Bermuda's first human resources conference will kick off today in the Southampton Princess and will focus on the new Employment Act which comes into effect next month.

Best Practices in Human Resource Management Conference and Exposition hopes to attract between 100 and 150 delegates.

Most delegates are expected to be local, but some are flying in from abroad including keynote speaker Helen Drinan, president of the Society for Human Resource Management who will speak about taking human resources into the new millennium and about how people are the new focus of companies.

The one-day event will focus on best practices.

"We expect there will be a great deal of interest in the briefing on terminating employees in accordance with the law, given by Ronnie Myers, of Marshall, Diel and Myers, and a talk on the Employment Act 2000 'Are you ready for March 1, 2002?'," said HR Associates partner Belinda Chiaramonte.

"There are a lot of companies out there who are not ready for the Employment Act when it comes into effect in March, and this will be a chance for them to find out more about this."