Litigation support, as a distinct professional niche within the legal environment, has been evolving to keep up with the simultaneously evolving capacity of technologies designed specifically for lawyers.  In essence, the role of a litigation support professional is to manage and advise attorneys on the application of technology to the practice of litigation.  The goal is to increase procedural efficiencies and the value of a given set of information.

What makes litigation support unique and valuable is the extent to which it fuses a combination of skill sets and experience — information technology (IT), law, project management and business administration — to form a distinct, coherent service offering.  In effect, a litigation support professional’s role is to match supply (technology, processes) with demand (litigation data) to maximize knowledge (lawyer’s grasp of the data).

One critical component of the litigation support function is project management, but it is management in a unique combination of ways that go beyond the standard project management practices.1  Not only do litigation support professionals have to manage distinct projects and groups of projects, but these types of projects frequently require shifts in resources as case dynamics are continually in flux.  From an administrative perspective, the efficient allocation of resources requires a timely and accurate picture of the supply.

Structure of Hogan’s Matter Intake System
Our litigation support department has staff members in five offices across the U.S., so it is vital to the efficient delivery of services that we track and monitor who is responsible for and working on specific tasks, the location of case data and the current status of a given matter.2  To do this, we have built a Microsoft Access database to track important project/matter metrics.  These include:

• Client and matter number
• Billing partner
• Contact attorney
• Responsible litigation support analyst
• Office
• Project description
• Vendor contact information
• Links to documentation, such as vendor agreements, chain of custody, confidentiality agreements and statements of work
• Location of case data
• Case status

In designing the intake system, we went a step further and developed it into a resource that could serve multiple litigation support goals.  We applied our stated mission of increasing the value of our data by creatively adapting technology.  We structured the database so that we could cross-reference data to other sets of data in order to achieve goals in two important areas:  marketing and data management.

Marketing
If the primary objective of litigation support is to match supply with demand, one challenge that exists in a law firm with hundreds of litigators is to identify exactly what is the demand.  Given the rapid evolution of technology, the explosion of clients’ data and the shifting dynamics created by the recent enactment of the new Federal Rules, attorneys do not always know what technology they need or what is available to help them achieve their goals of managing and understanding their data.  Matching supply with demand requires understanding what demand exists, and in some sense, actually helping to articulate to attorneys what their own demands are.  This is a litigation support department’s responsibility (and marketing opportunity).

Marketing litigation support services in a law firm is not simply a matter of saying "Here we are and here is what we do.  Call us."  It involves helping attorneys identify areas of their own projects where technology or processes can be incorporated to increase the value of their data.  There are, of course, different ways of doing this, but what we have done at Hogan is to structure our matter intake system to help target areas of potential demand by cross-referencing new matters coming into the firm with the historical workflow of the litigation support department.

As an example, let’s assume that John Analyst worked on a matter two years ago for Mary Partner on a case for client XYZ Corp.  The information about that project is contained in the database and available via created reports or queries.  Now we have been retained on a new XYZ Corp. matter, and Mary Partner is again managing the case.  By taking this new matter information and running it through our litigation support matter intake system, we can obtain a report that says John Analyst already worked on a case for Mary Partner and XYZ Corp., and here is what he did.  Once we know that, we can tailor our assistance for Mary before she even realizes she has a need for litigation support.  In essence, we’ve identified the potential demand and offered to match the supply at that early stage in the process where litigation support can be extremely valuable but is frequently overlooked.

Data Management
Another challenge we face is managing the amount of data that accumulates rather quickly on a network with fixed limits.  We do not have infinite capacity to compile data endlessly on our servers, yet we need to be able to rapidly respond to attorney needs, meaning we need to keep space available.  The challenge is to manage what we have so that we keep servers "lean" and free of excess data.  For each matter in the matter intake system, we track the specific directories where data for that matter reside.  We have structured the system and our procedures so that we can always account for the data we have and monitor the data’s economic effect.  We do this in two ways:

First, we tabulate monthly the backup and storage costs of each matter by sifting the data collected through the intake system via a program called TreeSize.3  We then run calculations based on the relative costs of backing up our directories.  This creates a report that allows us to monitor the matters that are most data-intensive and, thus, the most costly.

Second, we have instituted a procedural requirement for all analysts to perform periodic data storage audits (DSA).  This means if John Analyst is responsible for the XYZ Corp. matter that is using up five gigabytes of space for a review database and associated images, he will be required to periodically perform a DSA for that matter, which entails reviewing the directory to determine if there is redundant or excessive data that can be deleted.  This information is tracked in the matter intake system, which allows us to determine which directories need to be monitored.

Summing It Up
Litigation support is valuable because of the ways we can apply technology to increase the value of data and the efficiency of processes.  By designing one of our project management systems to increase the value of our own data, we are now better able to support our department’s marketing and data management goals, as well as extend the support we provide for our firm.

1 For instance, organizations such as the Project Management Institute or the International Project Management Association provide leadership in designing formal standards for project management.
2 At Hogan, it is officially the Litigation Technology Unit, which is a subunit within the Information Resource Center.
3 www.jamsoft.net/treesize/index.shtml

About our author :: :: ::

Paul Perdue is the National Litigation Technology Manager at Hogan & Hartson LLP in Washington, D.C., overseeing a litigation support staff of 15 across five offices in the U.S.  Prior to joining Hogan in 2006, he received his J.D. from Catholic University and managed litigation support departments at the U.S. Attorneys Office and at Woodcock Washburn LLP in Philadelphia.  He has also served on a legal education advisory board for Manor College.  Paul can be reached at psperdue@hhlaw.com.