Help needed from trade, business and workplace reporters re: e-discovery planning

By Patrick Eitenbichler

We read a lot in the press about e-discovery technologies and the business risks and challenges associated with responding to litigation requests.  The issues around capturing, archiving and managing content like email is widespread, in large part because of the attention garnered by compliance and government regulations from the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure and Freedom of Information.

What we aren’t seeing much of in the mainstream IT trades is advice and learnings from the trenches that isn’t purely technology focused. Creating a proactive regulatory governance strategy is as much about the cultural implications and pressures placed on the current workforce as it is about how to select the best ‘widget’ that meets customer demands.

IT people, records managers and legal people have not traditionally worked side by side.  They don’t typically speak the same language.  Just like the 90s forced business and IT types to align priorities, the e-discovery market is creating a new wave of needs for cross-business functional areas to communicate, partner and come together to form integrated plans.

Companies need best practices from those leading the pack in breaking down these organizational silos.

Living in a highly litigious environment is a reality we aren’t going to escape.  Issues like overcoming functional role stereotypes, enlisting the help of project management professionals, ‘meet and confer’ intermediaries, regional implications of legislation and compliance demands, and specialized training for e-discovery planning have not yet been exposed to the fullest by mainstream media.

I’d love to see more trade, business and even workplace reporters cover the changing roles of organizations as they attempt to do cross-functional proactive e-discovery planning.