Law firm information governance symposium report: matter mobility

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Matter mobility is the quick and efficient transfer of matter materials from one firm to another, usually initiated at the request of a client. Sometimes it's the entire file, sometimes it is a subset of those files based on the circumstances.

December 9, 2014 mins

Transcript

Transcript of Interview: Terrence Coan – Senior Director – HBR Consulting LLC

What is the definition of matter mobility?

Well, it’s the quick and efficient transfer of matter materials from one firm to another, usually initiated at the request of a client. Sometimes it's the entire file, sometimes it is a subset of those files based on the circumstances. But it’s usually precipitated when a lawyer is changing from Firm A to Firm B. That's probably seventy, eighty percent of those kinds of transactions. But I would consider the same efforts to be when a client simply just wants their materials back from the law firm. And so what does the law firm do? How do they collect them? What’s the process? What are the checks and balances?

What are the key points covered in the matter mobility report?

So in terms of the areas we cover, we cover cultural sensitivities. What is culturally acceptable in one firm versus another and an understanding that we have to be sensitive to that and we have to consider that. We then looked at some common pitfalls that firms will bump up against if they don't think about them and plan for them proactively. We talk about some of the policy elements, some of the policy statements that need to be included in the firm's broader information governance policy specific to matter mobility. We talk about process workflows and checklists that people would want to follow to be in compliance with the policy and things could easily slip through the cracks if they’re not on somebody’s radar screen.

And then we talked about technologies and metadata. So much of the material that we have to transfer today is in electronic form and while we tried to make the report speak to both paper and electronic material, the real challenges right now are in the electronic space. So we spent a good amount of time on a section on technology and metadata and how we can facilitate the transfer of that content. We hope it will be a useful tool to help people frame what it is they’re doing and give them some practical advice, like ”Here's how we actually can roll up our sleeves and do this.”