tfpl blog

Breakfast Networking

I was an eager attendee of the CLIG ‘Posh Breakfast Networking’ event this week. Kindly sponsored by 7side and held in the fine dining establishment of Hawksmoor, this was a wonderful opportunity to spend some quality time networking with members of the City Legal Information Group over a rather decadent breakfast. 

CLIG http://www.clig.org/ is a London organisation, formed to support legal information professionals, offering networking and training events. I always find these events beneficial, not just to meet new people and make fresh contacts in the industry but to hear on the ground what issues are concerning this professional community.

It was also a great ice-warmer before the forthcoming BIALL conference, to see who will be attending, make plans for meeting up as well as adding a few more followers on Twitter.

Project Risk Management- Keeping it simple

Earlier this week I attended a webinar for World Risk Day; the opening session was led by David Hillson of “The Risk Doctor and Partners”; the topic was Project Risk Management and the concern towards the stunted growth in success rate of projects hovering around 37%. The discussion looked at why this could be using a back to basics approach.

The key focus for all projects from start to finish should be the objectives; too often these get lost along the way due to various influences and this ultimately leads to either the project missing its deadlines or at worst, complete project failure. Discussed was a good way to keep focused on the basics by asking yourself “What is Risk? Is it purely Uncertainty? No. All Risks are uncertain yes, however not all uncertainties are Risks, only the ones that have or can have an impact to the project.” The ISO31000:2009 definition of Risk is “Effect of uncertainty on objectives”. It is important also to keep in mind the positive uncertainties of Project Risk Management that can be lost sight of while searching for, identifying, and analysing the more obvious negatives.

With this at the forefront of thinking on a project it should be easier to keep on track and on target.

You’re only as strong as your RISKIEST link

A lot of Risk Professionals I have spoken to during my time recruiting in to the Risk industry have said that one of the biggest struggles to get Risk Management working to its full potential within a company lies with the successful implementation of a companywide Risk Culture across all levels.

The biggest question, “How do you overcome the barriers to get this done?”

I have found that the most popular and seemingly successful method I have heard about is a top down approach. The idea and worth of Risk needs to be imbedded starting at the very top in order to give it real credibility within the company. If the board members are in support then the rest of the company will follow. As Risk doesn’t come with a stand out set of financials it can be difficult to persuade the right people that Risk is cost effective and worth the investment.

There does seem to be a great advantage to having a dedicated Risk Management team shown not only in the time they have to do their job but also the time they would have to champion Risk Management across departments through training sessions, intranet posts on recent successes, and regular interdepartmental liaison.

The struggle is getting and then keeping everyone on board as a company is only a strong as its weakest link.

From Big Data to Little Apps: How you can access, present and deliver information in the workplace

TFPL is pleased to be involved in the organisation of this year’s  London Knowledge and Information Exchange Ideas conference taking place on the afternoon of Friday 28 June 2013.

St Bride Foundation,
14 BrideLane,
Fleet Street,
London EC4Y 8EQ

Tired of hearing BIG talk about data? Want to cut through the hyperbole and learn something useful about using and managing your organisation’s data?

LIKE Ideas will be a practical, informative and enjoyable knowledge-sharing event. You’ll hear from expert practitioners who, like you, are interested in down-to-earth solutions to real-life information management issues.

To book on this event, please go to http://www.likenews.org.uk/likeideas2013.html

We look forward to seeing you there!

 

TFPL trio go to the London Book Fair

Victoria Sculfor, Lee Barnes and Liz Ryan attended the London Book Fair in Earls Court last week. The London Bookfair is a great exhibition where authors, publishers, distributors and service providers can all come together to share ideas, knowledge, technology and means to reach the target audience.  We too got a great deal out of the day, coming away with some excellent insight on issues and new developments within publishing, and of course the odd free pen!

We used this as an opportunity to meet some new faces and understand more about the services being offered and provided by publishers. There were some interesting talks and discussions at the Bookfair, especially on the changes in publishing in recent times for example the development of e-books and e-publishing. We were also introduced to some interesting tools which were being developed and used to aid these developments, such as self-publishing tools and new project management systems.

