2025 in Review: and what 2026 is set to deliver
- Tim Dive
- 9 minutes ago
- 3 min read
Author: Tim Dive, Director
This past year hasn’t just been hard, it’s been a relentless grind for small and medium-sized businesses across Australia. From ever-growing compliance pressure to regulators pushing ideological agendas, 2025 delivered blow after blow to employers who are simply trying to create jobs, pay wages, and run a business that matters.
In Episode 090 of The HR Cartel Podcast, I took the gloves off and broke down exactly what happened in 2025, what it meant for employers, and what 2026 is likely to bring. If you’ve been feeling the weight of it all, trust me, you're not imagining it.
2025: A Year of Coordinated Attacks on Business
The overarching theme of 2025? Coordination.
Across unions, tribunals, regulators, and even segments of the legal profession, we’ve witnessed what looks and feels like a targeted effort to paint businesses as the enemy.
Rather than addressing real workplace issues through meaningful reform or dialogue, the system has defaulted to vilifying employers.
If you're a small business owner, you've probably been told in 15 different ways this year that you're not doing enough, not compliant enough, and not trustworthy enough to manage your own workforce, even when you’re bending over backwards to do the right thing.
The System Has Lost Touch With Reality
We now have decisions being handed down that outright ignore what life looks like for employers on the ground. Legal interpretations that suggest annualised salaries must be reconciled pay-period-by-pay-period, regardless of actual award flexibility are not just unhelpful, they are dangerous.
The people writing these laws and decisions often have no understanding of payroll, cashflow, staffing, rostering, or day-to-day operations. Yet they’re setting the rules that make those very things harder and riskier to manage.
Why More Employers Are Checking Out
One of the big themes I raised in this episode was that good employers are starting to disengage. They’re checking out. They’re saying, “We tried, we did the right thing, and we still get flogged, so what’s the point?”
This is a serious concern. Because when small business owners no longer trust the system, they stop investing in it. They stop hiring. They stop offering above-award conditions.
They put up walls and go into protection mode. And it’s the staff, the culture, and the country that suffers for it.
2026: What’s Coming (and What We Should Prepare For)
Looking ahead, 2026 will be no different unless employers get coordinated.
We can expect:
More "reforms" that actually just redistribute power to unions and regulators.
Increased cost of compliance, especially in wage and award interpretation.
A continued push toward employee entitlement that leaves zero room for nuance or business discretion.
Workplace psychological safety being used as a tool for control, rather than a path to healthier work environments.
It’s not all doom and gloom but we’ve got to stay sharp. We’ve got to arm ourselves with facts, not fear. And most importantly, we’ve got to work together and push back when fairness is removed from the industrial landscape.
The HR Cartel’s Stand: Real Talk, Real Advocacy
This episode isn’t just a rant. It’s a call to arms for business owners and operators who care. We’re not here to make enemies of workers, we’re here to build better workplaces.
But we can’t do that while being treated as if we’re guilty until proven innocent.
The HR Cartel will continue to lead the fight, for employers.