By Greg Allan, tradesman and creator of Data First Coaching
Which award covers the staff of a landscaping business in Australia?
Most landscaping crews are covered by the Gardening and Landscaping Services Award 2020 (MA000101). The Gardening and Landscaping Award page says this award covers employers throughout Australia in the gardening and landscaping services industry and their employees, to the exclusion of any other modern award, once the right classification is found.
The award summary lists who it is built for: general labourers, experienced plant and turf maintenance staff, mower and edger operators, tradespersons, employees with a Certificate III in Parks and Gardens, Landscaping and Greenkeeping, and horticulture specialists. In plain terms, that is the design and construct crew, the paving and retaining wall gang, the turf and irrigation installers, and the maintenance round staff doing softscape and hardscape work.
What if some of our crew don't fit neatly under that award?
A landscaping business rarely runs one kind of work, and the award does not cover everyone on the books the same way. A business doing paving one week and a design and construct build the next can have staff sitting under more than one award depending on the job.
Admin and clerical staff who answer the phone and manage the calendar are not covered by the Gardening and Landscaping Award at all, as the Fair Work Ombudsman's own guide on choosing the right award sets out, since a different award covers that kind of office work. Arborists and tree crews can sit under the Gardening and Landscaping Award if their employer is in that industry, or under a different award if the main job is clearing vegetation around powerlines, according to the Fair Work Ombudsman's arborist coverage page. Bush regeneration work can sit under the Silviculture Award if it is done in forests, or the Gardening and Landscaping Award for other bush regeneration, as the bush regeneration page explains.
When landscaping work is part of a bigger building job, the Building and Construction Award can apply instead, since that award covers site clearance, earthmoving and landscaping work tied to a general building and construction project. Some states also run their own system: in Western Australia, businesses in the state industrial relations system can sit under the state's own Landscape Gardening Industry Award rather than the national one.
Why does knowing the award matter more than just paying the minimum?
The award tells a landscaper the floor, not whether the business is actually covering that cost on every job. A landscaping business running a paving crew, a turf and irrigation install team, a design and construct crew and a maintenance round all at once is paying very different labour mixes against very different job types, and the award does not sort that out for anyone.
The number that actually tells the truth is gross profit margin, tracked job by job and month by month rather than worked out once at quoting stage. If award wages for the paving crew, the maintenance round and the design and construct team are not landing against the right job in the books, every quote can look like it is making money right up until the quiet winter or the wet season hits and the bank balance says something different.
How do seasonal swings change what the crew is actually costing you?
You feel this hardest at the exact time demand and pricing power are highest. Spring and summer design and construct and paving work push crews harder, and when that pressure runs unmanaged, burnout, slower output and sick days follow right when the maintenance round and the install jobs are both calling for hands.
That is why demand and pricing need to move together. When demand is high and the billable days in front of your crew are low, pricing has to cover that gap rather than assume the crew will simply absorb the extra hours.
Picture a design and construct landscaper who had been running two qualified tradespeople on every paving and retaining wall job, which was a costly way to staff the work. Restructuring the crew so one qualified tradesperson works alongside a second-year apprentice, instead of a second qualified tradesperson, is the kind of change that shows up first in the job data, not in a feeling about how busy the yard looks. A business moving from one crew to several crews is also the point where this kind of staffing choice stops being a one-off decision and starts being a structure the business needs to repeat on every site.
Finding and keeping good people through those seasonal swings is its own fight. A generic job ad competes with every other landscaper's generic job ad, and the businesses that keep crews steady through the busy paving season and the quiet maintenance months tend to be the ones whose listing actually stands out.
How can AI agents help a landscaper keep track of award coverage and labour cost?
An AI agent is software that does a job the way you would do it yourself, using your prices, your wording and your rules. For a landscaper, that can mean an agent that holds crew classifications against the right award, tracks hours across the paving, turf, irrigation and maintenance round jobs, and flags when a wage has landed against the wrong job before it gets buried in overhead.
This is the data first point: that kind of checking done from the actual job and payroll data each week beats doing it from memory at the end of a quarter, because the crew mix on a design and construct job changes with every site, every season and every new apprentice on the tools.
Where can you check the current rules?
- Gardening and Landscaping Award and its summary: covers paving, turf, irrigation, design and construct and maintenance round staff in most states.
- Fair Work Ombudsman's coverage guide: how to work out award coverage when a business has mixed staff, including admin.
- Building and Construction Award summary: covers landscaping work tied to a wider building project.
- Arborist coverage page and bush regeneration coverage page: cover tree work and bush regeneration specifically.
- Western Australia's Landscape Gardening Industry Award summary: covers businesses that remain in the state industrial relations system.
This is general information, not legal, tax or employment advice. Check your own situation with the body named here or a qualified adviser.
How does Data First Coaching approach this?
Data First Coaching does not start with the clause number, it starts with the owner's own job and payroll data through the Trade Business Intelligence, because the real exposure is rarely the award itself, it is whether the wage attached to the paving crew, the turf install or the maintenance round is sitting against the right job and the right margin. Greg Allan teaches that “prices go up when there’s a high demand and low supply”, and a landscaper's quoting only holds up through a busy spring or a quiet winter if that pricing logic is built into the numbers, not assumed. The how, built from each member's own data, is worked through inside the Academy, among owners who are open minded, innovative and willing to share, because the Trade Business Intelligence is powered by every member.
Looking for a business coach who starts from your numbers? Landscaper Business Coach or every answer for landscapers.
