25th February - Guest Writer Jayne Finlay

Good day one and all from a sunny if not slightly chilly Antrim and the team at Legal-Island.

It's the final week in February and where has the year gone already?? Hard to believe we are stepping into Spring in the not too distant future.

As ever the team are busy on various ventures this week.

First up, the Training Centre are hosting Schrader – Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday.

Our Ceo, Barry, has a busy enough week. Today he has internal meetings more or less all day. Tomorrow evening he’s attending a business lecture at Queen’s University. On Wednesday he’s meeting Neasa Hunter about ISO work. On Thursday he’s speaking at Strathearn School to business pupils. On Friday he’s working on an R&D project.

Heather and a number of the team including Debbie, Peter G and Pamela will be heading to Dublin tomorrow afternoon in preparation for the HR Symposium this week in the Radisson Golden Lane. Heather recently attended an Irish Language Class and has been coming back with lots of lovely pronunciation for us - best wee saying for the week is ‘Doras feasa fiaraí’ - translation "the door of knowledge is to ask". Let's hope the delegates find the door of knowledge open at the Radisson Golden Lane. 

Also in attendance at the HR Symposium and taking on role of Chair for the day is Scott.

Allison will be in the office all week finalising details of the HR Directory.

Vanessa and Donna are meeting with George Wilson from CforC re the “role model” status for customer service.

As for me, I'm in meetings most of today, this evening I go to the MLA Networking event with the Institute of Directors (IoD) Young Directors' Forum. Tomorrow evening I'm joining Barry at QUB lecture. Wednesday I'm meeting Linda from the Iod to discuss the Annual Lunch. Thursday I'm working on Investors in People all day with the goal of getting a team set up and in place within the month.

Most importantly (some might argue!) though this week is the ongoing Battle of Boys v Girls on the Island. Head Judge Debbie Wilson will be assessing the 2 teams on their Hula Hoop skills in a Hula Hoop competition in the next round of Boys v Girls tomorrow. Come on the Girls!!!!

Guest Writer - Heather Stewart

Well the Boys v Girls challenge is well under way with our third week completed. Our ring leader/master/judge Debbie is doing a great job with the weekly competitions we started off with an antiques challenge, continued on to a movie music quiz, last week was the golf challenge and this week it is hula hooping. At this point it is only fair to mention that Arnold clinched it for the boys last week putting 9 holes in a row and so putting them in the lead with 2 games to 1 but us girls are simply lulling them into a false sense of security!

Other than hula hooping we do have plenty going on in the office this week:

Barry

Our CEO, has a busy week. He has internal meetings pretty much all day today. He's attending a seminar tomorrow morning at the Waterfront Hall. On Wednesday he's delivering some DISC training to staff whilst meeting representatives from Northgate and Fathom that afternoon. On Friday he's at an innovation seminar in Belfast.

Scott

Scott is meeting Stewart Miller from NorthgateArinso on Wednesday and hopes to work from home on Tuesday and Thursday. He is on annual leave on Friday and will be attending the wedding of Mark McAllister from the LRA to his fiancé Sonya Boyle from Belfast City Council at Tullyglass Hotel in Ballymena.

Jayne

As usual Jayne has a busy week of internal meetings along with attending Barry's disc profiling, joing Scott to meet Stewart Millar and then finally on Thursday she will be going to visit NACCO.

Marketing

The marketing team are meeting with Barry and Jayne on Tuesday afternoon to discuss their learning outcomes from their recent training from marketing consultant Paula Milligan and marketing guru Grant Leboff. 
Peter F, along with Jayne and Barry, is meeting digital consultant Gareth Dunlop from Fathom about a new Legal-Island website on Wednesday afternoon. He and Peter G are also attending an Invest NI run Google Analytics workshop at the Tullyglass Hotel, Ballymena on Thursday. Allison’s meetings appear to be internal this week apart from Thursday when she will be attending an 8am meeting hosted by the Northern Ireland Chamber of Commerce in The Europa entitled “Networking and Bitesized HR.

I will be working towards Ireland's HR Symposium 2013 which we are running next week and on Saturday I will be attending an Intensive Irish Language Course in St.Patrick's College. Other than that I may fit in a little bit of hula hoop training when I can!

Tá súil agam go bhfuil lá breá agat

Guest Writer - Allison Sutherland

Ball Boys and Girls!

It’s common knowledge that we’re a fun bunch of people here on ‘The Island.’  2013 has seen us start as we mean to go on with a heady mix of thumping hard work interspersed with great big dollops of cheer. 

