How to Measure the Return on Investment of Strong Information Governance Processes

Presented by InOutsourceMay 1, 2014

• Information Governance is an enterprise-wide approach to the management and protection of a law firm’s client and business information assets. An effective IG Program:• Enables lawyers to meet their professional responsibility regarding client

information,• Recognizes an expanding set of regulatory and privacy requirements that apply

to firm and client information,• And relies upon a culture of participation and collaboration within the entire firm.

-A Proposed Law Firm Information Governance FrameworkLaw Firm Information Governance Symposium

August 2012

Defining Information Governance

What is Driving IG?

Client Demands Volume / Efficiency Financial Concerns

Defining Return on the IG Investment

• Hard Savings:• Storage costs• Reduced discovery costs

• Soft Savings:• End user productivity• Avoiding law suits or damaged

reputation

• Measure your baseline

• Assign a cost

• Define a target/goal

• Evaluate again

Demonstrating ROI

• 10,000 folders per year- 2013

• $15,000

• 20% reduction

• 2014 usage- 8,125 folders

Access to Information

• Opportunities• Duplication of effort• Inability to work remotely• Time spent looking for information• Attorney to secretary ratio• Responsiveness to clients

Access to Information

• Measure costs• Average attorney billable rate• Records / administrative average

hourly pay• Lost billable hours• Response time

Sample Survey Questions

128%

242%

316%

48%

57%

Approximately how much time per day do you spend managing e-mail (printing, forwarding, saving, etc.)?

Sample Survey Questions

1

2

3

4

5

6

56

112

313

46

38

58

How long, on average, does it take to respond to a client inquiry requiring ref-erence to the "official matter file" when you are out of the office?

Access to Information

• Improvements• Reduce duplicates• Decide who is responsible for managing

information for each matter• Redistributing information governance

functions to dedicated resources• Improving remote access experience• Access to digital information often speeds

client response

Electronic Data Storage

• Opportunities• Storage is cheap, but

maintenance is not• Staffing costs, Backup,

Migration, Restoration• E-Discovery and Litigation

Holds• Lateral attorney movement

Electronic Data Storage

• Measure Costs• True cost of data storage and

maintenance• Storage per GB• Backup per GB• Co-location and Onsite space

dedicated to data• Staff

• External and internal e-discovery review costs

• Attorney departure review time

Electronic Data Storage

• Improvements• Reduction in electronic data storage• True media-independent destruction

processes• Targeted Litigation Hold procedures• Limiting repositories and limiting

duplicates

Physical Records

• Opportunities• Supplies• What you use and

how• Volume

• Staffing• Offsite storage• Onsite storage

Physical Records

• Measure Costs• Supply costs• Cost of a box

• Records staffing• Onsite storage• Offsite storage costs• Total, per attorney, per box

Calculating Offsite Storage Cost

• Determine Actual Hard Dollar Costs of Storing Materials Offsite.• Calculate total spend for offsite storage for

past 12 months based upon invoices or cost report supplied by vendor

• Total cost per year divided by volume. • If volume is measured in cubic feet, multiply

cost by 1.2.

Calculating Offsite Storage Cost

Total Storage 7,770.40 cubic feetTotal Invoice $3,840.71

$3,840.71/7770.40 = $0.49 Per C.FCost Per Carton $0.59 Per Month

$7.12 Per Year

Annual Volume:7,770.40 C.F6,475 Cartons

Annual Cost $46,088.52Assume 8 years$56.94 Per Carton

Physical Records

• Improvements• Consolidated supply ordering• Switch to letter-sized media• Reductions or re-purposing of staff• Renegotiate offsite storage contracts• Reduce offsite population• Reduce onsite population and Records

storage space

Risk Mitigation

• Opportunities• HIPAA compliance• Avoiding ITAR sanctions• Lost clients• Damaged reputation

Risk Mitigation

• Measure Costs• Potential Fines• Any history of compliance issues?• Lost clients• Negative publicity

Risk Mitigation

• Improvements• Information Governance Policy• End result is less “public” matter information for

compliance• Executive support• Strong training programs• Monitoring and Auditing

• Eric Mosca, CRM• emosca@inoutsource.com

• Nancy Beauchemin, CRM• nbeauchemin@inoutsource.com

• www.inoutsource.com

Thank You!