Disputes & Investigations: A Strong Business Case for Empowering Boundary-Spanning Experts
Author: LDI Team
In 1998, Pulitzer Prize-winning biologist and polymath Professor E.O. Wilson introduced the concept of the “grand synthesis.” The idea is that all disciplines—be they in the sciences or the humanities—can be “jumped together” to develop a more coherent understanding of the world we live in. Wilson famously wrote, “We are drowning in information, while starving for wisdom. The world henceforth will be run by synthesizers, people able to put together the right information at the right time, think critically about it, and make important choices wisely.”
Wilson’s prediction speaks presciently to the inherent difficulties of finding relevant information in a data landscape that's exploding in volume, velocity and variety. It is also the starting point of “Building Bridges in the Disputes Space with Legal Data Intelligence”—a must-read on the root causes of silos in the disputes and investigations space, their pernicious impact on workplace morale and client outcomes, and the various strategies and frameworks professionals can adopt to overcome obstacles in collaboration and alignment.
In this long-form article, the co-authors compare Legal Data Intelligence (LDI) practitioners to Wilson’s “synthesizers”: critical and creative thinkers who can work across multiple disciplines to solve problems efficiently and cost-effectively, helping clients find the “wisdom” buried in their data.
Silos: A Tale of Flawed Reward Structures & the Perversion of Incentives
Published by LDI Architects Dr. Tristan Jenkinson and Matthew Hamilton, and LDI founding member Kelly Friedman, the article breaks down silos into several different categories: geographical, structural, technological, hierarchical, and scheduling. It offers the practice group structure inside law firms as an example of a structural silo: statistics on performance, the co-authors argue, are often used to decide how profits should be split between the various practice groups, which means that collaborating across practice groups could also have financial implications.
Building Bridges in the Disputes Space with Legal Data Intelligence
Detailed case studies and KPIs for LDI practitioners on closing gaps and fostering cross-functional collaboration.
Read the ArticleOvercoming Silos: Case Studies by LDI Practitioners
By highlighting case studies from AstraZeneca, Marsh McLennan, and Walgreens, the co-authors outline how Legal Data Intelligence practitioners have built effective bridges in their organizations. One example they cite is that of LDI founding member Josh Kreamer who spanned the gaps between legal and IT. Josh recognized the significant benefits of building out a full in-house ediscovery team that could work across departments. Building that group and working across multiple internal specialist teams, Kreamer was able to realize more than $20 million in savings during the first three years.
KPIs for Boundary-Spanning Experts
Citing research from the University of Toronto and Harvard Business Review, the co-authors elucidate the tangible benefits of having “boundary-spanning experts”—in other words, Wilson’s synthesizers or Legal Data Intelligence practitioners—working across disciplines and building bridges between otherwise disconnected departments.
The co-authors also devote a significant portion of the article on detailed examples of KPIs that can be used to mark the success and efficacy of boundary-spanning experts. For example, when measuring the average time taken to provide insights on a project, it would be instructive to also measure the boundary-spanning expert’s impact on the time metric if they identified a more efficient approach to providing insights.
Managing a dispute or investigation requires subject matter, process, and technical experts. Yet too often, many legal professionals engaged in these areas work in silos. In the current world of legal technology, LDI practitioners are uniquely positioned to act as the vaunted boundary-spanning experts who can bridge communication gaps between specialist teams, foster collaboration, and drive efficiency. Check out “Building Bridges in the Disputes Space with Legal Data Intelligence” to take a deep dive into how they do it.