Project Planning and Management

in E-Discovery

DAVID A. ELLIS – MAYER BROWNBROWNING E. MAREAN – DLA PIPER

What are we talking about?

PROJECT MANAGEMENT• Process of planning, organizing, securing and managing

resources to achieve specific goals

EDISCOVERY PROJECTS• Efforts to preserve, collect and analyze electronically

stored information when the prospect of litigation arises

MANAGEMENT OF EDISCOVERY PROJECTS• The discipline of planning, organizing, securing and

managing resources to bring about the successful completion of e-Discovery projects

KEY THEMES

• COMMUNICATION– No such thing as too much

• DOCUMENTATION– At every phase

• EXPERTISE– If you don’t have it, get it

• FLEXIBILITY– Projects are rarely static

• FRONTLOADING– Spend now to save later

Elements of Project Management

COST• Ensuring the project is completed within budgetTIME• Ensuring the project is completed in a timely fashion and

deadlines are metSCOPE• Ensuring the project includes all the required work and only

the required workQUALITY• Ensuring the project satisfies the needs for which it was

undertaken

BEST PRACTICES

The Phases of E-Discovery Projects

• INITIATION• PLANNING• COLLECTION• PROCESSING• CULLING• REVIEW• PRODUCTION• CLOSING

INITIATION

• Identify the objectives: what are we doing and why?– Define the project– Delineate goals, milestones, etc.– Institute a legal hold– Determine the budget early, if you can

• Create the team– What are the main activities needed for this project?– Who has expertise in this area?– Will we need an outside vendor?– Define roles and responsibilities

The Project Management Team

INITIATION: COMMON PITFALLS

• Failure to implement and monitor a legal hold• Not understanding the scope or the scope

creep

INITIATION: COST MANAGEMENT

• Understanding apples and oranges pricing from vendors– Collection costs– Processing costs– Hosting costs– Data storage fees

• What can be done in-house?– Billable time– Data storage fees

PLANNING

• Identify potentially relevant information• Create a budget estimate• Preserve potentially relevant information• Consider tools to assist• Create a plan document

Identification of Potentially Responsive Information

START WITH THE CLIENT• Interview client IT personnel, make them part of the team• Review data map• Interview potential custodians (what do they have and

where?)• Identify the types of ESI involved• Where is ESI kept by the enterprise?• Where is ESI really kept?• Identify privacy or confidentiality issues• Identify third parties who may have information• Determine the need for forensics

Budgeting

• Prepare a budget estimate• Templates are available• Manage expectations– Best case v. worst case– Identify variables up front– Revise as variables become fixed

• Communicate– Appeal to your audience– Are you spending now to save later?– Are you putting client in the most defensible position?

Preservation of Potentially Responsive Information

• Suspend document destruction practices• Identify and interview key players• Issue and monitor litigation hold

PLANNING: COMMON PITFALLS

• Overlooking the value of the client’s IT personnel

• Collecting using Drag and Drop – usually not sufficient

• Not conducting custodian interviews• Cross-border issues for international clients

PLANNING: COST MANAGEMENT

• When identifying key players, consider tiered approach.

• When interviewing key players, start with a questionnaire.

• When issuing a litigation hold, consider litigation hold software applications to automate the process of issuing and monitoring compliance.

• Know the volume and potential cost before you decide on a method of collection.

COLLECTION

• Identify the key players and physical location of data

• Determine who will be present for collection• Manage expectations• Determine chain of custody for data post-

collection• Document the process

COLLECTION: COMMON PITFALLS

• Sending a vendor to a collection without counsel

• Not being prepared for the collection• Over collection• Under collection • Self-collection• Cross-border issues

COLLECTION: COST MANAGEMENT

• Collection is typically charged at an hourly rate plus the cost of hard drives.

• Do we need to collect deleted files? Slack space?

• Consider a targeted collection• Consider a remote collection

PROCESSING: WHAT IS IT?

• Steps taken by Litigation Support or a Vendor on collected data to make it ready for review and/or production

• Includes:– Data and metadata extraction– De-duplication– Filtering/searching– Data conversion– Creation of TIF images– Performing text extraction– Creating load files– Loading to Relativity for review– Exporting from Relativity for production

PROCESSING

• In-House v. Vendor– Timing– Volume– Budget

• Early analysis of data is critical

PROCESSING: COMMON PITFALLS

• Unilaterally deciding on search terms or date restrictions

• Global de-duplication of data and later discovering source of data is important

• Failure to account for source code• Failure to address images and media files for

review

PROCESSING: COST MANAGEMENT

• In-house v. vendor– Consider charges per GB or per hour– Consider cost of drives, disks or FTPs for

deliverables– Consider storage fees

CULLING

• Filtering• File types• Prioritization of custodians• De-duplication– Global or by custodian?

• ECA tools

CULLING: COMMON PITFALLS & COST MANAGEMENT

• Beware of hidden costs– For extracting data from ECA tools– For re-filtering

• Failure to document searches, record search terms and combinations of search terms

REVIEW

• Create review plan– Create a reasonable timeline– Single-tier or multi-tier– Logistics

• Staffing• Training• Supervision• Quality control

– Prioritization of review population– Privilege review and log

REVIEW: COMMON PITFALLS

• Failing to supervise a review team• Failing to batch documents for review• Failing to review hidden or extracted data in

native review

REVIEW: COST MANAGEMENT

• Consider native review• Consider technology assisted review• Technical issues– Litigation Support time– Vendor time

PRODUCTION

• Coordinate with vendor and Litigation Support• Consider special requirements• Document in detail• Quality control at every phase

PRODUCTION: COMMON PITFALLS

• Not being prepared– Know what form you agreed to, what form is

required• Not allowing enough time– To quality control– To resolve discrepancies

CLOSING

• Complete documentation• Lessons learned• Templates for future use

SUMMARY

• Project management is a valued skill• Communication is key• Get expertise when you need it• Strive for defensibility

Questions