eDiscovery Professionals: Order-taking or Consulting? – Introduction
July 18, 2012
I work with attorneys and electronic discovery professionals in a lot of law firms, and I witness a variety of law firm cultures and litigation team dynamics. In the best environments, I see litigators turning to the electronic discovery professionals in their firms for advice and guidance in handling discovery. Unfortunately, however, I too often see talented electronic discovery professionals – who have a wealth of knowledge and significant expertise – functioning as “order-takers”. And all too often, this means that electronic discovery work isn’t done as cost effectively as it could be, and the work product suffers.
I would like to see more electronic discovery professionals shift from order-taking to consulting. And I don’t mean opening up a shop and hanging out a shingle. I mean providing substantive consultative support to the litigation teams in their firms.
In this blog series, we’re going to talk about electronic discovery consulting in a law firm, and making that shift from order taking to consulting. Specifically we’ll cover:
- Order taking: why it happens and what problems and issues arise?
- How do you make the shift from order-taking to consulting?
- What are the characteristics of a good consultant?
- Some handy consulting tips
- What are the consulting opportunities in a typical case?
Look for posts in this series over the next several weeks. And please let us know your thoughts on this. Do you function as a consultant in your firm, or do you do more order-taking than you’d like? Have you successfully shifted from order-taking to consulting? If so, how did you make that happen? Do you have tips you can share? Please let us know or if you’d like to know more about a particular topic.
Disclaimer: The views represented herein are exclusively the views of the author, and do not necessarily represent the views held by CloudNine Discovery. eDiscoveryDaily is made available by CloudNine Discovery solely for educational purposes to provide general information about general eDiscovery principles and not to provide specific legal advice applicable to any particular circumstance. eDiscoveryDaily should not be used as a substitute for competent legal advice from a lawyer you have retained and who has agreed to represent you.
Great topic - I look forward to reading more and participating in the discussion. Corporations are looking harder at discovery costs and this topic directly relates to helping corporations better manage that work.
Thanks!