I was on a webinar today, a particularly good one to boot, about a study
that was conducted to find out what strategies and tactics inside counsel
(and companies in general) were taking to control and/or reduce their
eDiscovery costs.  An astounding 86% reported that their organization had
made efforts to improve their RIM programs with an end game of improving
their litigation readiness.  I was so excited to hear that!

Then, a few slides later, the researcher reported (quite enthusiastically)
that the relationship between Legal and IT has taken a dramatic turn for the
better.  That prompted me to ask a question ...

Did your research indicate an increase (or decrease) in the amount of RIM
involvement with litigation events, and/or their relationship with Legal and
IT in that regard?  I added a little commentary to help structure their
response by adding, Legal owns "relevance", IT owns "access", yet RIM owns
the "content" - shouldn't all three be at the table?

And here's where it all went to you know where in a lovely Gucci handbasket
...

Both speakers essentially said that while there is a good indication that
RIM, as an activity, is on the rise, RIM people really don't need to be
involved (horribly generalizing their comments, but that really was the
gist).  They went on to say that the *reason* RIM doesn't really get
mentioned in the eDiscovery Team context is because ... [discourse about how
old RM programs dealing with paper were like what librarians do ...!] ...
most of that is simply now automated and just falls under Legal or IT.  Ack,
ahem, bleh!  Really??

The speaker who acutally did the research continued and shared that RIM
people were reported by some survey respondents to be involved, but that it
was rare.  The speaker's impression is that there are few organizations out
there who have a sophisticated enough RIM program (and RIM leader, I
guess) to warrant their own seat at the "adults" table (my analogy, not
theirs).  Most of the time, he said, any RIM people involved are simply
there as support to their IT or Legal superior.

I share all of this not to incite a riot, or a litany of angered responses,
but more as a bit of a wake up call.  Clearly, although there are a few
great examples out there of those who've "made it", we still have a long way
to go to prove that we offer a perspective that is truly unique, and
*equally* important.

So ... to take this fairly negative message to somewhere (hopefully)
positive ... what are YOU doing to get that point across in YOUR
organization?

Cheers,
Julie

-- 
Julie J. Colgan, CRM

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