Law Department Management Blog
Some thoughts on litigation management practices that may be becoming more common:
1. Separating discovery law firm (to handle all aspects of discovery) from the law firm(s) that handles the rest of the litigation (See my post of Nov. 13, 2005 about Nextra.).
2. Electronic discovery unbundling, which includes using offshore resources (See my post of Jan. 27, 2006 about Accenture and Mauritius.).
3. Hiring plaintiffs’ lawyers as defense lawyers.
4. Using a project manager from business to handle, track and report on the many aspects of big litigation (See my post of April 18, 2005 (6) about an assigned coordinator from business.).
5. Concept searching software and data visualization software for discovery (See my post of Feb.19, 2006 about this software.).
6. Appreciating the law department as profit center because of the lawsuits and recoveries it pursues (See my post of Feb. 8, 2006 about DuPont.).
7. Combining mega-bundles of lawsuits, like Tyco choosing Shook Hardy for all its products liability litigation (See my post of Jan. 3, 2006.).
8. Experiencing the effects of a huge quantum of settlements funding later lawsuits of plaintiffs’ firms (See my post of April 27, 2006 with Prof. Brickman’s analysis.)
On the negative side, some practices trending downward in popularity:
1. Extranets seem not to have caught on that much (See my post of Aug. 27, 2005 about not seeing many.).
2. Still very little defense contingency fee work (But see my post of Jan. 20, 2006 about patent troll lawyers and their contingency fees.)
3. UTBMS codes continue to shrink in usage, except in insurance defense (See my post of April 23, 2006 about why they have not succeeded.).