Australia at Work is being jointly funded by the Australian Research Council (ARC) and Unions NSW. The ARC is a statutory authority within the Australian Government's Education, Science and Training portfolio.

This project is a result of the ARC's Linkage Grant Scheme. The Linkage Project scheme supports collaborative research and development projects between higher education organisations and other organisations, so that advanced knowledge can be applied to practical problems. The Workplace Research Centre's linkage partner for the Australia at Work project is Unions NSW.

After the ACTU, Unions NSW is the largest organisation responsible for coordinating and representing unions' common interest in Australia. It is best understood as 'the union of unions' in NSW. Unions NSW has coordinated the funding contributions to the Australia at Work project made by various unions including the Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union (CFMEU) mining division, CFMEU ACT branch, NSW Nurses' Assosciation, Victorian branch of the Australian Nursing Federation, Shop, Distributive and Allied Employees Assosciation (SDA), and the Police Federation of Australia.

The research will help employers, government and unions better understand how working life is changing and the effect any changes are having on Australian workers. The project will also develop the unions' scholarly research capacity in their future. Unions NSW believes the research is important in helping them embrace an approach to policy development, implementation and evaluation that makes better use of empirical evidence in guiding decision making and improving the working lives of Australians.