This is good old fashioned ‘Boys v Girls’ amusement.  This morning saw me kick off my shoes as I began the ‘putting’ practice of a lifetime.  Really, it’s just the same as Flushing Meadows – only this ‘green’ is slightly to the right of the upstairs fridge. 

Whichever team putts the most balls tomorrow will win.  It’s rather annoying, as the boys aren’t picking their balls up after them – I think it’s called making an issue of theirs being in the ‘holes’ and mine being in the bunkers!

It was announced today that the girls won the Music from the Movie’s task from last week and we’re racing neck and neck into the middle of February.  Personally, I don’t know why we bother; everyone knows that girls are better than boys!

Back to the work theme - Jayne will be mostly in the office this week although later today she will be attending the IoD Steering Committee meeting in Belfast.  Also, on Thursday she’ll be chairing our HR Network meeting which is taking place at Arthur Cox’s offices in Belfast.  Friday sees her catching up with Gareth Dunlop from Fathom alongside Barry and Peter F.  More about this further on.

Our CEO, Barry, has a very easy week by his standards. He’s in the office all week with just one visitor tomorrow. No doubt a time for him to catch up on some R&D not to mention some paperwork

Peter F is meeting Philip Bain from Shredbank on Wednesday afternoon at the Hilton Hotel, Templepatrick and on Friday, Gareth Dunlop from Fathom is coming in to meet with Peter, Jayne and Barry to discuss the design and implementation of our new corporate website. Exciting stuff and loads to think about after our sessions with marketing genius Grant Leboff last week!

Kerry Murphy is hosting 2 day Managing Difficult Conversations tomorrow and Wednesday and Redundancy Selection on Thursday.  Both events at taking place in the Training Centre.

Scott hopes to work from home on Tuesday and Friday this week. Wednesday sees him in Dublin for meetings, including Barry Reynolds, DAC Beachcroft; Wendy Doyle, solicitor; Mary Rafferty of Consensus Mediation; and Hannah Carney of Hannah Carney & Associates.  He will then be in Belfast this coming Friday to meet Michael Black and Aisling Byrne of Cleaver Fulton Rankin – followed by a Strategy Team meeting in the afternoon.  No peace for the wicked (or our Scott) because Saturday sees him back in Dublin, where he will be giving a presentation on workplace alternative dispute resolution at the National College of Ireland, along with Ger Deering, Director, Department of Jobs Enterprise and Innovation.  We still let him have Sunday’s off!

I’m looking forward to meeting Melita Williams on Wednesday who is the Director of Bespoke Belfast.  A great organisation that creates fun day’s for you and your staff.  I wonder what she’ll think of our Boy v Girl theme?  I will then be heading into Belfast on Friday to meet up with David Storrs from MaST.  I will also begin work on a very exciting project aimed at helping those involved in the HR function simplify their tasks/year.  You will hear more in relation to this in the coming weeks and months.  Mind you, if you can’t wait then give me a call and I’ll tell you what I can! 

Guest Writer - Vanessa Porter

It’s a busy week here on the Island with the first of our NI Season 1 Conferences taking place on Thursday – the sold out Delivering Professional Workplace Investigation which will be ably hosted by Kerry here in our Training Centre.

 

Also taking place in our Training Centre this week – on Monday and Wednesday our Marketing team along with Barry and Jayne will be training with Marketing Guru Grant Leboff.  Whilst on Tuesday all of our Managers are in a half day training session with Gillian Leetch-Armstrong.  We finish the week with a visit from Firmus Energy who will be utilitising the centre all day on Friday.

 

Scott is working in the office on Monday-Wednesday.  He will be meeing Stewart Miller of Northgate Arison and Jonathan Young of Dunbia on Thursday.  On Friday Scott hopes to work from home.

 

As well training this week Barry will joining Scott at the meeting with Stewart Miller on Thursday and will be having a catch up with Kerry on Friday about our Data Protection conference which is taking place on 6th June.

This week saw presentation of the first win in the LI Boys v Girls challenge – well done Scott – who won our antiques quiz – there’s a joke in there but I’m not going to be the one to make it!!

Guest Writer - Peter Fitzpatrick

He's done it! Heartfelt congrats to our Chief Executive, Barry Phillips and his other half Anna, who got married in Moscow on Saturday. I'm sure you'll agree that Anna looked stunning, with Barry scrubbing up quite well himself. Everyone on this 'island is delighted for them both.

There's no rest for the wicked while Barry enjoys the start of married life, and we have a busy week here:

Our Managing Difficult Conversations two day course is flying at the moment, so much so that we've only got one place remaining. Contact Vanessa now to make that place yours!

