The Association of Corporate Counsel (ACC) is the world's largest organization serving the professional and business interests of attorneys who practice in the legal departments of corporations, associations, nonprofits and other private-sector organizations around the globe.
If you conduct business around the world, you know data privacy policies are far stricter outside the US than in. When you add Sarbanes-Oxley regulations to the mix, all bets are off. If you have US headquarters with international operations, you likely ponder the issue of privacy vs SOX often. Have all the answers? Didn’t think so!
In-house counsel often has the opportunity to help shape the record around a company’s conduct and then defend the record as best they can in litigation. Take this opportunity to evaluate the steps you can take to shape the record and develop a litigation strategy that does the most with whatever the record eventually turns out to include. In addition, receive practical pointers on what government agencies conducting their own investigations expect from companies and how you can negotiate with those agencies to protect your record.
"Patent litigation" - unfamiliar venues, strange procedures, and crippling potential downsides often come to mind with these words, and companies’ patent dockets continue to expand. This panel of patent litigation veterans will draw from their experiences to help you better address your next patent case, from practical tips to new case law that will drive the cutting edge of this important topic.
Records management is often not viewed as a responsibility of the general counsel's office, but records management decisions, and mistakes, can often raise a host of legal issues. This basics program will introduce in-house counsel to the basic elements of a records management policy including the law, review recent regulatory and judicial decisions that should influence a company's records management, and target the types of information that require special attention when it comes to preserving or destroying corporate records. An emphasis will be placed on automated information.
Learn the what, when, who and how of records retention in litigation and non-litigation settings. The discussion centers on when a records hold order should be issued; what the hold order contain, how it should be implemented, and processes to make sure that the hold order is being complied with throughout an organization. The panel discusses real-life scenarios and provides insight into the dangers of not having a records retention program.
Conventional views of records and discovery are failing organizations in their quest to effectively tackle the challenge of managing corporate information. Many in the legal and records management community talk about the intersection of records and discovery, implying that these are two distinct parts of a larger information paradigm. They are not.
We all know there are new ediscovery provisions in the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. But how can a small law department determine the best records retention policy and then manage the records to efficiently respond to the inevitable ediscovery request? What are the basics you must be prepared to address? How do you protect yourself and your IT department from being overwhelmed by burdensome requests? We addressed these issues and more in this program and provided checklists to help you manage the process.
Advantages and disadvantages of performing investigations and techniques for investigating. Also, spoliation of evidence and whether to report the findings of an internal investigation.
We've all seen movies where a smoking gun document surfaces late in a crisis. While this can be entertaining when it is someone else's problem, most of us would prefer to avoid this scenario with our own companies. The best way to avoid smoking guns is to implement sound document retention policies. Topics to be covered include education and document retention challenges, proper maintenance of files, teaching law to non-lawyers and making the law relevant, encouraging non-lawyers to use proper document creation processes, and much more.
Establishing and managing corporate governance best practices for any company can be a challenge. But how do you do it on a limited budget with few personnel? How can a small law department meet the challenges imposed by evolving standards to adapt corporate governance best practices that fit the company? How do you advise the Board and senior management? Benchmark with your small department peers who have been there, done that. Learn what tools and resources are available to ensure compliance with best practice standards.