Hennings Lawyers Pty Ltd

ACN 672 714 813

Our Firm

Hennings Lawyers is a national law firm registered to provide legal services in all States and Territories of Australia.

Our firm is built on the unique experience of our people. Our founding principal played a key role in the creation of the Fair Work Act and a number of modern awards. He has appeared in a number of major industrial cases in the national industrial tribunal. He has an even more extensive track record of preventing industrial disputes and resolving complex workplace matters outside courts and tribunals.

We also utilise the expertise of a strong network of consultants, contractors and service providers. We leverage technology developed by our founding principal to enable us to deliver complex work in areas such as wage compliance without the need for a large team - a higher quality and speed of service at a lower cost.

We are passionate about helping our clients to solve a wide variety of industrial relations and employment law challenges, just some of which include:

  • enterprise agreements, bargaining and balloting

  • wage compliance, underpayments, backpay claims and remediation work

  • modern award interpretation and compliance

  • terms and conditions of employment (contracts, policies, procedures and other resources)

  • industrial disputes and individual claims or complaints

  • employee management and workplace investigations

  • representation in the Fair Work Commission and various courts

Tell us how we can help you

  • Cawley Hennings

    Cawley Hennings

    MANAGING PRINCIPAL

    Cawley was admitted as a lawyer in 2007. He was admitted as a legal practitioner of the High Court of Australia in 2009 and the High Court of New Zealand in 2023.

    Cawley’s passion for industrial relations is matched with almost 20 years of IR experience at leading industry associations, small to medium businesses, large corporations, government agencies and legal practices.

    He was a member of the National Workplace Relations Consultative Council and Committee on Industrial Legislation which were central to developing the Fair Work Act 2009. He was also involved in the award modernisation process in 2008, the process which developed the current modern awards.

    Cawley has achieved significant outcomes in a range of cases before industrial tribunals such as the Fair Work Commission and the NSW Industrial Relations Commission.

    He has appeared in three national wages cases, a number of significant industrial disputes and a wide variety of applications relating to unfair dismissals, general protections and employee disputes.

    Cawley is an experienced HR professional and has worked as an HR director, senior business partner, project and change manager.

    He also has significant experience solving issues relating to wage compliance, underpayments and remediation work.

    He also enjoys coding and app development. He designed and built CheckPay, a precise underpayment calculation and analysis app. He also designed and created iVOTEr, an enterprise agreement voting system.

    Cawley holds a Bachelor of Laws, Master of Laws and Executive Master of Business Administration. He enjoys photography, rail history, genealogy and piano.

    Cawley is the Managing Principal of Hennings Lawyers and has held a number of board-level appointments. He is a 2025 - 2026 Member of the Employment Law Committee of the Law Society of New South Wales. He is also a National Director at Pride in Law and a Member of the Reference Group of the Fair Work Commission’s Workplace Advice Service which offers pro bono advice and assistance to eligible employers and employees.