Courts Excellence in a Changing World: Highlights from Day 2

The second day of the Courts Excellence in a Changing World conference was even better than the first with a number of best practices demonstrating court excellence. Many of these best practices involve technology innovations that provide the foundation for transformation.

The best practices shared provided the courts capabilities for 24×7 citizen services, reduced costs, increased transparency, access from anywhere at anytime, increased citizen satisfaction, and more.

Agenda highlights from day 2 included:

Welcome keynote: Jeff Apperson, CEO, IACA

Panel: Best Practices in Technology to Maximize Efficiency and Public Confidence.  Disruptive technology innovations including the Internet, smart phone applications, and social media are impacting the courts and providing capabilities that are enhancing the confidence of citizens and society with the courts ranging from e-case registration to virtual interpretation.

Moderator: Trevor Pegley, Director,Visionhall Information Systems Limited

Abdulrahim Ahmad Al Mudhareb, Director of IT, Dubai Courts

See Kee Oon, Chief District Judge at Subordinate Courts Singapore

Esteemed Judge Mustafa Erol, Deputy Undersecretary of the Ministry of Justice in Turkey

Majed Al Adwan, Director of the King Abdullah Project for the development of the judiciary, Ministry of Justice in Saudi Arabia

Panel: Enhancing Stakeholder Alignment. Managing the interests of stakeholders is critical to achieve excellence in the work of Courts. Courts cannot function in isolation from other sectors and their partners who share influential roles with them. This collaboration requires the development of effective programs to ensure a positive impact on Courts performance and to avoid any shortcomings. Among the most important partners are the government, the private sector and educational institutions.

Moderator:  Cathy Hiuser, IACA President-Elect

Professor Gregory Reinhardt, Executive Director, The Australasian Institute of Judicial Administration

Shirley S. Abrahamson, Chief Justice of the Wisconsin Supreme Court

HE Justice Dr. Jamal Hussein Al Sumaiti, Director General, Dubai Judicial Institute

Sumaia Khalifa Hammad, Director of Communication and Business Development at Dubai Smart Government (DSG)

Panel: Empowering the Administrators: Pros and Cons

Moderator: HE Justice Ali Al Madhani, Chairman of IACA Middle East Board and Justice of the DIFC Courts

Ms. Sonja Gruevska, Court Administrator in the Supreme Court of Macedonia

Vladimir Passos DeFreitas, Former President of the Brazilian Federal Judges Association

Midas Marquez, Chief Administrator for the Philippines Courts

David Vaughn, Chemonics, USAID FAIR Justice Project

Maureen E. Conner, Ph.D.Associate Professor

Global Economic Instability – Consequences on Budgets and Caseload. Local and global economic variables and other more complicated matters that sometimes suddenly burden the Courts directly influence Courts workload. This reality calls for dealing with this aspect of exchanging experiences and drawing on lessons from contemporary experiences in this area.

Moderator: Jeff Apperson, CEO, IACA

Judge Emad Meswadah, Head of Court Administration for the High Judicial Council of Palestine

Julien Vilquin, Doing Business Project Team World Bank

Erica Bosio, Doing Business Project Team, World Bank

Closing keynotes: Hamad Al Badi, Ministry of Justice and Richard Foster President, IACA

In closing, I would like to thank all participants for sharing best practices for court excellence, and all the sponsors including Dubai Courts, DIFC Courts, and the International Association for Court Administration (IACA).

I look forward to seeing everyone again for the Seventh International Conference, Sydney, Australia September 24-26, 2014.