Our Event Write Up series hands over to members to share their thoughts from events.
DEG/ILTA/LTC4 Training Special – June 2023
Event write up by Jackie Armstrong, regular attendee
It was so lovely to see lots of familiar faces (some in person and some online) as well as some new ones at the recent ILTA Education SIG, DEG and LTC4 meeting discussing the world of legal digital skills training. I was lucky enough to be able to attend the meeting at Milbank LLP’s offices in person which was a real treat.
There were some insightful discussions around how we can deliver effective training in a hybrid environment and indeed should we even be attempting to do that? My view is that training should be either face to face or remote (for us Zoom) and not a mix of the two as it is very difficult to make the remote attendees feel included. However, there is new technology coming along all the time that can help with that so it may be that in the future it will be easier to achieve a hybrid training session that is satisfactory to all participants.
There were lots of other thought provoking discussions including how chat bots could help provide “just in time” training and how we can adapt to ever changing technology (for example the Microsoft 365 updates).
As always, the time just flew by and before we knew it the meeting had ended. Thank you so much to all who organised, hosted and took part in the meeting. I can’t wait for the next one!
Jackie Armstrong
IT Training Lead
Penningtons Manches Cooper LLP
About Jackie
Jackie is an IT Training Lead for Penningtons Manches Cooper LLP. She currently leads a team of 3 trainers who deal with business as usual training as well as project training. She has worked in the legal field for most of her working life and for the last 12 years as a Legal IT Trainer for a number of large law firms. She and her team are involved from an early stage in any upcoming projects, and are able to advise on the level and methods of training required to ensure good user adoption. Jackie and her team pride themselves on being subject matter experts in all the applications they support having been involved in the creation and updating of training material including quick reference guides, eLearning and short videos.
Document Accessibility – April 2023
Event write up by Hanneke ter Veen-Hockney, regular attendee
“If you don’t design for accessibility, it’s like saying to every fifth person who walks in your door, ‘I don’t really want your business.’”*
Read moreManipulating PDFs – February 2023
Event write up by Sharon Gordon, regular attendee
The DEG event, Manipulating and Managing PDFs, that took place in February 2023 was very enlightening, and I am very glad I was able to attend as I learned a lot about PDFs and how they are being used today.
Read moreDEG Teams Talk – January 2023
Event write up by Joanne Humber, committee member.
This online Teams roundtable meeting, led by Richard MacDougal, Sherry Kappel, Tracy Kraft, and Pat Mansuy, certainly proved popular and opened up everyone’s eyes to both the possibilities and the pitfalls of this software!
Teams was actually launched in 2017, but it wasn’t until 2019 followed by the beginning of Covid lockdowns the following year, that it really began to be used in earnest by law firms.
Read moreAsk the Experts - January 2023
Event write up by Joanne Humber, committee member.
Well, what a great session that was! The first in-person combined with Zoom event happened at Milbank’s very smart new offices at 100 Liverpool Street. It was so good to see some familiar faces both sitting around the conference table and on the screen. Maybe life is returning to something like normal?
Read moreDocument Excellence Day – October 2018
Event write up by Sue McNulty, regular attendee
From jazzy socks to Word Perfect memories to Scottish humourism – the Document Excellence Day did not fail to deliver, as always.
Read moreDocument Excellence Day – 4th October 2017
Event write up by Julie McCarthy, committee
I have been attending this event now for around 5 years and have to say this has got to be one of the best ones yet!! It was so well organised and ran exactly to the timings on the agenda. We started the day with refreshments and our first opportunity to network with other attendees. At 9.30 am the sessions started with Clare Waller leading the day. She gave an excellent introduction to the day with some interesting facts and figures, particularly how many total years’ experience the UKDEG team had been working in Law – too many to mention!
Planning the Document Excellence Day
Event write up by Clare Waller, committee member and event chair
As each year goes by and the event grows, the Document Excellence Day takes just that little bit more effort to organise. On the up side, every year we learn how to do things better and I hope that shows.
Directly after the event there’s a period of mop up. There are lots of thank you emails to speakers, sponsors and all those who have helped to make the day a success. Feedback is read and collated and a report produced for the Committee Members. Slides and information are uploaded to the website.
And then – we start all over again! Planning for next year’s event has already begun. So, where do we start. First the venue and then the date – that’s the easy bit.
Document Excellence Day (formerly Word Excellence Day) – still lived up to its name
Event write up by Teresa Vincent, regular attendee
This year’s Document Excellence Day was as great as ever. I came away with some useful tips and lots of food for thought. I imagine most of the attendees like me are trying to find meaningful ways of including a 3D Hubble space telescope in our future PowerPoint presentations!