Scott hopes to work from home three days this week – Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday. On Thursday he meets Ciaran Trainor from the Equality Commission for Northern Ireland and Paul Fieldhouse of Hyperion Growth.

Heather has returned from her trip to London with loads of information about potential venues for our GB Annual Review of Employment Law conferences in October this year - the early bird catches the worm, and all that.

Our other Conference Manager, Kerry Murphy, is also on the hunt for new venues this week, although she's a little closer to home with appointments to visit the Tullyglass and Galgorm in Ballymena on Tuesday.

Our Training Centre has been hired by the Health and Social Care Trust this week. We've got a great offer on Training Centre bookings at the moment - book the Training Centre for a Monday or Friday and you'll save 33% on room hire. To find out more, email meetings@legal-island.com or contact Donna Kirkpatrick on 028 9446 3888.

Guest Writer - Kerry Murphy

Let it Snow!!! 

It may be a little late for Christmas but according to colleagues there has been plenty of snow in different parts of the province this weekend. James even had enough to make this magnificent snowman on Saturday night (see picture). There's not much left here in Antrim but just enough so that Allison could test run her pretty new snow boots today.




Staff movements this week:

Barry, our CEO, is on a shorter week this week. He has meetings all day today and much of tomorrow. On Wednesday he has a meeting in the City of London with a large law firm before flying off abroad for a few days.


Scott is in Belfast on Wednesday, meeting Kevin McVeigh of Elliott Duffy Garrett and Lorraine Toolan of the EEF. After working from home during the day, Scott returns to Belfast on Thursday for an evening of fun and firewater at the Pinsent Mason’s annual Burns Night celebrations at QUB. Hangover permitting, he hopes to be working from home on Friday. A man’s a man for a’ that, efter a’!


Jayne is in the office all week with internal meetings, except for Thursday morning when she is at the Legal-Island and Employers for Childcare joint Business Breakfast at The Mac.


Donna will be out at a Health and Wellbeing conference on Wednesday which is in Lisburn and has been arranged by BITC and the Public Health Agency.


Heather has internal meetings today and tomorrow and will be going to London Wednesday – Friday for a Meet in London event to find new venues and suppliers.


The marketing department is looking forward to a full day of training on Wednesday with Paula (Gibson) Milligan who is Director and Sales Consultant at PM Sales Solutions. She’ll be offering her advice on sales techniques to make 2013 a great year.


Allison has internal meetings for most of this week. On Thursday she will be seeing Ian Ferguson from the Construction Employers Federation at the Employers for Childcare and Legal-Island Business Breakfast which is taking place at the MAC.


James and Jayne will be meeting with Mark Maguire from Invest NI on Wednesday.


Kerry is in the office all week. I will host Vital Nutrition’s January Kickstart breakfast session tomorrow in the Training Centre from 9.30 – 10.30am.


Have a truly amazing day on Saturday Barry and Anna!!!

The Week Ahead

Guest Writer, Barry Phillips, CEO

Are we in the top ten of company blogs yet here at Legal-Island? Possibly not.But if there's an award for a company blog we'd certainly like to be considered for it. We like awards at Legal-Island and we're currently contemplating entering a few this year. Meantime...

We've a busy week ahead this week as the Legal-Island machinery swings fully into gear. I have meetings all day today and an Engagement seminar tomorrow with BITC. I'm seeing Stewart Miller from Northgate on Wednesday followed by a nice relaxing massage from the Carecall visitor. Thereafter it's meetings right through until Friday.

 Scott is meeting with David Braziel of Team Solutionz today. On Tuesday Scott has a meeting with Sam Davidson of the Henderson Group and will be co-chairing the HR network at SAM Mouldings in Antrim. Wednesday sees Scott choose aromatherapy as his stress-busting option from Carecall and Thursday sees Scott attend a breakfast session on the Bribery Act, courtesy of Carson McDowell, followed by his annual appraisal meeting in the afternoon. Scott hopes to work from home on Friday.

 Jayne and Peter F are meeting our web consultant, Gareth Dunlop, at Fathom’s offices in Belfast on Friday afternoon. This meeting should provide another step towards the development of our brand new website!

 Kerry will be meeting with Niamh Shiells from the Association for Coaching for a site visit at the MET, Titanic on Thursday.  Legal-Island will be sponsoring the Annual Association for Coaching Conference and will marshal the event. 

 In the training centre this week we have Schrader on Monday, Health and Social Care on Wednesday and on Thursday and Friday we have Social Services Training.

Best of all the Legal-Island hens have started laying again! We're taking this as a sign that the worst of the Winter is now over and that none of us will be stuck for a break time snack for a good while longer.