It was a really great day and one that we all thoroughly enjoyed; we look forward to attending next year!

 

 

Tweet your CV?

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887323820304578412741852687994.html

I saw this article about the use of twitter as a way to promote your summarised experience.  I am used to seeing it as a medium to advertise positions to reach specific demographics such as the social media aware; or at least to notify of new opportunities with a strapline and link to a fuller advert, with its speed and openness.  I guess similarly the CV tweet would need to tease to a fuller CV and be used in conjunction with all other mediums.

 You can follow us to receive our job alerts at www.twitter.com/TFPL_jobs 

 #TFPLjobs

Libraries to store all UK web content

This is an interesting article on libraries storing and
preserving web content:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-22028738

Spring is in the Air...

I think we are all hoping that is true. The daffodils and crocuses are trying hard to push through and be seen and on this theme it’s always a great reminder to our candidates to reflect on where you have got to in your career development and what you can be doing to push yourself to the next level of your own career  path. 

So if you do find yourself in a reflective mood over the Easter break, and you can’t physically eat any more chocolate eggs, why don’t you dig out your current CV and breathe some new life into your current profile.   

Our team of Consultants is always on hand (when they’re not busy eating chocolate eggs themselves!) to meet up and refresh your registration so please do get back in touch. If you’ve previously been registered, send us your latest CV and if you haven’t been in to meet with one of the team then it’s probably high time to push your head into the spring sunshine and focus on your own growth and next steps.

Happy Easter everyone!

Adapt and evolve – the only way to survive

I attended the UKCIF meeting last night with Gordon Murray Smith talking on competitive intelligence lessons learned within the dynamic mobile telecoms industry from his perspective from his time with Nokia.  I was rather surprised to learn that Nokia started out in 1865 in wood pulp and paper before moving to rubber, cables, car phones and then eventually the mobile phones and services we know them for today.   Gordon’s talk was not only informative but an interesting look at how quickly technology has developed a key illustration being the development and re-invention of the handsets.

The message that came out of the talk for me was that although it’s fairly common sense that to survive in business you need to adapt and evolve to what the market needs, what isn’t always considered is how to do it in the right time.  It seems that as businesses develop and grow the challenge becomes not necessarily about the understanding of the market and development of new ideas but taking action to make those ideas a reality.  Large organisations need to address how to maintain the ability to be agile and nimble to turn innovation into action.  Some of this comes down to having a leadership that are open to investing in and developing new ideas, some comes down to being able to have a critical focus on what new ideas are going to have the most impact for the business.  What was certainly clear was that having huge amounts of money to spend on innovation did not necessarily make it more effective in terms of capturing the next big idea in the marketplace.

Recruitment: How to get the best out of TFPL.........and all your own efforts

http://careers.guardian.co.uk/working-with-recruiters-how-to-guide

This article in The Guardian, about the value of engaging with a Recruitment Consultant, is well worth a read. Please follow the link for the full article.

The most powerful asset TFPL has, and the best reason to use a Recruitment Consultant is the power of advocacy - based on trust and expertise.

Embraced by many organisations, RPO (recruitment process outsourcing) has largely ignored the value of advocacy in the market place. However, whilst portals and administrators produce a lean process, semi-automated recruitment systems are not designed to celebrate or differentiate the individual.

The same might be said for most job sites. The systems do produce management information, which helps firms manage a large volume of transactions, but at the same time, such processes make it difficult for an individual's talent, a go-getting firm or an extraordinary opportunity to stand out.  Pre-designed fields and indexing can't cater well for every need and won't rise to a challenge. In the real world, we need both RPO and full service recruitment companies to complement each other.

For customers, the true value of our expertise lies in the advocacy, expert advice and individual attention that TFPL gives. The advice in this article is excellent - find a good recruiter (we're here) and work with them constructively.

If you would like to talk to TFPL about your career, team or organisation's needs, please email to recruitment@tfpl.com for an appointment or contact me, Julia Hordle, on 020 7332 6093 for a confidential discussion.