E-Discovery: Managing the Unmanageable

The e-mail or voice-mail message has a familiar and ominous tone: "This is (insert name of in-house counsel here) from the law department. It looks like there may be some litigation involving (insert product name). We don't have a copy of the complaint (or subpoena) yet, but we know we are going to have a pretty tight deadline for responding, and we will need to coordinate with your IT department. You may receive a call from (insert name of law firm you have never heard of before) in the next couple of days to discuss what we need to do in terms of data preservation and our response. If you have any questions, please call or shoot me an e-mail. Thanks very much and have a good day."

And so it begins. It will not be a good day. This message may be the call to arms in an electronic discovery battle that may materially affect your IT plans, projects, personnel and budget.

The critical qualifier is "may." The legal press is chock-full of articles, written by lawyers for lawyers, about how to manage e-discovery. Missing has been straightforward guidance for CIOs about their e-discovery management role. I hope to fill this gap by providing concrete and common-sense steps that you and your IT team can take to effectively manage the size and cost of e-discovery. The first step in this process is to understand some of the e-discovery rules of engagement.