Recently, an attorney at Arnold & Porter Kaye Scholer contacted Greg Jordan, the firm’s director of discovery operations, with a request. “We need to know what data was loaded and what documents and emails we produced” on a matter that closed in 2008. Jordan was able to locate the matter and produce a report with a full list of produced documents, in minutes, he said—for a case that closed 13 years ago. “That could be my whole presentation right there,” he laughed.

Jordan, and his colleague Melissa Weberman, lead attorney and manager of Arnold & Porter’s e-data group, were speaking on a panel at Legalweek(year) about the need to move away from email as a project management tool. They recommended a centralized project management platform—akin to a huge, shared, digital whiteboard—where all production requests are entered on a form that meets litigation support needs. The entire matter is tracked, collectively, by attorneys on the matter, together with litigation support staff.

E-Discovery Is a Different Animal