Better Questions, Better Legal Data Workflows

0:05 – Michael Gibeault

Welcome to TCDI Talks, where we highlight the people and ideas driving innovation in legal services and technology. I’m Michael Gibeault, and today we’re exploring how asking better questions can help legal teams build more effective legal data workflows. When a new matter comes in, there’s often pressure to get moving quickly, but the conversations that happen before collection and review can have a lasting effect on the workflow that follows.

So, joining me today is my colleague, Ned Adams, TCDI’s Senior Director of Legal Services and Solutions Engineer. Ned has spent more than two decades helping our clients work through complex legal data challenges. His recent article, “Why the Best Legal Data Workflows Start with Better Questions,” and it explores how listening closely helps teams make a more informed decision throughout the matter.

Ned, welcome back to TCDI Talks.

1:09 – Ned Adams

Thanks, Michael. Good to be with you today.

1:11 – Michael Gibeault

So, Ned, let’s jump in. Your article starts with a question that sounds simple: “What problem are you trying to solve?” In your experience, what gets missed when teams move into technical work before they’ve agreed on that answer?

1:27 – Ned Adams

Yeah, it’s very common, and I think human nature in a lot of ways. And part of TCDI’s culture is Lean Six Sigma. One of those lessons that we have to continually teach ourself is to define the problem before jumping to a solution. In litigation, moving too fast can mean missing a critical step. An incomplete collection may leave out key evidence or ESI protocol negotiated without a technical input may create obligations that are difficult and costly to meet down the road.

So, sometimes you just need to slow down to speed up. Taking that time at the outset to understand the problem helps you make better decisions and avoid preventable work later on.

2:06 – Michael Gibeault

When you’re starting a conversation, Ned, with a client about a new matter, what do you want to understand first?

2:14 – Ned Adams

I mean, timeline is your obvious answer there.

And that’s very, very important. But we also want to understand the client team. Is it an in-house team? Are there outside counsel that we’ll be working with? Who owns which tasks? Is there going to be one single point of contact for everything? Or will we have different people that we’ll be working with along the way? And that’s often where TCDI can really make an impact early by asking a lot of questions up front, making sure everybody is clear on the scope of the project, the responsibilities and the deadlines before we get into all of the work, and there’ll be a lot of work that happens with every project.

2:53 – Michael Gibeault

Can you share an example, Ned, without identifying the client, where carefully listening to the client’s answer changed the whole follow-up process and questions and approach you recommended?

3:07 – Ned Adams

Yeah, listening is the key word there. You need to listen and have them describe their process.

That can sometimes tell you a lot, because not everybody on a litigation team works with technology every day. So, sometimes assumptions about timing can go unchallenged. On a recent project I was working on, the client was describing how they were going to give us the data and it “should be quick.” Then they started talking about how they had five, six terabytes of data that needed to be exported from their system and then given to TCDI.

Transferring terabytes of data takes a little bit of time. And that was a part of their schedule that they hadn’t really accounted for. So really, just by listening closely and raising my hand early on, we helped the team build a more realistic timeline. How long does it take to get the data from A to B? How long does it take to process and load that data?

It’s just a simple, practical way to add some value early on and really get everybody on the same team and feeling like partners.

4:06 – Michael Gibeault

You write that “knowing where the data lives is only part of the picture.” What can the people who use those systems every day tell us that we might miss by looking at the data alone?

4:21 – Ned Adams

Yeah. When counsel’s collecting or doing collection interviews, asking which tools people are using is a really great starting point. The next question is how are they using those tools, and are there any other tools that have not been identified yet?

Sometimes in those conversations, you will uncover a source that hasn’t been considered. For example, is the sales team using WhatsApp or WeChat instead of email sometimes? What systems does the operations team use out in the field? Working through the who, what, when, why, and where helps you build a more complete picture of where relevant data may live.

4:58 – Michael Gibeault

How do you bring those people into the conversation early enough in the process to influence the workflow?

5:05 – Ned Adams

Yeah, I mean, it starts with asking a lot of questions, and I know that that’s a theme that we’ve kind of brought up a couple of times. When you’re scoping a project, you’re also identifying who needs to be a part of the conversation.

