Guest writer: Pamela Park

Well done to Debbie for volunteering at the Silver Surfers Day in Antrim library last Friday. I am sure you’ll have made a huge difference to each individual in enabling them access the net. We’ll watch out for them on Twitter and Facebook. Who knows they may even start their own blog!

This week is gonna be as blustery as the weather, as there’s yet another busy week ahead.

Our CEO Barry has internal meetings all day today until 4p.m. after which he will be attending a Mediation Symposium at the Law Society HQ in Belfast.

On Tuesday he's pulling out all the stops to do a whole load of "speed networking" meeting first his old chum Colin Daly at the Northside Community Law Centre in Dublin. Thereafter he's visiting Lemans Solicitors in Dublin 2 to talk about some new education seminars. He's meeting Liz Ryan of Mason Hayes for lunch. After that he's off to Eversheds for a meeting with David Fagan finishing with a quick coffee at the offices of O'Rourke Reid to see star performer Killian O'Reilly. He's then shooting up the motorway to meet top Legal-Island speaker Paul Joyce off the train before taking him to dinner in Antrim.

On Wednesday he's meeting David Brazier from Teamsolutions about our new conference software.

On Thursday he's meeting Kat Hinfey from Carecall for breakfast, Stella Gilmartin later that day to chat about mediation developments and Pamela Woods later that evening to talk about changes to child protection legislation.

On Friday he's attending an Annual Review Conference meeting where we'll be brainstorming what goes in our flagship event later this year. Phew!

Jayne our Managing Director has her usual internal meetings today. Tomorrow she will be carrying out interviews for an Intern with Ainsley, our Marketing Manager. On Friday she’ll be getting her thinking cap on when she joins our managers in a meeting to discuss ideas for our Annual Review of Employment Law Conference which will take place in Belfast and Dublin later this year.

Scott who is our Head of Training and Development is meeting Tanya Kennedy from BITC on Tuesday and is in Dublin on Wednesday networking and on Thursday chairing our ‘Hot Topics’ event at ByrneWallace offices, Dublin.

Apart from interviewing for an Intern, Ainsley our Marketing Manager is also meeting Andrew Cuthbert from Omnisoft on Thursday to discuss social media software and how it can be used by Legal-Island.

Kerry, Conference Manager for Northern Ireland is meeting with Olive McCartney from the Antrim Civic Centre on Tuesday. She will be hosting both the Understanding Irish Employment Law at the Hilton, Belfast on Wednesday and the second day of our Internal Mediation course on Thursday in the Legal-Island Training Centre.

On Thursday morning, alongside Donna, Office Manager, she will be attending Ballycraigy Primary school to present certificates in their morning assembly to all the pupils who participated in the 10 week hockey programme which was one of our volunteer projects this year.

Kerry would like to take this opportunity to say a very well done to both teams who played in the Antrim sixes tournament last week. And an extra special congratulations to the boys team who lifted the Plate on the day!!

Heather, Conference Manager for Republic of Ireland is meeting Hilary Dickson from Business in the Community (BITC) later today and on Thursday she’ll be hosting our ‘Hot Topics’ event at ByrneWallace offices, Dublin.

Peter, Marketing Officer is attending a Northern Ireland Chamber of Commerce ‘Sponsorship and Advertising Opportunities’ seminar at the Fitzwilliam Hotel, Belfast on Tuesday and volunteering with the Ballycraigy Primary School footballers on Wednesday afternoon.

This week I’ll be completing my volunteering day at T.A.C.T. which is the Talnotry Avian Care Trust based in Crumlin. They rescue sick, injured and abandoned wild birds and animals and currently have over 350 long term animals in their care. They receive no Government funding so I am sure my time here will be well spent.

Enjoy your week!

Guest Writer: Scott

On Tuesday Scott will be helping on the Learn to Earn programme as part of our volunteering work with Young Enterprise NI: He'll be based in Parkhall College, Antrim, for the day.

On Thursday he turns trainer and will be facilitating sessions, along with Lorraine Toolan of the EEF, on discipline and underperformance at work.

He'll be leaving early on Friday to go to Scotland to get his eldest daughter, Catriona, from university. Do you remember when summer holidays seemed to last forever?

Barry the CEO has an easy enough early part of the week with nothing more than internal meetings planned until jetting off to London for a couple of days on Wednesday. In the big smoke he's attending a conference delivered by Peter Thompson. He's also meeting a representative at Squires Saunders Hammonds and then Colin Carrol for drinks and a chat Wednesday evening. On Friday he's with coach Richard O'Rawe in the morning and has an "Ompa lumpa" lunchtime meeting on Friday.

Ainsley will be at Ballycraigy Primary School on Wednesday afternoon coaching the kids football and then on Thursday afternoon he will be meeting Cleo Devaney from Tibus to discuss our website.

Pamela will be attending a National Training Awards Information Seminar at DEL Offices in Belfast from 8.30-10am this Wednesday. We are not entering the awards this year but it is all for preparation for an application in 2012.

