ILTA Voices

Most organizations have adapted to the new normal of supporting employee-owned devices and providing the tools necessary for lawyers and staff to work when away from the office. As more people make the transition to working remotely more than in a traditional office, there are implications that need to be addressed. We had three of your ILTA peers share their thoughts on how to make a remote workforce really work. You can read the article that includes all three perspectives in the Fall 2015 edition of Peer to Peer. Here is the full interview with Sandy Mikita, Information Technology Project Manager at Eckert Seamans Cherin & Mellott, LLC.

Most organizations have adapted to the new normal of supporting employee-owned devices and providing the tools necessary for lawyers and staff to work when away from the office. As more people make the transition to working remotely more than in a traditional office, there are implications that need to be addressed. We had three of your ILTA peers share their thoughts on how to make a remote workforce really work. You can read the article that includes all three perspectives in the Fall 2015 edition of Peer to Peer. Here is the full interview with Andy Jurczyk, Chief Information Officer at Seyfarth Shaw LLP.

Certifiable! The Value of Certifications to Your Career - CEDS with ACEDS Is the Certified E-Discovery Specialist (CEDS) designation right for you? Find out in this installment of our podcast series on industry-related certifications, as Janice Jaco speaks with Mary Mack of ACEDS about the benefits of holding the CEDS certification. Speakers: Janice Jaco is the E-Discovery Project Manager at Keesal, Young & Logan, where she brings creative solutions to data‐intensive challenges and supports the efficient delivery of outstanding e-discovery, legal project management, ESI consulting and technology services to clients. She is an ACEDS Certified E-Discovery Specialist with extensive experience managing large‐scale e‐discovery collections in state and federal courts, and in SEC enforcement actions and DOJ investigations. Janice holds numerous certifications and is one of a small team of professionals steering the e-disclosure/e-discovery group of the Legal Technology Core Competencies Certification Coalition (LTC4), charged with defining competency standards for attorneys and paraprofessionals in the broad spectrum of skills required to measure e-discovery competency. She is the recipient of ACEDS' prestigious 2015 E-Discovery Person of the Year award. Mary Mack, the Executive Director of the Association of Certified eDiscovery Specialists (ACEDS), is the author of A Process of Illumination, the Practical Guide to Electronic Discovery and the co-editor of the Thomson Reuters West treatise, eDiscovery for Corporate Counsel. With 15 years of experience in handling e-discovery, she was previously the enterprise technology counsel for ZyLAB and the corporate technology counsel for Fios. Mary is a member of the Illinois bar.

Office 365 Conversations - Skype for Business Join us for a series of discussions examining various aspects of Office 365, its applicability to ILTA membership and strategies for incorporating it into your work environment. This session will focus on Skype for Business. Moderator: Tim Hooks, IT Director at American Municipal Power, Inc. Speaker: Larry Kuhn, an Account Technology Strategist at Microsoft, joined the company as an enterprise consultant in 2001. As a consultant, he helped numerous global enterprise customers plan, design and deploy solutions based on SharePoint and .NET technologies. In his current role, Larry assists his customers with solving their business challenges and seizing market opportunities using Microsoft-based solutions. With over 25 years in the software industry, his experience spans areas of end-user productivity, application development and project management.

Microsoft at ILTACON 2015 - Recap Description: In this informal podcast discussion, we review the sessions Microsoft participated in during ILTACON 2015. Speakers: Larry Kuhn, an Account Technology Strategist at Microsoft, joined the company as an enterprise consultant in 2001. As a consultant, he helped numerous global enterprise customers plan, design and deploy solutions based on SharePoint and .NET technologies. In his current role, Larry assists his customers with solving their business challenges and seizing market opportunities using Microsoft-based solutions. With over 25 years in the software industry, his experience spans areas of end-user productivity, application development and project management. Kara Portwood from Armstrong Teasdale continually brings value to the firm's clients by facilitating desktop technology best practices. She often works with clients to help with collaboration, solve technology issues and contribute to building successful business relationships. Kara is ILTA's Strategic Relationship Liaison to Microsoft.

Certifiable! The Value of Certifications to Your Career - IGP with ARMA, Part II Description: Is the Information Governance Professional (IGP) certification right for you? Find out as we continue our exploration into the benefits of the IGP certification. In this session, the second of two on IGP, we hold a lively and informative discussion with several IGP certified professionals to get their perspectives. Moderator: Jennifer Watters Farley, CRM IGP, the Records Manager at Sidley Austin LLP, is a records and information management professional with over two decades of experience. She is a member of ARMA International and the ARMA Metro NYC Chapter, where she continues to coordinate the ASPIRE public speaking program. Ongoing professional development is very important to Jennifer and she's excited to be part of the development of this ILTA podcast series to encourage others to continue their own professional growth. Panel: Julie J. Colgan, IGP, CRM is the Head of Information Governance Solutions for Nuix, a software company based in Sydney, Australia. She is an 18-year veteran of the information management profession with roles spanning public and private organizations, consulting and technology firms. Julie is past president of ARMA International, holds multiple industry certifications and is a sought-after speaker and writer on a variety of information governance topics.   Deborah Juhnke, the Director of Information Governance Consulting at Husch Blackwell in Kansas City, holds both the CRM and IGP certifications. She is a founding member of the firm's information governance group, whose exclusive focus is the development and implementation of information governance, privacy and data security compliance programs. Deborah is a frequent speaker and author on the topic of information governance, and a contributing editor to the firm's blog, www.bytebacklaw.com. Jason C. Stearns, IGP, CRM, the Director, Group Information Governance at BlackRock, is a member of the firm's legal and compliance group. He is responsible for the global implementation of information governance (IG) standards and requirements. Previously, Jason worked at UBS as a director and portfolio manager; Group IG where he was responsible for IG strategy development, project management and oversight; and New York Life Insurance Company as the corporate records manager.