For example, if IT owns the email and the other systems where the data lives, they’re going to need to be involved early on in the conversation. One single in-house or outside counsel attorney shouldn’t have to answer every single question themselves. Let’s bring the people in who know the systems that will be doing the work, and then find the right balance for the team as the project takes shape.

5:40 – Michael Gibeault

Collecting everything can feel like the safest choice, especially when a team is worried about missing something out there. But how do you help clients make thoughtful decisions about scope, while maintaining the confidence that they’re capturing what matters?

5:58 – Ned Adams

Absolutely. It’s finding that right balance between collecting too much and collecting too little. Either one can drive up costs. By asking a lot of questions, and a lot of the right questions early on, and then revisiting them as the matter develops, that’s going to help you make some informed decisions and be confident that you’re getting the right data.

Again, we go back to some of the five W’s, that means we just start asking which custodians matter? What date range fits the facts? Which data sources are in scope, and are there data sources that may be in scope, but they can wait to a later stage?

For example, email may be critically important. WhatsApp may be really important or Teams messaging and things like that, but there may be another data source that can just wait. And then the most important question

6:50 – Michael Gibeault

With so much attention on AI, what should a team understand about its data and objectives before choosing any technology?

7:00 – Ned Adams

Yeah, it’s kind of interesting that we made it this far without mentioning those two letters: AI. But you really have to keep going back to that one question: what’s the problem we’re trying to solve? At TCDI, that typically involves three major components: right technology, right people, right process. What does the team need the technology to do? What platform is going to fit the data and the review approach?

And where do we need people to apply judgment and validate those results? Choosing the right technology matters, but it works best when all the other parts are in place too. If one of those pieces is missing, the cost will show up later. 

7:38 – Michael Gibeault

Sometimes the deadline leaves very little room for planning. How do you make those upfront conversations useful when the team needs to act quickly?

7:49 – Ned Adams 

Yeah, this is going to sound counterintuitive, and we’ve already said the phrase “slow down to speed up,” but it’s very valuable. Now, that doesn’t mean that people are going to move slower. It just means that we’re taking a little bit of time upfront to have those thorough conversations with the right people in the room. Once everyone’s understanding of their objectives and their roles, the whole team can move faster and move in the same direction and really gain that momentum in a positive way.

8:15 – Michael Gibeault

You also talk in your article about “workflow drift,” when the work gradually loses its connection to the original objective. What are the signs that it’s time to revisit the plan?

8:28 – Ned Adams

Yeah, so at those points in time, you need to fall back and rely on a defined workflow and the thorough documentation that was created at the beginning that defines that problem and then the steps that you’re going to go through. As a matter develops, new information can always change the plan, but the workflow needs to adapt while keeping the team focused on the objective. That takes really continued listening and regular check-ins with the folks responsible for both the legal strategy and the technical work.

8:57 – Michael Gibeault

Now, what does a useful checkpoint between the legal team and the technical team look like?

9:03 – Ned Adams

At TCDI, it kind of falls back to partnership. We want to create an environment where people can give feedback throughout the project that helps us catch issues early and avoid unnecessary work. If things are going down a wrong path, we need to course correct as soon as possible.

It also keeps the technical work tied to the legal objective. That habit of listening, adjusting, and improving is central to how TCDI applies Lean Six Sigma.

9:30 – Michael Gibeault

Ned, for someone listening who wants to improve an existing workflow, where would you suggest they start, and what question would you encourage them to bring to their next team conversation?

9:42 – Ned Adams

Yeah, a lot of the answer to that is in your question.

Listen. Be curious. Ask those questions. Ask them early and often. Really focus in on the question like what is the problem we’re trying to solve? Are there any process steps undefined? And then last and most importantly, are the processes defensible? That is how you’re going to be able to drive success in every project.

10:06 – Michael Gibeault

Ned, thank you again for joining me and sharing your perspective. So, your article is a useful reminder that questions we ask early can shape every stage of a matter. So, continuing those conversations as new information emerges helps teams make better decisions about their data, and keep the work connected to what they’re trying to accomplish. For more on this topic, you can read Ned’s article on tcdi.com.

Be sure to follow TCDI on LinkedIn for future episodes and insights from our team. But thanks for spending the time with us today. We look forward to having you back for the next episode of TCDI Talks.

10:50 – Ned Adams

Thanks, Michael.