Best Practices for an Efficient Legal Review Process
An efficient legal review process is the foundation of a streamlined response to document requests. Best practices begin with the lead document review attorney, who will assemble a team, establish guidelines, and manage the project through to completion.
Planning and Establishing Guidelines and Selecting a Team
The legal document review attorney who leads the project will prepare document review guidelines that include:
- A timeline for completion of the project.
- How to identify documents that are responsive and relevant to the production of documents in response to the document request.
- Description of the legal issues in the case and how documents will be coded for issues of importance.
- How to identify privileged documents and identifying information for privileged parties.
- Information on case-specific confidentiality designations and any relevant protective orders.
- How to use any software specifically designed for the project.
- Quality control procedures to ensure the guidelines and protocols are being followed.
After the guidelines and protocols are established, a team is chosen and trained.
The Team Works with the Lead Document Review Attorney
Ideally, the document review will occur in one room where the team members will assemble to do their review work. Collaboration between team members should be strongly encouraged. One team member may have a particular insight on a review topic or may have already addressed a similar issue.
Team members should be encouraged to ask questions. There should be open and frequent communication between the lead document review attorney and the team to determine:
- If there are problems with the software they are using for the project.
- If there are any questions about how to apply the guidelines.
And any resolutions to issues that arise should be disseminated to the entire review team to ensure consistency.
Periodic reports must be given to the lead attorney and to the client so progress can be monitored and any problems solved in a timely manner. Quality control checks must be implemented to ensure that the guidelines are being followed, documents responsive to the request are being properly identified, and privileged documents are being withheld or redacted.
Law firms and in-house counsel often choose to outsource the task of comprehensive document review and foreign language review to Baer Reed, an offshore legal services provider that uses best practices for an efficient legal review process. Contact Baer Reed LPO for more information.
- On October 30, 2018
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