Human Resource Management and Business Law

Human resource management and business law is a degree that combines two disciplines that are tightly connected in professional practice. Every employment relationship, from recruitment to disciplinary action, operates within a legal framework, and HR professionals who understand that framework in depth are more effective, less exposed to risk and better able to advise their organisations. Business law provides the analytical foundations in contract, employment, equality and commercial law that underpin how organisations function legally.

Human resource management develops your understanding of recruitment, training, performance management, organisational development and the strategic dimensions of managing people.

At Strathclyde, this four-year full-time programme includes a year abroad, giving you international academic experience and a broader perspective on how employment law and HR practice differ across national contexts. The programme covers areas including recruitment and selection, training and development and conflict management at work, alongside the legal frameworks that govern employment relationships and commercial life in the UK and internationally. You will develop both the legal reasoning skills of business law and the practical management knowledge of HRM, graduating with a combination that is genuinely distinctive in the job market.

You will study Scots law, with its distinctive features, alongside the HRM disciplines, developing your ability to navigate the legal and professional dimensions of managing people in organisations of different sizes and types.

Graduates are well placed for careers in human resources, employment law, people management, recruitment, organisational development, trade union work, equality and diversity roles and management consulting. The combination of legal and HR knowledge is particularly valued by organisations that need HR professionals who can operate confidently within legal frameworks. Postgraduate study in HRM, employment law or business is a natural option.