Discovery Resources

by Dennis Kiker – Director, Professional Services, Fios, Inc.

I’ve noticed a theme in many of my conversations with outside counsel recently when the topic of the Sedona Cooperation Proclamation comes up.  First there is a tightening around the mouth and the eyes narrow just a bit.  It is not dissimilar to the look my daughters would give me when I asked whether they had tried talking it over with the person that was mad at them.  Just a momentary thing, but there was that flash that said, “Yes, I know this is what I should be doing, but you really don’t understand what my life iscontinue…

by Nancy Patton, Professional Services, Fios, Inc.

In the first two posts in this series, I’ve emphasized that Legal and IT are the core building blocks of any Discovery Response Team. Representatives of other departments can be added to the team as required; depending on the organization’s structure, individuals from records management and compliance also may serve on the Discovery Response Team, as will members from other key business units. If desired, external partners including outside counsel, key vendors, off-site data storage managers and e-discovery consultants may also be added to the team for their knowledge around ESI.

Members of the team should bring a unique perspective on ESI management,continue…

by Nancy Patton, Professional Services, Fios, Inc.

In my first post in this series last week, I discussed why a Discovery Response Team is a critical component to an effective e-discovery response.  This week, let’s talk about the steps you must consider in order to assure the greatest success in building your Discovery Response Team:

1. Establish a team charter. This is a formal document that should address the team’s mandate, goals and objectives. It should define the elements of the team itself, and it should specify the resources the team will require.
2. Identify the Right People. your Discovery Response Team should represent an interdepartmental mix of legal

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by Richard Wersinger, Technical Trainer, Fios, Inc.

In their August 2009 Law Technology News article, Robbery?: Are we cheating clients if we don’t purge duplicates? (Law Technology News, August 2009, Vol 16 No. 8, ) authors Anne Kershaw and Joseph Howie suggest it is possible to gain review efficiencies by deduping across multiple custodians.  They wrote:

While many techniques (e-mail threading, concept clustering, analytics) can improve review efficiencies, we focused on deduping across custodians, because it is readily available and can be implemented in most review programs. It is the low-hanging fruit of litigation cost control.

A single example: If Bob sends an e-mail to

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by Eric Sedwick, Professional Services, Fios, Inc.

A few years ago, the Electronic Discovery Reference Model developed its signature framework – taking the term signature literally as it named the model after itself – and delineated management guidelines for the primary phases of the e-Discovery process.  After adding two new projects for 2009-10, some might say the EDRM just can’t leave well enough alone.  Among the new projects is the Information Management Reference Model (IMRM), a project designed to “provide a common, practical, flexible framework” for records management, much in the same vein as the original EDRM.

Some might ask: why isn’t one model enough?  Information Governancecontinue…

by Nancy Patton, Fios Professional Services, Fios, Inc.

It’s not an original concept to say that successful business systems are built on a foundation of people, process and technology.  Also not surprising are the difficulties that arise when addressing the “people” part of the equation, and especially in regard to e-discovery.  Although a company may have stellar processes and state-of-the art technologies to address its e-discovery obligations, they may be for nought without the right people in place to implement them.

When an organization receives notification of a lawsuit or regulatory investigation, one of the first concerns the legal department should consider is whether or not it will be ablecontinue…

by Dennis Kiker, Director of Professional Services, Fios, Inc. I meet with companies every week to talk about e-Discovery and related issues.  The one question I get asked more than any other is, “What are other companies doing?”  And the number one object of that question of late is records management.  Although it seems to be changing, the unfortunate answer to that question posed about that particular topic is “not enough.”  There appear to be a number of reasons for that response, even excluding budgetary constraints.  One is that there are typically a number of different constituencies to satisfy.  The legal department wants to reduce the volume of datacontinue…

by Aaron Pippin, Senior Project Manager, Fios, Inc.

It is well-known that retaining a client is much easier and more cost-effective than finding a new one.  In most cases, the provider’s goal is to further the work with a client and eventually get to a point where a partnership develops.  As that partnership grows, the trust factor grows, work flow becomes efficient, and both parties begin to operate like a well oiled machine.

In e-Discovery, the key component (or oil, to continue the metaphor) to maintaining this partnership is the quality of case management.  A law firm may send a large set of data to a provider because they knowcontinue…

by Dara Scott, Client Delivery Manager, Fios, Inc.

Do unto others as you would have done unto you.  This simple proverb, if followed, will surely increase the productivity and accuracy of your document review.  A Kansas State University researcher found that happy employees have higher levels of job-related performance than do unhappy employees.

With document review, finding happy employees is not always an easy achievement.  Many who find themselves reviewing documents all day are bright and capable law school graduates, who never anticipated being subjected to document review and the associated salaries.  As a result, many are not happy to be on a doc review assignment.

Thecontinue…

by Aaron Cronan, Esq., Fios, Inc.

What strikes me as odd about Senator Specter’s proposed bill to change the pleading standards, (see article:  Twombly Revisited) is not the age-old left v. right conflict over liberal pleadings, but the total lack of specifics in the bill. This bill rewinds 52 years of precedent, merely to avoid the last three years. Under the bill, courts will apply the standard in Conley v. Gibson, 355 U.S. 41 (1957) to 12(b)(6) and (e) motions. Boy, that is some inspired bill writing.  If the legislature is going to countermand Supreme Court holdings with a law, how about some pithycontinue…