Vendors Take Note!

Allow me please to comment on an excellent article written by the New York Law Journal's Anthony Lin entitled "Sullivan & Cromwell Suit Against Vendor Highlights Problems With E-Discovery" http://www.law.com/jsp/article.jsp?id=1199441137204

As many of my collegues, I occasionally find myself time quite enraged by the promises of certain EDD vendors that use all possible means known to man to land a project just to come up short in delivery.  It takes a tremendous effort and extensive experience to see through all their shenanigans during the "pitching process" in order to select a vendor that would not only stand by their promises but would work with you as well as your internal and external clients to adapt to the demands of a case and deliver the necessary service.

All of us know a few of those that get most of our business. Unfortunately, they constantly need to compete with the others that let's just say use less than ethical approach to land a project, often knowing in advance that they would not be able to deliver inside the required budget and time frame.

This is not an old-fashioned "vendor bashing" but rather a celebration of our bellowed industry's evolution to a new level where everyone involved in the complex process of EDD will carry responsibility for the quality of the work they submitted and promises they made.

I therefore highly encourage the vendor community to take note!

Comments

[Gregory Lelli]

There are so many scenarios and nuances that come along with the processing of electronic data, it doesn't suprise me that this has finally come to light. I agree, that the purchaser of these services needs to be sure the vendor has the ability, capacity, accountability and can prove it. Managing these discovery matters as projects and using the principles of project management is crucial. I recommend law firms find a vendor that stresses project management or utilize the software appication like Caselawg.

[George Rudoy]

Gregory,
Thank you for proving my point in regards to ethics in vendors attempts to land a project, or more specifically in your case, advertise a product...

[Joh Brady]

As a vendor in the industry I have seen my share of vendor created (or compounded) issues. There also is a problem related to the clients own limitationin in their knowledge of technology. Many times they don't know what they need or how to ask for it. Clients far too often rely on the vendor to make the decisions related to processing their data. In addition, data is often "dumped" on a vendor at the last moment to have them process in hopes of making a deadline. Many vendors are desperate enough to take on projects under these circumstances with predictable results. My message to both vendor and client is to bring the vendor in as early as possible to begin planning a "Scope of Work". The client should have it's own Technical Staff validate the vendor's capabilities and bridge the communication between the Client and Vendor. In addition get sample data from client and provide sample deliverable to client.

[Jonathan Maas]

Very valid comments, Joh (?). Unfortunately, many law firms (your clients) and clients (our clients) simply do not have the budget to maintain permanent staff of sufficient technical ability/practical knowledge.

Your points about preparation, sampling and getting data to the vendor in reasonable time are good, but in my experience often there is *no* delay whatsoever in getting the stuff to the vendor - we operate to very challenging timescales and usually (but not always!) pass whatever we have to the chosen vendor as soon as we get it, with the same deadlines we face imposed on the vendor. We work round the clock, too!

That having been said, I think it is important to understand (certainly in the UK) that the part played by the client (yours or ours) is important: a claimant will be better prepared early on and keen to make the expenditure; a defendant will tend to be less well prepared, face tighter timescales and be considerably less keen to incur any costs until absolutely necessary (usually last minute).