The Importance of People and Process in Electronic Discovery

http://ow.ly/9yurU

An article by  Daryl Shetterly on the e-Discovery Myth website of the law firm LeClair Ryan.

The article discusses issues that pertain to the planning and workflow process associated with the eDiscovery requirements associated with a specific litigation.

The article states, "More often than not the “eDiscovery problem” is really a communication problem, a planning problem or a failure to get the right people involved until it is too late to complete the task without Herculean effort that is disruptive to the organization. Everyone has their war stories, here are a few of the situations I hear of most often:

• waiting too long to begin identifying sources of relevant data – resulting in a late start that makes each phase of the project a mad dash to production;
• not properly preparing for the meet & confer process – resulting in a lost opportunity to fully utilize the cooperative potential of the process;
• collecting documents too quickly – resulting in multiple collection requests to IT or the expense of using outside resources to re-collect once the scope of collection changes;
• gross underestimation of the time and money required to complete the project – resulting in budget overruns and missed production deadlines;
• using the wrong document review technology – resulting in inefficient and costly document review based on an inability to leverage technology properly; and
• beginning document review too early – resulting in a costly re-review when the issues are clarified."

The article further states, "Both eDiscovery and project management are complex topics that are not mastered by attending a CLE or reading a few books. Quarterbacking the eDiscovery aspect of a case is best done by someone who has been doing so long enough to see the anomalies and to know how easily the budget or timeline can go off the rails."