Social Media Bringing IT and LEGAL Together

Recommind, a provider of predictive information management software, released the results of its third annual survey on the working relationship between corporate IT and legal departments. In contrast with last year’s study, this year’s indicates that the two departments are forging a more productive relationship as they work together to manage the most sensitive data in the enterprise.

According to this year's report, which surveyed senior IT managers at enterprises averaging 17,500 employees, technical knowledge of eDiscovery is improving across the board, and legal and IT departments are coming together to solve new dilemmas posed by internal investigations, regulatory requests and the skyrocketing use of social media. 

The state of the relationship

Overall, the survey suggests that the state of the relationship between legal and IT is holding steady, with 52.1% rating it “good” or “very good,” compared to 54.5% in 2010. Drilling down into the details, however, respondents reported a number of positive trends.

Both IT and legal are making eDiscovery a higher priority.

-- 66.9% report that legal and IT are meeting to collaborate or strategize at least once per quarter, compared to 48.4% in 2010.

-- Only 26.3% said IT considered eDiscovery a "low" or "very low” priority, down from 39.1% in 2010.

-- Only 17.6% said that legal rated eDiscovery a "low" or "very low” priority, compared to 29.1% in 2010. 

"Not understanding/respecting the technical complexities of e-discovery" remained by far IT’s top frustration in working with the legal department (35.9%), as it was last year. And tellingly, asked what the legal department would pinpoint as its top frustration when working with IT, respondents most often said, “trying to influence decisions traditionally made by legal” (26.7%). Last year’s top choice, “lack of legal knowledge,” ranked only fourth out of five this year (17.2%).


Why IT and legal work together 

A new section of the survey focusing on areas of IT-legal interaction revealed social media as a clear up-and-coming priority. 

-- 30% of respondents reported that the IT and legal departments at their companies collaborate on “eDiscovery involving social media” at least once per quarter, suggesting that despite its novelty, social media is already playing a significant role in eDiscovery at many large organizations.

-- 34.7% of respondents said IT and legal collaborated on "crafting or implementing social media policies" for the first time in 2011, and 24.5% cited "eDiscovery involving social media"  ― the number-one and number-two results, respectively.

-- Looking ahead to 2012, more respondents expected to collaborate for the first time on social media policies (26.9%) and social media eDiscovery (26.9%) than on any other activities. 

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