Donna is in charge of the de-clutter day in the office this Tuesday.

On Friday Debbie will be volunteering at Antrim Library, helping out by teaching basic computer skills at the Silver Surfers’ Day.

Heather will be attending the following women in business event on Thursday: WIB NI BUSINESS FORUM 2011

Jayne is meeting Anne Dargan on Tuesday, decluttering and then meeting Kerry and Ainsley for one to one meetings. On Wednesday am – she has a photo shoot then finance meeting, then Heather meeting. On Thursday Jayne is covering hosting of Mediation 1 in Training Centre then 2pm Donna meeting.

On Friday – Jayne is attending hockey tournament from 11.30am with Ballycraigy Primary, followed by a 3pm meeting on email service.

Onwards!

Guest Write Barry Phillips CEO

I'm so lucky to feel so proud of my staff. Here’s one employee who stood outside Tesco last Friday collecting money for a good cause. That takes bottle. Well done Vanessa say I.
As a company we’re up to two really important but quite different things this week. We’re all “de-clunking”. In otherwords, we’re going through files and folders, drawers and cupboards to see what we can throw away. No doubt we'll feel we have an office twice the size once done. We’re also working on our application to the Irish News for the Champion of Champion award. We’ve won an award over the last few years six times including “Best Place to Work” twice so the pressure's on. We’ve got something a bit wacky in mind. But then we do wacky. And rather well I might add.

On Tuesday our conference executive Scott will be meeting Rosie Smyth from Ulster Supported Employment Ltd. USEL was established in 1962 with the aim of providing supported paid employment for people with disabilities within its Belfast manufacturing base.
Our MD (sporting a fine new hairdo incidentally) is in meetings all day today. Tuesday evening she's attending the B4B event "Generating income and good customer relationships" at the Wellington Park Hotel, Belfast. Thursday and she’s attending the CforC course on Facilitation Skills at Holiday Inn Express Antrim. She’s in the office rest of week, internal meetings etc with no doubt something spectacular planned for the weekend.
Our conference manager ROI Heather is off to England covering the TUPE seminar in London on Wednesday. Bon voyage Heather.
Our conference manager NI Kerry is hosting the second day of the Internal Mediation course on Tuesday in the Legal-Island Training Centre and is attending an 'Art in the Garden' networking event at the Culloden that same evening. Apparently she knows these gardens well having visited these and many others in the summer when playing her tuba in the local silverband for 6 years. On Thursday she will be presenting Ballycraigy Primary School with their sponsored hockey kits and will be helping out at a small local tournament in preparation for next weeks Antrim Sixes Tournament. Come on "Anrim"!
Ainsley our marketing and sales manager has a busy week too. Tomorrow evening he’s attending a B4B event with Jayne at the Wellington Park Hotel. On Wednesday he’s volunteering at Ballycraigy Primary School coaching football. On Thursday he’s running the innovation club. In between times like the rest of us he’s busy de-clunking.

Me, myself and I are busy this week with a combination of internal staff meeting and networking meetings. On Monday I have the usual one-to-ones with senior staff. On Tuesday I'm meeting Clive Byrne from NAPD and Michael Lantry from Certification Europe after that. I’m seeing Hannah Carney from Hannah Carney Associates for lunch and finally Marion Courtney late afternoon. Later that same day I’m attending “Generating Income and Good Customer Relationships” with other Legal-Island staff at the Wellie Park in Belfast. On Friday of this week I’m attending a Sales seminar at the Hilton and afterwards meeting Jim McBain of ASCL and George Wilson of the Centre for Competiveness and finally the company account Mike Nangle for lunch.

Onwards Islanders!

Guest writer: Debbie Wilson




Now that the confetti has settled and the "I do's" have been said welcome back to Legal-Island from a glorious Bank Holiday. The Royal Wedding has passed and William and Kate are now husband and wife.



I would like to take this opportunity for wish the new Duke and Duchess of Cambridge a long and happy life together and I think I speak for everyone when I say Kate was absolutely beautiful!!



Staff movements for the forthcoming week are as follows:


Barry is busy this week. He's just back from a few days in Moscow. What's the Russian for "pay back time" I wonder? He's meeting Mike Jones from Penna here on Friday but other than that he's fairly office bound all week for a change.


Scott will be assisting at the 'Managing Underperformance in the Public Sector' workshop on 5th May and will be meeting with Penna representatives on Friday to discuss the feedback from the HR Conference.


Jayne is in Strategy day follow up meetings today and will also be meeting with Barry. On Wednesday she has a a marketing meeting and is also attending a meeting with the Irish News.


Heather will be in the office all week involved in planning 2012 meetings.


Vanessa will be volunteering for Marie Curie on Friday, working in the charity shop in town in the morning and collecting donations from kind shoppers in the afternoon.


Here's to another busy week at Legal-Island.......