Have you ever crawled into bed exhausted, but since it was just a “normal” day, you can’t quite figure out why you feel so drained? Is your team struggling to perform at their best? It may not be your fault! Karen Dillon’s research on high performers reveals a hidden culprit: microstress. Microstress is so subtle that you might not even know you’re facing it, but it’s affecting your performance at work and your everyday life. In this talk, Karen will define and identify microstress — and, more importantly, what you can do about it.
TRAINERS
Karen Dillon, NYTimes Best Selling Author, Contributing Editor HBR, Harvard Business Review (HBR)
Building Agile Legal Teams: Strategy, Structure and Capability (Dublin)
As regulatory complexity and organisational pressure intensify, legal leaders must build teams that are not only efficient, but adaptable, resilient and strategically aligned. Agility today is less about structure alone and more about mindset, capability and leadership judgement under constraint. Grounded in real leadership experience, this will be a candid, peer-level discussion with time for participant exchange.
CHAIR
Emer Walsh, CLO, Gas Networks Ireland
SPEAKERS
Alan Daly, Group Head of Legal, Electricity Supply Board (ESB)
With growing scrutiny on the sector, understanding how the Ombudsman interprets issues of service delivery, accountability, and trust has never been more important.
CHAIR
Mark Foxcroft, Partner, Devonshires Solicitors
SPEAKERS
Richard Blakeway, Housing Ombudsman, Housing Ombudsman Service
This masterclass explores how senior leaders can identify, evaluate, and execute successful mergers and acquisitions to accelerate growth and create long-term value. Participants will examine the full M&A lifecycle — from strategic rationale and target identification to due diligence, deal structuring, and post-merger integration.
Boardroom Capital: Where Investment is Heading – and Why It Matters
This Chairs & NED meeting explores how today’s capital markets are shaping strategic decision-making at board level. Led by Investec, this session begins with a top-down view of public markets, macroeconomic conditions, and investor sentiment, before drilling into the sectors, themes, and geographies attracting capital.
CHAIR
Diane Moore, Independent Non-Executive Director, Cantor Fitzgerald
Have ORAs Got Trustees To The Next Level In Terms of Scheme Governance?
As the first tranche of schemes approach the deadline for signing their first ORA, we reflect on what we have learned, and what could be done better going into the next cycle and the ongoing ORA process. We will also discuss a response to the challenges of seeing the ORA as not just a one-off compliance exercise but as a valuable ongoing part of business-as-usual. Chairs of pension schemes can also take the opportunity to reflect on whether the implementation of the General Code more generally has brought real governance benefits for their schemes.
SPEAKERS
Jenny Gibbons, Head of Trustee Governance Consulting, WTW | Mat Backus, Pension risk specialist, WTW
This Executive to Non-Executive Director masterclass is designed to support senior executives in successfully transitioning into non-executive (NED) roles.
A Bridge Over Troubled Waters: The River Island Restructuring Plan
The UK retail sector has been grappling with subdued consumer demand, an accelerated switch to online shopping during the pandemic and rising costs squeezing profit margins. High Street and mixed channel retailers face stiff competition from online-only stores. This was the backdrop to clothing retail brand River Island sustaining losses in 2023 and 2024.
