By Sarai Schubert, IPRO COO
In some of our previous blog posts, we’ve talked about AI in eDiscovery from a technology point of view.
My blog last month focused on how Active Learning runs in the background and allows attorneys to choose whether they want to use it to validate the results they found in their traditional workflow. And our Vice President of Product Frederick Bourget took that one step further by blogging about how attorneys can train their Active Learning tools to optimize their eDiscovery workflow.
But this blog—and the recent IPRO Morning Show we held on LinkedIn Live—cover more of the people side of using AI in eDiscovery.
It’s often hard for attorneys to look at using new technology in their workflow because they’ve already agreed on the eDiscovery workflow and format. No one wants to change the process in the middle of a case; it presents a lot of unnecessary risk. However, there’s a misconception that active learning has to be agreed upon from the beginning rather than viewed as a powerful tool working alongside the legal team.
Why Should Corporate Attorneys Care about Active Learning?
Corporations now are getting slammed so many other things–data subject access requests, subpoena requests, internal matters, data breaches, investigations for potential litigation —you name it. Corporate attorneys are constantly trying to manage risk and the things that matter most in their organization.
Most legal teams don’t have the resources to keep up with it all, and it’s only on them to figure out how they will manage. Many are relying more and more on Law Firms and ALSPs to help.
Active Learning can help corporate legal departments get through documents and find what they are looking for a lot faster (e.g. around a small document request), while they put more of their legal expertise and continue to focus on larger issues at hand.
Why Should Law Firms Care about Active Learning?
Corporate legal teams are relying more and more on an ALSP to get through the large sets of data, which they more likely to have implemented Active Learning as part of their document review services. Many ALSPs also are bringing in legal staff to further help get through documents quicker.
Law firms need to realize that AI is now a necessity to keep up with the explosion of data. They must also find a way to extend their value to the Corporate legal, beyond litigation.
I’ve been there, and I get why law firm attorneys are still hesitant.
They get into a case, and there’s already a ton of risks associated with the case. If I put myself in their shoes, in order for me to adopt new technology while I’m also putting my career on the line, I have to be able to trust it and understand what’s actually happening.
But AI can really be an assistant for attorneys–someone who’s helping them through document review. The technology is always on, so they then can decide if they want to look at the insights that’s coming out of it. This allows them to continue to practice and follow their agreed upon case workflow and follow their agreed upon case workflow. It can bring document review upstream, find conflicts, identify reviewers making mistakes and not understanding the scope, find documents they didn’t “search” for, identify documents that are bringing false positives and more.
It can be a technical assistant helping them through their case, not changing their case workflow. Attorneys will be able to meet their discovery deadlines, be ready for a deposition, and uncover more information faster.
Active learning cannot be a black box, however, as transparency is key. It needs to provide me with enough information to fully understand the reasons behind the insights, it allows me to trust the technology assisting me.
Attorneys Can Use AI without Changing Workflow
The more attorneys start looking at the results that Active Learning can bring on their case and looking at how it could really start helping them find more relevant information earlier on in cases, the more they will want to start using it and adapting to it as part of their workflow. Their next case’s meet and confer will naturally start changing to adding more technologies like Active learning to their workflow.
It’s about getting to the documents, not through the documents. – Ann Snyder
Check out more about Active Learning from IPRO.
