Retention Resources

How often and how thoroughly do you take out the data garbage? Many "gotchas" surround data disposal. Here's advice on how to avoid some big traps from experts Tom Lahiff, Director at PricewaterhouseCoopers, and Deidre Paknad, President & CEO of PSS Systems.

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Paige Cole, Legal Specialist, The Williams Companies

The root cause of high discovery costs is too much data, however the only way to defensibly and reliable dispose of data is to ensure that Legal, IT, and Records are aligned. This case study will provide best practices and processes for defensibly disposing of data.

Alexandra Buck, Senior Counsel and Director of eDiscovery and Retention Management, Abbott Laboratories

A strong partnership and robust process across Legal and IT is critical to preserve and collect relevant information and to dispose of expired data. The high volume of information and its distribution can make IT the Achilles Heel. This case study will cover building strong partnerships and strong processes that link Legal and IT and enable better legal governance of information.

Thomas Lahiff, Director, Pricewaterhouse Coopers

Using 100% retention as a legal holds solution is perhaps the most expensive approach to preservation; as the data builds up, it may not mitigate as much risk as expected and it significantly increases operating and discovery costs. Very often, litigation executives disregard retention schedules in favor of holding everything because they worry about spoliation or doubt the integrity of the retention schedule itself. Legally-based retention schedules combined with a good legal holds process are possible and can be used to effectively defend against claims of spoliation. This session will look at the processes to develop legally-sound retention and preservation programs for the best offense and best defense.

Deidre Paknad, President & CEO, PSS Systems; Founder, CGOC

Today every company manages legal holds to mitigate risk, but how they do so has a huge impact on the corporate bottom line. With tough economic conditions, the choices the Legal department makes for how and what to preserve and retain are critical. This session will look at retention and preservation practices and their relative cost footprints and offer ways to take a "greener" approach.

Jay Brudz, Senior Corporate Counsel, GE

Implementing good retention practices and information hygiene is often met with resistance from business groups and even the legal department. By calculating the true loaded cost of information to the corporation -- including the cost to manage, discover and litigate it -- companies can make much better cost/benefit decisions. Moreover, transparently allocating the real cost of information can reduce unnecessary discovery budget surprises improve allocation of discovery costs.

Richard Gomes, Senior Vice President, IT Risk, Citigroup

A good retention program not only ensures business records are retained properly, it helps identify where information is stored in the corporation and ensures that expired data is disposed properly. This session will focus on developing and quantifying the business case for an effective program can help the legal department, business groups and senior management appreciate the cost of their current retention practices and the savings improvement will bring.

Matt Cohen and Deidre Paknad discuss the pernicious problem of legacy data in most corporations. They combine process management and robust legal workflow with subject matter and data analysis expertise to provide a framework to efficiently inventory and categorize legacy data, to establish the facts needed to determine what data can be destroyed, and to document the process to help companies resolve the legacy data crisis.

Written by Kevin Brady, this article looks at retention and legal holds together by examining Rambus, Inc. v. Infineon Techs. AG (2004) and Hynix Semiconductor Inc. v. Rambus, Inc. (2006). Valuable lessons can be learned about retention and preservation by taking a closer look at the Rambus cases.

Harry Pugh, Executive Vice President, Operations & Technology Policy Coordinator, Citigroup

Citigroup began its global retention program several years ago for risk management and compliance purposes and today it has one of the very few effective enterprise retention management programs in operation. The program has driven strategic benefits by enabling the company to disposition legacy data, normalize data management, and drive out waste.

As the revisions to the Federal Rules take effect December 1, many companies are looking at their processes to determine risks and gaps and to address them. This can be a daunting challenge and certainly the hurdles the Rules present are significant. It's made more daunting by confusion on the terms "retention" and "preservation". Both retention and preservation arise from law, but they have different meanings, disciplines, and implications.

Written prior to the December 1, 2006 amendments to the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure Kevin warns records managers to take heed. He points out a number of important areas to the amendments including early focus on issues regarding the existence, form of production and the preservation of ESI; restricting the scope of initial discovery of ESI by categorizing information as either "reasonably accessible" or "not reasonably accessible"; and limiting the penalties for the loss of ESI as a result of routine good faith operation of computer systems.

Harry Pugh, Executive Vice President, Operations & Technology Policy Coordinator, Citigroup

Approaches to quantifying and characterizing legacy data to enable proper disposal and drive down costs. A case study on how retention best practices can drive real benefits.