Contract Law for Non-Lawyers
Contract Law for Non-Lawyers
Contract Law for Non-Lawyers is an intensely practical guide through the essentials of contract law, exploring such details as when a contract will be required, when you have a contract (and don’t necessarily know it), what types of contract exist and the effect of statutes on your contractual arrangements.
This popular training course also scrutinises what happens when things go wrong, including how you can get out of a contract, options for assessing damages and remedies for breach and looking at the contractual implications of working in an e-commerce environment. You will grasp the crucial ingredients required for a good contract, and gain tips for understanding contractual material.
Key Learning Outcomes
- Learn the essential ingredients to a contract
- The offer, acceptance and certainty
- Create contracts that can be enforced
- Lessons on how to create good contracts – form, content
- Reviewing your contract from a risk management perspective
- Tips for reading contracts
- Estoppel – the double-edged sword
- Statutory impact on contract law
- When contracts can be set aside
- Reviewing remedies for breach or repudiation
- Assessing damages – what are your risks?
Who Should Attend
Those involved with drafting or editing contracts, and those wanting more knowledge around how contracts may impact themselves and their organisations.
Past Attendee Testimonials
Excellent course, met expectations, informative, good content and entertaining.
I found Terry to be personable, interesting, engaging & easy to understand with great examples.
Your new role and responsibilities
- What makes a great manager?
- The transition to your new role
- Building on your current strengths
- Establishing your credibility from the start
- What you should no longer be doing
Managing and motivating people for improved performance
- Developing an effective people management style that works for you
- Setting team goals and roles, and allocating tasks
- Setting expectations for your direct reports
- Understanding what motivates different personalities
- Leading by example to gain commitment
- Developing people to realise their individual potential
- Engaging your team and recognising achievements
- The benefits and challenges of delegation
- Turning around poor performers
Time Management
- Prioritising – why this is important if you want to be an effective leader
- How to manage the negative impact of interruptions, so that we get more proactive work done & find time for coaching our team members
- How to confidently say “no”/ “not now” without offending people
Managing other people
- Identify & address specific ‘challenges’ you face when managing your team
- Leader as coach – an analogy for what good leadership looks like, in your role
- Setting expectations of performance & behaviour: Helping people understand what ‘good looks like’ in their role, so they can confidently deliver results
- Recap: Leader as coach analogy from module 3 & link to today’s session
- How do we define feedback?
- How to prepare for feedback: collecting and articulating the correct information so that our team members remain engaged in the conversation
- Giving effective feedback:
- Praise – ‘catching people doing things right’ to continue to motivate them
- Developmental feedback & coaching – how to support people who are below your expectation, so they can ‘get back on track’
- Practise the above conversations, using real-life scenarios
Developing your communication style
- Opening the lines of communication with and amongst your team
- Matching your communication style to the needs of individual team members
- Staying connected with your team
- What to tell your team and what not
- The importance of face-to-face communication
- Tackling those difficult conversations
- The art of giving constructive feedback in a positive manner
- Developing your listening skills
- Understanding what can cause misunderstandings and disengagement
Using assertiveness to manage difficult situations
- Projecting confidence and assertiveness in your role
- Handling conflict within the team
- Dealing with resistance from previous peers
- Protecting your team from unreasonable external pressure
- Dealing with disciplinary issues – some key rules to get you started
- Picking your battles – knowing when to take action
Managing your growing workload
- What to do when you are being pulled in multiple directions?
- Techniques for coping with a large and growing workload
- How to prioritise and focus on your core KPIs
- Setting time aside for people management
- Using meetings effectively to achieve progress
- How to delegate and still achieve results
- Minimising disruptions and reducing time spent reacting
How to avoid committing common management mistakes
- What are the main causes of management failure?
- Common pitfalls to avoid as a new manager
- Understanding what works for you and your team
- Building up your team’s abilities rather than trying to do everything yourself
- Letting go of tasks
Continuing to grow as a manager
- Defining success as a manager: group discussion
- Taking a proactive approach to your own professional development
- Core management skills to focus on next
- Spotting opportunities for growth in your role
- What could hold you back?
A popular leading specialist in legal training, Terry Reid combines teaching with legal consultancy work across Asia and the Pacific. Terry has over 20 years as a barrister and solicitor and teaching experience at a tertiary level, having begun to lecture law after time in legal practice. Terry was educated at the Universities of Auckland and University of Melbourne and now mixes teaching, a law practice and legal consultancy across Asia and the Pacific.
Terry regularly provides courses for professional organisations and private sector clients, advising on topics such as contract law, strategic governance and regulatory reform in financial markets. He regularly provides advice to organisations such as the Asian Development Bank, World Bank and Governments’ on business law reform. design of reform programs as well as drafting legislative instruments.
As well as working in Australia and New Zealand he has worked extensively in South East Asia and the Pacific. He is currently the team leader on two major business law reform projects in the Solomon Islands and Vanuatu. This advisory work includes the provision of advice to Governments on business law policy, design of reform programs as well as drafting legislative instruments. A large part of this work involves the training of government officers and private sector participants on law reform issues.
Terry regularly presents to a wide range of audiences on business law topics. He has particular interests in contract law, corporations’ law and general business law including trade practices. He is a regular presenter at international conferences and has published widely in his areas of expertise.
Terry Reid
Facilitator, Contract & Legal
Register for this Event
This is a 2 day course; unless virtual. Courses start 9am (coffee & registration from 8.30am) and run until 4.30pm / 5.00 pm each day.
Expand dates below for more details.
May 5, 2026
- Last Minute $2699+gst per person
- Cliftons, Wellington
May 7, 2026
- Last Minute $2699+gst per person
- Cliftons, Auckland
August 4, 2026
- Last Minute $2699+gst per person
- Virtual
November 3, 2026
- Last Minute $2699+gst per person
- Cliftons, Wellington
November 5, 2026
- Last Minute $2699+gst per person
- Cliftons, Auckland
