08:30

REGISTRATION AND COFFEE

09:15

Chairman’s welcome and introductions

09:30

Reading the economic and political environment to optimise your role in growing the business.

  • Defining the role of the GC in the context of the business and the wider external factors that may impact it
  • How do you help protect the business?
  • Understanding the role of the GC when it comes to board and non-exec expectations of GCs
  • How do you deal with major international incidents in countries such as Ukraine and Syria, as part of your role as a GC?
  • Stephen Archer Founding Partner of UK business strategy and leadership consultancy , Spring Partnerships

10:10

Aligning your legal department function with other business functions

• How do you run your department like the rest of the business?
• Dealing with different areas of the business effectively
– How do you ensure your business and your function is aligned to the business strategies and is focused on the areas the business thinks is important?
– How do you position yourself against your peers?
– Ensuring you can add value

10:50

MORNING COFFEE

11:20

Maximising business opportunities whilst minimising risk. Finding the balance

A growing proportion of GC’s work is not strictly involved in legal matters but in commercial decision making, especially in the area of business and risk management
• Identifying different types of risk to your company; Legal risk mapping and understanding the framework of risk
• Ensuring your risk calculations are correct
• How do you help balance the opportunities to drive growth with the inherent risks associated with them?
• Assessing where you and your legal teams should be accountable in managing associated risks
• What processes need to be put in place to enable your teams to effectively deal with managing business risk, and how do you help your team do this?
• If you operate out of a number of different countries, how do you manage your risk strategies?

12:20

Harnessing the concept of innovation to become more efficient in the delivery of services

This session will look at the concept of innovation and how GCs can innovate and leverage both their in-house and external resources and capability.

As lawyers you need to be increasingly innovative in how you deliver services to the business. Hear what practical steps they have done to make this happen across their organisations br. This session will offer you insights how to stand out from the crowd and inspire loyalty.

13:20

LUNCH

14:05

WORKSHOP 1: The GCs tool-kit to deliver corporate culture and value and an appropriate brand across your team

  • Capturing the strengths of both companies
  • Aligning two (or more) different cultures
  • Alignment of legal functions and rationalisation of legal spend
  • Ensuring people, culture, and leadership are the  game makers

14:05

WORKSHOP 2: Successfully integrating legal teams post-acquisition

  • Capturing the strengths of both companies
  • Aligning two (or more) different cultures
  • Alignment of legal functions and rationalisation of legal spend
  • Ensuring people, culture, and leadership are the  game makers
  • Joanna Day Director of Legal Services, Santander

14:55

AFTERNOON TEA

15:25

WORKSHOP 1: How do you run your legal department like a business?

Business expertise and numeracy, as well as legal skills are the basic foundations for a successful General Counsel role. Choose from one of our interactive business workshop sessions.

This workshop will offer you

  • Top tips for interpreting profit and loss accounts balance sheets and cash flow statements
  •  Business planning
  • Reading a balance sheet
  • Top 10 tips for preparing an effective budget
  • Managing your internal and external budget like the rest of the business
  • Demonstrating value to the business

15:25

WORKSHOP 2: Delivering effective presentation, communication and negotiation skills to the board and executive committee

  • Ensuring your message is received in the way it was intended
  • Using the right language and the right message for your target audience
  • Deploying effective negotiation skills to win the hearts and minds of the board

15:25

WORKSHOP 3: Deploying efficient technology to deliver value across the legal team and the business

This session will give you the opportunity to fully understand how you source, install and budget for new technology. Examples include e-billing and document retention.

  • Identifying technology needs
  • Where do you go and how do you choose the right technology for you?
  • What’s out there?
  • Effective deployment tactics
  • Clare Belcher Head of Legal, Global Business Development & EMEIA Region, Travelex

16:15

Becoming an effective leader of top talent: Recruiting and developing employees to meet business goals

  • Building growth and career development in the context of business strategy and plans
  • How can you recruit top talent and retain them?
  • Training and personal development including soft skills
  • What are the behavioural types that work well for your legal team to develop in your lawyers?
  • Building a superior team of people who will create and execute a legal strategy that generates value for the business
  • Keeping skills current and allowing them to move out of your team
  • How do you provide career progression and retain engagement with those located regionally and internationally?

17:10

NEW FORMAT: Concluding interactive roundtable session at end of Day One

  • What did delegates gain from Day One of the Forum?
  • What are the remaining key challenges facing them they would like to hear tomorrow?
  • What should be discussed at tomorrow’s Forum?

17:40

Conclusions from Chair

17:50

Networking drinks

19:00

Buffet dinner

09:00

Moring refreshments

09:30

Recap from yesterday

09:45

How do you evolve your role within the business?

• How as a general counsel do you define your function, shape your ambition and have the courage to follow through?
• Changing your function to ensure it is still aligned to the business
• How can you demonstrate value and encourage people to join new things?
• How do you expand into new areas? Ways of shaping policy and avoiding mistakes

10:30

MORNING COFFEE

11:00

BACK BY POPULAR DEMAND: Moving from a general counsel role into a non executive Director, CEO or Chairman’s position

This session will give you the opportunity to hear from the co-chair of the GC100 committee looking at career progression and a current general counsel and company secretary upon what led to their perspective of the opportunities in the market and their appointment as a NED. You will get to understand how and why it happened. You will also gain a clearer understanding as to what is hindering lawyers from getting to the top roles and what can be done to move them in the right direction.

• What are the inhibitors to transition and what can you do for your team’s long term development?
• Making the most of the role
• Building it into your team development and succession planning
• At what point in time should general counsel and company secretaries address the possibility of moving to another executive level or board level position?
• Are lawyers the next CEOs or the next COOs?
• What can be done to change the future role of general counsel and company secretaries?

11:50

Leading virtual teams with members based in multiple locations

  • How do you create a legal network or legal family in an organisation which is cross-borders?
  • Securing buy-in and engagement from the team
  • Creating a cohesive team proposition across international boundaries
  • Effectively organising your department’s structure and reporting mechanism across regions
  • What knowledge management systems are used to link departments together?
  • Ensuring you have the right balance of skills and influence across a multi-level, multi-disciplined global organisation
  • Moira Shannon Associate General Counsel, M & M Middle East and Asia/Lead Counsel Global Commercia, Shell International
  • Nuns Moodliar Vice-President Legal & Corporate Affairs , Hertz International
  • Suzanne Wise Group General Counsel and Company Secretary, Network Rail

12:40

Concluding interactive round table sessions

Delegates will be able to discuss on their tables they have learnt from this year’s event and what they will take away with them.

13:10

Closing comments from Chairman

13:15

Lunch and end of the Forum