Following on Omega’s highly successful conference with the same topic, held in Johannesburg in March of this year, we decided to take this theme in the form of a one day workshop to London. The workshop was structured to highlight the risks and responsibilities which face the management of modern companies with plenty of time for discussion and debate. Central topics explored included:

• What are the essential characteristics of the corporate environment of the 21^st Century?

• What are the vulnerabilities facing companies?

• What are the risks companies confront?

• How does management handle these risks?

All of these issues were dealt with by a truly impressive panel of speakers representing many very high profile global companies including Ernst & Young, PricewaterhouseCoopers, IBM, and the Control Risks Group amongst others (see below). Also represented was the US Embassy in the UK, in the form of Joyce Rabens, Minister for Economic Affairs at the Embassy in London. Other more technical topics explored included current international trends in auditing, the container industry and the risks faced, bribery and corruption in the international economy, the challenges faced by corporate leadership and information security.