latest news Archives - Cathy Wilcox Training

High-quality writing and drafting e-learning courses – rarer than hens’ teeth!

May 25, 2021 by Cathy Wilcox

When not delivering hundreds of virtual training and coaching sessions, I’ve spent much of my time in the past fourteen months working hard to produce e-learning versions of my most popular courses: Client-focused legal writing and Effective legal drafting. And…. [drumroll] I’m proud to announce that they are now available to buy. Whether you’re an individual wanting to develop your own written skills, or a small or large law firm looking for an alternative to live training for your people, we have something for you.

One firm has put 800 of its lawyers worldwide through the three drafting modules. Feedback has been very positive across the board – here are just a couple of snippets:

“I particularly appreciated how you were able to incorporate interactive learning elements (where I could put things into practice) despite the fact this was all done virtually. Unrelated to the substance, I also really appreciated the clean and uncluttered user interface going through the modules – really helped to keep everything digestible!” Junior lawyer at a US law firm

“I liked all the examples you gave and that they were categorised to make the point and then explain with examples and exercises. I really liked the interactive nature of the sessions – most particularly those exercises that allowed learning to be put into practice in context and the way the sessions built skills in a layered way. I appreciated your mini videos at the beginning of each segment explaining the ‘what and the why’ – you have a lovely calm and engaging style. I thought module 3 was especially effective.” Professional support lawyer

Zooming all over the place

June 21, 2020 by Cathy Wilcox

Instead of hopping on planes or trains most days of the week, I haven’t moved from my home office since coming back from skiing in mid-March. But I’ve still trained hundreds of people. This made me smile, and sums up my thoughts!

Some exciting bedtime reading

June 21, 2020 by Cathy Wilcox

I’ve just bought a book that will keep me busy for a while! I’ve wanted Kenneth Adams’s book for ages but it wasn’t available in the UK until now. It’s the most comprehensive text on contract drafting that I know of, and I’m really looking forward to getting stuck in!

Developing your staff remotely

March 26, 2020 by Cathy Wilcox

It’s been a rollercoaster few weeks, and we’re not through it yet. Interesting to see how my clients are reacting. At the start some were cancelling sessions, especially international ones. Now, more and more are realising the need to keep developing and challenging their people, especially while they’re isolated at home.
Ten days ago I’d done only one webinar in my life. I’ve now delivered six full seminars (1-2 hours) and many shorter coaching slots by Zoom, WebEx, BlueJeans, Lync, Skype, MS Teams, Loop-up and others! What a baptism of fire! I’m also training people every day on how to use Zoom (including some of my competitors). We need to pool our resources at times like these.

Some positive thoughts on the coronavirus crisis

March 19, 2020 by Cathy Wilcox

I write this sitting in my home office where I’ve been all week. On the first morning I was full of anxiety because I’d had nothing but cancellations of training sessions, first abroad and then also in the UK. But it’s amazing what can come out of adversity.
On Monday I signed up to Zoom and began thinking about remote training.
On Tuesday I delivered my first training session by Zoom, pushed to do it by the client. It was interactive and lively, with twelve delegates, and the feedback was great!
On Wednesday a good client offered to partner with me to develop some e-learning drafting training. This has given me the momentum to get going with something I’ve wanted to do for ages.
Today I’ve had Zoom calls with eight different clients and contacts – it’s just nice to see a friendly face when you’re otherwise working alone. Oh, and I’ve done an hour’s one-to-one coaching with someone I was already working with.
Tomorrow I have three back-to-back coaching sessions with lawyers from a Portuguese law firm. I’ve already trained them face to face, so it will be easy.
I’m wondering how I ever had time to travel all over the world to deliver live training! But there’s room for both in the world – I don’t think the remote training will ever disappear.
I’m now working on offering some public webinars – more on this soon. If you’d like to talk to me about remote training or coaching for your people, I’d love to hear from you!

