1. Controlling Litigation Support Costs
Proven Strategies for Cost Control

2. Today’s Speakers Panelists: Tom Barce, Fulbright & Jaworski LLP
Panelists:
Tom Barce, Fulbright & Jaworski LLP
Julie Brown, Vorys, Sater, Seymour & Pease LLP

3. Dynamic Landscape for Cost Control
Lean
Profitable
Competitive
Innovative
Strategic
Service Oriented
Firms and Corporations need to address these philosophies when managing costs.
Some seem counter intuitive but they’re really not.
Each need to be managed, quantified and balanced.
Its not easy.
Can be accomplished

4. Areas of Influence
Department Costs
Client Billing
eDiscovery Expenses

5. Road to Achievement Research Report Recover Revise
Knew most of the statistics I needed were available in our systems
Just not compiled in a meaningful way
Connected with our CFO, Accounting Data Control
Got statistics from vendors where necessary
Compiled data in simple ways to report to upper management

6. Department Costs Evaluate & Report Build & Improve Manage
Utilization
Overtime
Net Revenue
Manage
Staff Capacity
Non-Billable Activity
Time Entries
Build & Improve
Professional Development
Documented Processes
Quality Assurance
Public Relations
Define Services
Empower Legal Teams
Progress Reports
Profitability
Efficiency and ability to tell a meaningful story about your work.
Important point about your time entries: they have to convince the clients you did valuable work. Many technical people aren’t akin to this while legal and consulting are
Have a professional development manager.
Management team and staff contribute to routine presentations. This builds VALUE in our people and helps justify the cost of your services
Quality Assurance = work people will pay for
Staying in front of people reminds them what you do to earn more work.
Be creative about services

7. Client Billing Develop Alternative Fee Arrangements
Provide Month End Case Activity Reports
Report Budget to Actual Expenses
Monitor Write Offs
Review Actual Realization
Alternative Fee Arrangements should provide savings and predictability
Preempt proformas and bills with a brief synopsis of your department’s work. Should go to the billing partner and be client-ready. Helps them understand what they don’t necessarily appreciate about technology
Manage the client expectations that you set through budgets (see sample template in the session materials)
Work with executive partners to build accountability for billing and collecting for your services

8. eDiscovery Evaluate Case Profile Manage Process
Collection sets the stage
Key opportunity in culling, filtering & analysis
Efficiency in review
Leverage Vendor Services
Influence Case Strategy
Monitor Vendor Invoices
I work with vendors to report annually about the volume of data collected, culled, processed, delivered, reviewed and produced.
Allows me to build predictability for similar cases
Sample report in session materials.
Be defensible, not overly broad and surgical in your approach to eDiscovery
Leverage the wonderful new and emerging analytical tools on the market
Help lawyers align technology STRATEGY with case objectives.
Here’s the critical mental ascent: Its not the tool itself and what it can do, it’s the benefits of the tools that further their goals, for example predictive tagging improves quality and cuts COST.
Insure service providers are billing accurately
Track invoices to insure timely payment