Mike Madden
GENERAL COUNSEL
FTR GROUP PTY LTD and FOR THE RECORD LIMITED
BRISBANE, QUEENSLAND, AUSTRALIA
4:30 am
Wake up for my weekly morning ride with my local grupetto — a group of six cyclists. Before leaving, I quickly scroll through emails from our Denver and Dublin offices and deal with any urgent matters.
5:00 am
The gruppetto meets below Mount Coot-ha, which overlooks the city of Brisbane. After a strenuous 25-mile ride up the mountain and around the Brisbane River, we stop at a French café for a quick coffee.
7:00 am
Head home to have breakfast with my family. My two-year-old son Walter loves pancakes and eats them while we chat about his day at day care. I also spend time with my five-month-old daughter Vivienne. I am trying to encourage her to say “mamma,” but she mostly just giggles. I love starting my day this way. Afterwards, I catch up on the news and get organized for my day at the office.
8:30 am
Arrive at the office and take a call with external counsel in New York. He updates me on further developments regarding a potential patent litigation matter and proposes possible strategies moving forward.
9:00 am
Review draft contracts and specifications on a couple of tenders in the United Kingdom and Hong Kong.
11:00 am
Take a short break and walk out to grab a coffee before my next meeting.
11:15 am
Meet with the group CFO and company secretary to discuss legal budgets across different business units for the coming financial year. We outline some securities exchange compliance requirements.
12:00 pm
Head to our barrister’s chambers for a conference with our external counsel. We discuss a civil litigation matter and an upcoming application for summary judgment.
1:30 pm
Quick lunch at Sam’s Café, which serves as a chance to catch up with the ACC Australia Vice President Karen Grumley, who works in the building next to my office. We both have very young families so we swap parenting tips and tales.
12:15 pm
Meeting with our group CIO where we discuss our organizational information security policy and document the “role of legal” in the incident response and business continuity plan. We also discuss “Brexit” and the reforms to the EU Data Protection Directive to better understand how they will impact our business. We agree to present a joint paper to the executive team on the changes and likely requirements for our EU operations at the next executive management meeting in two weeks.
3:00 pm
Meeting with the group CEO to update him on progress of litigation matters.
4:00 pm
Review of our Support and Maintenance Terms of Service with our support lead. He suggests an edit to the contract document because they are changing some of the back-end processes as part of a new version of software that will be released later this year.
5:00 pm
Catch up on emails and update priority lists for things that can be dealt with tomorrow. I also complete my quarterly legal report for the company’s next board of directors meeting.
6:00 pm
Call our Dublin office to consider the need for cross-licensing of some IP with a partner organization, define the best way to document that arrangement, and explain how joint IP created during the partnership is split at the end of the term.
7:00 pm
Arrive home for bath and story time with my kids. We always read three stories before bed. Tonight, Walter selects Mega Machines, The Singing Mermaid, and When You Wish Upon a Star (my personal favorite as it has beautiful illustrations). My wife Emma and I share the reading. After kisses and goodnights, we put Walter and Vivienne to bed. Once the kids are settled, my wife and I catch up on the day over dinner.
8:00 pm
Catch up on some general reading, including some papers for an ACC board subcommittee call tomorrow morning on career mobility. The subcommittee is made up of staff from the United States, Abu Dhabi, and of course Australia! Brisbane is almost a day ahead of the East Coast of the United States, so a call at noon Eastern Standard Time is 2 am (Thursday) in Brisbane. Conduct a final check of my email and set my alarm clock for 1:45 am so I have time to grab a coffee and make sure dial-in details work.
9:00 pm
Organize my home office and set up my notes, laptop, dial-in details, and coffee machine for the 2 am meeting and call it a night.
