Employment has changed in the past decades because the world has changed. We've entered a new era, an era where the work ethic of employees, and more often the thinking and ethics of employers are many times questioned.

             The Federal Program for Labor Management has started as a way to provide for employees' representation through chosen representatives, in collective bargaining with respect to personnel policies, practices and matters affecting working conditions. Also, it was created to ensure that employees who want to exercise this right and take an active part in this process have the chance to do so. .

             The contemporary challenges in labor relations and human resources management include the care for employee rights, disciplinary policies and procedures, alternative dispute-resolution procedures, organizational ethics in employee relations or governmental regulation of labor relations. Not less important issues regard the labor relations process, structures, functions, and leadership of labor unions, the bargaining process and trends in collective bargaining, the labor agreement and administration of the labor agreement. All these form a complex discipline with the sole aim to make work relations more efficient and satisfactory for both parts. Labor relations are an important topic of human resources management.

             The labor agreement is a contract between a organization's management structures and the its labor force, represented by unions, concerning aspects like wages, benefits and working conditions. Is comes in the form of written policies and procedures. The goal of this document is to create equitable work relations, in order to assure the workers' social protection, preventing or diminishing the conflicts of interests and avoiding strikes. All aspects of the labor-management relationship are dynamic. The agreement has the role to bridge the gap between the interests of both sides.