Guest Writer - Peter G

We've all made it back safely to the ‘The Island’ this week after a crisis weekend of lock-down as we soaked up some severe snow storms. However it’s not all bad, Easter is on the horizon and a long, chocolate-fuelled weekend awaits us all.

Our sights certainly aren't blinded by the weekend ahead, with a jam-packed calendar of events over the next few months. In NI we welcome the Northern Ireland HR Conference for 2013 and our annual Data Protection in the Workplace Conference, amongst many others. In ROI we are looking forward to our first Conflict Resolution at Work conference and our annual All About Absence from Work event, both of which allow delegates to bring a friend along for free.

The team’s movements for the week are as follows:

Our CEO Barry has a busy week ahead. Today and tomorrow he has internal meetings pretty much all day. On Wednesday he’s meeting Martin McKay from TextHelp first at their offices and then at ours. On Thursday he’s meeting David Robinson here at Island House for lunch. Friday Easter or not he’ll be in taking advantage of a quiet office no doubt.

Peter F and I are attending an Invest NI Pay Per Click workshop on Tuesday in Ballymena. He’s also manning the office on Friday while everyone else starts their Easter holidays with a well deserved day off.

Allison has appointments with Midland HR on Tuesday morning and Capita on Wednesday afternoon.”

Scott has no appointments set for this week and hopes to work from home on Tuesday and Thursday. Just like everyone else, Scott is looking forward to the double bank holiday weekend this Friday and Monday. And, just like everyone else, he’s not really looking forward to decorating. However, She Who Must Be Obeyed has spoken and he has understandably changed his mind. Nothing now excites Scott more than standing back after a hard day’s graft and looking at the ecstasy on the face of his beloved as she admires his brush strokes and plumb work, especially in those hard to reach parts.

‘The Blind Artist’ is this week’s Boys v Girls challenge, which involves blindfolded drawing and probably lots of shouting. The scores are currently sitting at 3-2 to the girls, but confidence is high in the boys’ camp (as always!) and we are looking to take the point this week!

Guest writer Arnold

Welcome on the island. After celebrating St. Patrick’s long weekend we are all back to the office to work hard before the Easter holidays.

This week we are hosting Discipline & Underperformance at Work event at the Dunsilly Hotel, Antrim on Thursday 21^st March. Our TrainingCentre is fully booked this week with Social Services Training in today and day 4 - 6 for the 8 Day MII Certified Mediation in from Wednesday.

Networking

Jayne will be out on Thursday visiting BITC and meetings in Belfast

Heather will be out with Kerry at 'Worldhost Customer Service Training - Customers with Disabilities' on Thursday morning at Beechlawn House Hotel, Dunmurry

Allison is inundated with requests to either register for, or, appear in our 2014 Legal-Island HR Yearbook.  The purpose of the publication is to provide each individual within the HR function both control and ownership of their individual role, position and personal career. A team of some of the best practitioners will be contributing to sections aimed at assisting HR through 2014. If you have a case study/scenario that you believe would be of interest to other HR Managers we would love to hear from you. To request further information contact her here in the office 028 9446 3888 - email Allison@legal-island.com

Scott is not very well and has a sore tummy and is working from home today and hopes to be in the office tomorrow, if the brave little soldier feels up to it. At the moment, it doesn't look good. He really does have a very bad tummy and his mummy is in Edinburgh and can't rub it for him, but he definitely hopes to be fit enough to carry out the discipline and underperformance training on Thursday at the Dunsilly Hotel, with Lorraine Toolan of the EEF. Depending on how the invalid gets on this week, he'll either be working from home or the office on Friday. That will teach him for bragging about going to Barcelona when the rest of the office was working. It's a special quality of food poisoning you get in Catalonia, presumably. Get well soon, sick boy!*

Peter Gilpin will meet Joel Kerr from Synergy Learning this afternoon, to discuss a potential e-learning platform.

Our CEO Barry has an easy enough week being in the office for most of it with the exception of an InvestNI seminar to attend in Belfast on Thursday

* NOTE: Legal-Island would like to point out that Scott, as usual, wrote the above summary of his movements this week and it does not indicate the thoughts of an uncaring employer.

Guest writer Jacqui

 

From left to right: James, Arnold, Peter F and Peter G

From left to right: Heather, Jenny and Kerry

Just a few photographs of the latest "Boys V Girls" tournament that we have going on here on the Island.

The latest round involved a frog race which was won for the second week running by our NI Conference Manager Kerry, who saw off stiff competition from James in the semi-final.

Kerry's latest win puts the girls ahead and we look forward to the next crazy event Debbie has lined up for us.

Congratulations also go to our other Kerri, who has taken on the new part-time post of Conference Assistant. She will split her day by continuing with her reception and, her PA duties for Barry in the morning before moving upstairs to work alongside Scott in the afternoon.

As for the work taking place this week...

BARRY (CEO)

Has internal meeting pretty much all day today.

