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Audits by governmental agencies are on the rise, and compliance with the ever-changing and increasing number of regulations is challenging. Employee benefit plans could impose liability for your company’s employees who serve as fiduciaries, your board or your company. In a Jeopardy! format, this session will examine the top six sources of liability and top six best practices to avoid liabilities from employee benefit plans for welfare, retirement and executive compensation plans and specific issues for multinational companies.

It feels great to give back to the community, and even better when you're able to contribute through your field of expertise. If you haven't tried pro bono work, ACC and the Pro Bono Institute challenge you to get involved - literally. You too can make a real, lasting difference. Get started with this article and use your department as a catalyst for change.

California’s unique “toxic warning” law, Proposition 65, has been on<br />the books in the United States for 30 years, yet it continues to trap the unwary manufacturer and retailer and funnel millions of dollars to a cottage industry that seemingly exists for just one purpose: lining their pockets with your company’s hard-earned profits.

Today, more than ever, corporate law departments are focusing on the notion of what constitutes “value” and how to enhance it to support their organizations. Not surprisingly, law firms are also increasingly focused on creating “value” for their clients as well. While both say “value” is their prime objective, the definitions differ.

Contractual risk allocation tools are powerful, and therefore commonly subject to negotiation and litigation. However, counsel often overlooks or misjudges the provisions' complexities and impacts. Therefore, parties commonly find themselves facing more liability than they thought they bargained for. This article gives ten key tips to avoid common risk allocation drafting pitfalls and achieve legal and business objectives.

The hype around Generative AI has contributed to a wave of interest in how to apply many forms of artificial intelligence, not just GenAI. 

This article provides an overview of the technology concepts to consider when assessing legal workflow automation (WFA) tools as many providers are enhancing their solutions with AI.

In our annual review of the topics shaping governance today, we consider the ideas that will trend in boardrooms across Canada for months and years ahead. The dominant theme in Davies Governance Insights 2012 is the ability of the shareholder to take control of the governance agenda. In the Power and Influence of Canadian Shareholders, we look at three very different situations in which shareholders succeeded in their demands for governance change. <br /><br />In Boards Seek Fairness for All Shareholders, we describe the TELUS response to empty voting and the trend among mining companies to adopt advance notice bylaws. Both reflect the efforts of boards to resist shareholder actions that do not benefit all shareholders. In Shareholder Democracy Movement Continues we consider the status of majority voting and say on pay and Focus on the Integrity of the Shareholder Vote Intensifies brings up to date developments in the very important, if complex, area of the proxy voting system in Canada. Challenges in Overseeing Operations in Emerging Markets sets out the most important challenges demanding the attention of boards and management teams of issuers with operations in emerging markets. We end our review with a catalogue of the most recent developments in governance standards under New Governance Guidelines, Criteria and Rankings.

Is negotiation a science or an art? In-house counsel are increasingly involved in deals requiring them to apply a structured approach to this skill. This interactive session will help participants evaluate strategic options when negotiating and will explain the techniques which can be used to increase the probability of success.

Learn about the profile and practice of fellow in-house counsel Isabel Waida, vice president and associate general counsel for Nuance Communications, a Burlington, Massachusetts-based software company that specializes in voice-recognition technology. It’s appropriate that a polyglot — she speaks six languages — landed at a corporation that is making it easier to communicate.

This White Paper is part of a series of Latham & Watkins publications highlighting significant developments under Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act (FATCA) and outlining some of the major workstreams that foreign financial institutions must complete in order to comply with FATCA.

This article discusses the requirement for licensed premises to lodge a Risk Assessed Management Plan (RAMP) with the Office of Liquor and Gaming Regulation (OLGR).

Organizations experiencing a security incident must grapple with numerous competing issues simultaneously. Learn the “Dos” and “Don’ts” to help your organization more effectively engage your service providers, and recommended principles to incorporate into your Incident Response Plan and distribute to the incident response team at the outset of every incident response effort.

A brief overview of your company's alternative dispute resolution options in intellectual property conflicts.

Columnist Todd H. Silberman examines the creed for the lawyer and how it should apply to in-house attorneys.

ACC Docket highlights Gillian Wong, manager legal and deputy company secretary of St. Barbara Ltd., and her work with the ACC Australia Chapter.

This sample outlines the key concepts and recommended practices for creation of a Data Security Policy - a key component of managing sensitive information.

This panel will discuss copyright compliance as it relates to social media in an interactive session, asking the audience to evaluate scenarios involving employee use of social media for sharing information or obtaining third-party content for use in marketing or promotional campaigns. The session will combine a review of recent regulatory and legal opinions on the topic from around the world with a candid look at situations encountered everyday by in-house IP counsel. The session will include tips and tricks to help you determine whether content on social media is free to use and share, using examples from YouTube, Google Images and Flickr, among others. This session promises to be fun as we take a look at the use in a corporate setting of music, movies and text obtained by unsuspecting employees from social media sites.

This ACC Guide provides an overview on trade secrets in the United States. It will explain the legal framework that in-house counsel can use to inform, protect, and provide guidance when dealing with trade secrets, intellectual property usage, and what you company might face in attempting to protect certain information.

This survey reports sheds light on in-house counsel concerns on the impact on attorney-client or legal professional privilege of using AI tools based on responses from 456 participants from all over the world.

A company’s board of directors is responsible
for investigating allegations of wrongdoing by officers and employees of the company. However, sometimes it is a board member who ends up in the investigatory hot seat. This article examines the best practices companies should consider when investigating alleged board member misconduct.

This multi-jurisdictional guide covers common issues in securitisation laws and regulations – including receivables contracts, receivables purchase agreements, asset sales, security issues, insolvency laws, special rules, regulatory issues, and taxation.

This Wisdom of the Crowd, complied from responses posted on the New to In-house and Small Law Department eGroups, addresses issues of the liability and various restrictions on running a contest or sweepstakes. The issues discussed include elements of a sweepstakes, operating a contest open to the general public vs. business partners, and operating an office bracket pool.

This ACC Guide (formerly known as an InfoPAK) provides the reader with a general overview of the economic conditions in four pertinent Latin America countries: Colombia, Mexico, Panama, and Brazil.

Presents a country-by-country overview of the availability of protection from disclosure of communications between in-house counsel and the officers, directors or employees of the companies they serve.