A trio of grammar-related events

February 23, 2020 by Cathy Wilcox

Three things happened recently:
– I received a highly appropriate birthday card from my sister: great example of the “grocer’s apostrophe”.
– I read a new (to me) a book called “Grammar snobs are great big meanies” by June Casagrande. Such a great title, and a really good read. I learnt plenty about grammar in the US.
– I worked one to one with a lawyer this week to brush up his grammar. It’s amazing how many highly intelligent and accomplished professionals lack confidence in their grammar and punctuation. A whole generation of us missed out on proper grammar teaching at school unless we studied another language. But it’s never too late!

Tautology at the gym!

January 29, 2018 by Cathy Wilcox

The running machine is where I catch up on what’s hot and what’s not in the music world. I’m afraid the grammar geek in me couldn’t get over one lyric this morning. Great new song by Ramz – “Barking”. But his line “7 a.m. in the morning”… When else could 7 a.m. be? He could so easily have changed it to “7 o’clock in the morning”…

How to improve poor drafting

June 13, 2017 by Cathy Wilcox

I promised to redraft Article 25 of the General Data Protection Regulation (see my last post). Here’s my best effort so far. Unfortunately Word Press doesn’t let me indent, so it’s not as easy to read as it would be in real life:

1. When deciding how to process, and when processing, data, the controller must take appropriate technical and organisational measures such as using pseudonyms (the Measures).

2. Measures must be designed to:

(a) implement data protection principles (such as data minimisation) effectively; and

(b) integrate into the processing all safeguards necessary to:

(i) comply with the Regulation; and

(ii) protect the rights of data subjects.

3. In taking Measures, the controller must consider:

(a) the state of the art;

(b) the cost of complying with the Measures;

(d) the context and purpose for processing the data; and

(e) the likelihood or severity of the risks that processing the data might pose to rights and freedoms of individuals.

I’d welcome comments, or suggestions to improve the drafting! In my next post I’ll explain the techniques I used.

Worst drafting seen this week…

June 9, 2017 by Cathy Wilcox

Take a look at the General Data Protection Regulation, an EU regulation coming into force in May 2018. Article 25 is a 114-word cracker:

“Taking into account the state of the art, the cost of implementation and the nature, scope, context and purposes of processing as well as the risks of varying likelihood and severity for rights and freedoms of natural persons posed by the processing, the controller shall, both at the time of the determination of the means for processing and at the time of the processing itself, implement appropriate technical and organisational measures, such as pseudonymisation, which are designed to implement data-protection principles, such as data minimisation, in an effective manner and to integrate the necessary safeguards into the processing in order to meet the requirements of this Regulation and protect the rights of data subjects.”

Scoring it on my StyleWriter software gave it a “dreadful” and an “unreadable”! A client challenged me to redraft it – easy enough, you’d think, with plenty of lists and sub-clauses. But when you take a closer look, parts of it are ambiguous – and that’s the danger with poor drafting! Anyway, it’s work in progress while I work out the legal meaning. More next week…

Commas before “and” hit the headlines again

March 17, 2017 by Cathy Wilcox

I’m a big fan of putting a comma before “and” when it helps the reader and adds clarity. I read this in Metro yesterday:

“They needed a flat that was affordable but also within easy reach of work and Lewisham, with a DLR station, was perfect.”

With no comma after “and“, most of us will read “within easy reach of work and Lewisham“, get confused, and have to re-read it to make sense of it. A comma before the “and” would have solved the problem and made our lives easier.

What is the Oxford comma? It’s where, in a list of three or more items, you put a comma after the second-last item and before the “and“:

“Apples, bananas, and pears“.

Mostly you don’t need it, but occasionally it’s useful:

“I shop at Sainsbury’s, Marks and Spencer, and Lidl.” [I know that in reality M&S has an ampersand.]

The Americans are generally less keen than we are on the Oxford comma. Indeed the Maine Legislative Drafting Manual instructs lawmakers not to use it. But three truck drivers in Portland, Maine have just won a case in the appeal court that may cost Oakhurst Dairy millions of dollars in a dispute over overtime, just because of the lack of an Oxford comma.

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