the full five days receive the Skillset Development Certificate of Completion, stating the course title, course code, dates and delivery format — suitable for professional-development records and employer reimbursement.

Frequently asked questions