Tomorrow he's talking to Andy Bounds author of "The Snowball Effect" and has a meeting with his coach, Wendy McCullough.
On Wednesday morning he's attending a seminar at InvestNI whilst in the afternoon he's meeting Switch New Media in Belfast.
On Thursday morning he has an Irish lesson with the rest of us and an ST meeting that same afternoon.
Friday and its R&D all day.

SCOTT

Scott returns from Barcelona on Tuesday. Did he mention he was going to Barcelona?

On Wednesday he chairs a meeting of HR conference speakers and facilitators at the offices of Carson McDowell in Belfast:
http://www.carson-mcdowell.com/

The HR Conference this year takes place on 15^th May:

http://legal-island.com/events/all-events/412/northern-irelands-5th-annual-hr-conference-winning-in-business/

On Thursday Scott returns to the office for some training on how to pronounce Irish names, with Colm O’Neill. Colm pronounces his name Colm, like column but without the uh and the n. Seems easy enough.

Friday will see Scott working from home before seeing him fly off yet again on Friday evening to see his beloved Hearts play the mighty St Mirren (2^ndbottom plays 3^rd bottom of the league) in the Scottish League Cup final at the weekend.

http://www.hampdenpark.co.uk/events/hampden/scottish-communities-league-cup-final.html

Could it be two cups and insolvency in only 12 short months? Living the dream, boys, living the dream...

JAYNE

Before heading off to Stormont with Heather for 12:00pm at Long Gallery, Parliament Buildings, for the NIABT Women in Business networking event, Jayne will have some internal meetings, which is what she has planned for the rest of the week except Friday when she will be starting a long weekend for her birthday!

DONNA

On Thursday I will be attending the Ireland Excellence Awards at the Clandeboye.

KERRY

Will also be attending the HR Conference meeting at the Carson McDowell offices, Belfast on Wednesday afternoon, along with Scott.

TRAINING CENTRE

We are hosting an Advanced Coaching event today and tomorrow and then the first 3 days of the 8 day Certified Mediation course starting on Wednesday. 

Gonna sign off now and find out what whacky carry on ... we will be partaking of this week...

Enjoy whatever it is you are all doing this week.

 

Guest Writer- Donna Kirkpatrick

Photo (right)- Kerry Murphy,  Legal-Island Hoola-Hoop champion 2013.



                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                              In 2009, Aaron Hibbs, USA, managed to hula hoop continuously for 72 hours. Well Mr Hibbs you had better watch out because right here in Legal-Island we may have a contender for the title, in the form of Kerry Murphy, Conference Manager NI.  Hours (well maybe minutes) of dedicated training meant that Kerry "out-hoolled" all other staff members to win the next round in the series of Boys v Girls - one for the girls Kerry we salute you!

Enough chat of hoola-hooping, here is what is going on this week.

Tuesday
We have introduced a new booking software into the company and on Tuesday, Vanessa and Debbie will be giving us an overview of the program. 


The boys v girls challenge this week is entitled "LeapFrog" but the logistics have been a closely guarded secret and will be revealed by Miss Fun (aka Debbie) on Tuesday.

Who knows by next week, we could have a contender for the leapfrog category in RIO 2016 - if it isn't a category, maybe it should be. 


Wednesday 
Heather will be leading the team for the Education law Update in Dublin -she will be ably assisted by Vanessa, Jayne and Peter.  

On Wednesday Scott  will be meeting Shauna Hughes from Caterpillar.

Pamela is meeting Allan Nelson from Forth Communications in Bangor who is coming over from Edinburgh to see if he can help us with a new email service system/members portal.

We are looking forward to John Byrne of Signability coming into the office on Wednesday and he will be be writing our mission statement "We believe in making the lives of HR Professionals easier" in the foyer for all to see when they enter the building. 

Thursday
Allison, Peter and Jayne will be signing off on the "Legal-Island's Yearbook 2014".

Heather will also be hosting the Mock EAT event in Dublin - no rest for the conference manager this week. 

Barry will be meeting with David Robinson and in the evening he will be attending a dinner at Stormont. 

Thursday morning Scott flies to Barcelona for a short break and will return on Tuesday 11^th March. On Saturday Scott will be at the Barcelona v  Deportivo La Coruna game and will be hoping Barca play better than they did against Madrid.

Other highlights of a trip to Barcelona will doubtless include the Montjuic magic fountains:

http://www.barcelona-tourist-guide.com/en/albums-en/magic-fountains-montjuic/

Restautante Sinatra:

http://restaurantemyway.com/en/

And Sagrada Familia:

http://www.google.co.uk/search?q=gaudi+cathedral+barcelona&hl=en&rls=com.microsoft:en-gb:IE-Address&rlz=1I7AURU_enGB499&tbm=isch&tbo=u&source=univ&sa=X&ei=l2I0Uee1NOmY0QXl04HIDg&ved=0CFAQsAQ&biw=1280&bih=874

Friday
This is International Women's day and Jayne and Kerry will be attending the IOD Women's Leadership Conference at the Ramada hotel Shawsbridge.

Barry will be attending a Crowd Sourcing event at the Innovation Centre.

Looks like there will be no time for hula-hoop practice as a busy week lies ahead.