I have always done free ‘good karma’ calls for former or future clients. I am happy to share off-the-cuff knowledge, contact info or resource links without any expectations. I can see why an attorney would hesitate to provide legal advice without a formal relationship. I frequently run into questions that would require my time and effort to understand their infrastructure, policies, user practices, etc. [...]
Take Rob Robinson’s 5th survey on PC adoption. My recent engagements have had me elbow deep leveraging analytics and supporting retained counsel in the relevance hunt, so I answered Rob’s five questions this year. PC/TAR systems, models, workflows and usage cases have gotten COMPLICATED. Complicated enough that Rob has complied a background list of definitions for the many different shades of machine learning. I [...]
Most eDiscovery M&A is all about consolidating customer bases or creating a more exciting technology solution. Press releases focus on the ‘better together’ story and frequently skip hard details like potential redundancies or layoffs. The snippet above about a ‘dedicated RelativityOne environment in Canada’ caught my attention. Legility has not yet responded to my questions about whether this instance is Legility owned, hosted and [...]
When Jay Leib and team created the NexLP Story Engine™ in 2013 it only ran on top of a Relativity instance. That made sense given the team’s deep Relativity knowledge and relationships. I always wondered how long that dependence would last following kCura’s 2016 acquisition of Content Analyst. It lasted a lot longer than I initially expected. So the real question here is how [...]
We are living in an age of unprecedented layoffs, work stoppages, downsizing, and general unemployment. I frequently call out weak corporate termination policies/protocols during discovery health assessments. It is a complicated process with many players, data sources and heightened emotions. Most people hate confrontations or making a scene. Any fuzziness in your separation protocols may result in former employees walking away with corporate data [...]
Session workflow or check list to review separation of employment policies and protocols from a discovery readiness perspective. This is not actual policies or protocols. Instead, it is an extended bullet list of separation scenarios to consider and decision elements that your policies/protocols should cover. Every work environment has unique data systems, business models, risks and corporate cultures that must be considered when developing [...]
Far too many of the marketing emails that wind up in my feeds or Inboxes do not convey the ‘simple’ functionality of the product or service. It is frustrating to have to go to a web site to figure out that SimpleLegal is a cloud based legal billing management platform. eBilling is a reality for corporations with any real litigation profile. Since Mitratech seems [...]
Always interesting to see a new marketing term floated to see if it will stick. Zack provides good context and differentiation of the ‘New Law’ solutions being spun out of firms. We have known that the traditional partner track firm model has been slowly eroding. The days of massed associates pulling 12 hours coding shifts to plow through millions of documents are ending. Many [...]
The eDiscovery market continues to stratify into global players and boutique shops. The merger of HaystackID and NightOwl does seem to have potential synergy since both focused on corporate managed services at different phases of the eDiscovery lifecycle. It will be interesting to see if we have a small round of layoffs after the dust settles. Can the merged company successfully pull market share [...]
Refreshing blog calling out classic eDiscovery sales/billing/pricing games. Our industry is rife with reps who are pressured to bid low and bill high. I do not recall being called an ‘ediscovery wonk’, but if the hat fits I will wear it. Since RFP engagements regularly follow up my typical strategy assessment or health check engagements, I see these games all the time. Cat’s basic [...]