Certifiable! The Value of Certifications to Your Career - CIPP, CIPM and CIPT with IAPP Description: Is a certification in information privacy right for you? Find out as Doug Forman of the International Association of Privacy Professionals (IAPP) talks about the history and benefits of the Certified Information Privacy Professional, Manager and Technologist (CIPP, CIPM and CIPT) certifications with Jim Merrifield, IGP, CIP, in the second of a series of ILTA podcasts on industry-related certifications. Speakers: Jim Merrifield is the firm-wide Information Governance Manager at Robinson & Cole LLP and co-founder of the first ever conference focused exclusively on information governance, InfoGovCon. He is a respected advisor in the IG community and an active member of several industry associations including ILTA, IAPP and ARMA. Jim's information governance experience includes deployment of enterprise programs, policy development and enforcement, creation of disposition programs, technology solution evaluation and consulting services. He is a certified information governance professional (IGP), has written for numerous publications, blogs at R+C Data Privacy & Security Insider and TechTarget, and frequently speaks on information governance and data privacy issues. Contact Jim at jmerrifield@rc.com. Douglas Forman is the Certification Director at the International Association of Privacy Professionals (IAPP), a professional membership organization that offers education, events and certification to those who work in information privacy. Before arriving at the IAPP, Doug spent eight years developing standardized assessments for Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Delaware and others. He can be contacted at dforman@iapp.org.

Maintaining Confidentiality of Client Information Are you getting pressure from your clients to improve the confidentiality of information in your firm’s possession?  Have you been asked by your lawyers why their ethical obligations aren’t enough to satisfy clients?  Have you considered locking down your document repositories as a response?  Listen to two veteran law firm technologists discuss their experience with these issues and more. Scott Christensen Scott Christensen is currently a CIO at Large, serving in technology leadership positions with national and global law firms over the past 25+ years. At Edwards, Wildman Palmer LLP, Scott served as the Director of Technology (US) and Information Security. Prior to Edwards, Wildman, he was the IT Director at Bell, Boyd & Lloyd LLP. He has served in numerous industry volunteer roles including six years on the Board of Directors for the International Legal Technology Association (ILTA), and two years as ILTA’s President.  He served on the planning committee for ILTA’s 2014 and 2015 LegalSec (Information Security) Summit, and is a member of the Law Firm Information Governance Task Force, an IG ThinkTank sponsored by Iron Mountain.    He is a frequent speaker at technology conferences including ILTA, ARMA and ALA on the topics of leadership, hiring and retaining staff, information governance, information security, electronic records management, risk management and cloud computing. He enjoys teaching occasional college courses in the areas of Computer Science and Business Management. Scott also has experience serving on the Board of Directors of other non-profit organizations with oversight over finance, personnel and governance matters.  Brian Donato With 28 years of experience ranging from software developer to process engineer to security officer to IT director, Brian Donato brings a broad technology and business background to his current position of CIO at the law firm of Vorys, Sater, Seymour and Pease LLP where he has worked for the last 17 years.  Brian is married with 4 kids and 1 dog, all currently connected to the Internet of Things.

Nearly 10 years ago, Seyfarth Shaw blazed a trail as the first major law firm to apply Six Sigma and Lean process improvement methodologies to better serve the needs of their clients. Starting with process improvements in law firm operations, Six Sigma and Lean thinking have become pervasive throughout the culture of Seyfarth and changed the way Seyfarth’s legal teams deliver services to clients. Seyfarth used these process improvement methods to drive value for their clients through more efficient delivery of legal services, better quality of services, lower cost and greater budget predictability. Spurred by overwhelming demand from their clients, Seyfarth is again breaking new ground with the formation of SeyfarthLean Consulting, a dedicated team of 30 technologists, legal project managers, data analytics specialists and process improvement professionals who work with clients and law firm partners to improve the delivery of legal services. James Kittle spoke with SeyfarthLean Consulting directors Kim Craig and Andrew Baker to learn more about their efforts. (Read the article in the Summer 2015 Peer to Peer)

Leaders within law firms and legal departments have identified that business and legal process improvements are mandatory to stay competitive in an ever-changing market. This topic is a great fit for ILTA's Law2020 initiative that focuses on ways in which legal organizations must adapt to thrive in the future. We enlisted three of your ILTA peers to share their thoughts on improvements to make today for a better tomorrow, and they shared visions of the future. You can read the article that includes all three perspectives in the Summer 2015 edition of Peer to Peer. Here is our interview with Angela Dowd, Director of Practice Innovation at Burns & Levinson, LLP.