Legal Current

Parts of this Q&A appear this week in The Capital Crier – the daily newspaper of the American Association of Law Libraries (AALL) annual meeting in Washington, D.C.

As the legal industry braces against the pressures of the current economy, several areas remain strong – particularly litigation. We talked with Jean O’Grady, Director of Research at DLA Piper, and John DiGilio, Manager of U.S. Research Services at Reed Smith, about the ever-changing field of litigation, and how today’s litigators keep up.

Q. As the manager of a large law firm’s information resources, you have witnessed firsthand the changes in the industry. How has the work of litigators changed in the last few years?

O’Grady:  The way people get information today has changed drastically – everything is instantaneous. It’s distracting. Litigators can’t focus and absorb all the information that’s needed. Google is deceptive in making it easy to find something vs. finding the right thing. In litigation, you need the best quality information.

DiGilio: Litigators are busier now than ever. Time is more of a premium than it has ever been before. Their workload has increased, and they’re being challenged to not just work harder, but also to work smarter.  Concerns about cost recovery have increased but have also given way to concerns about cost prevention. Litigators want to assure that the client is satisfied with what they are paying for, and they’re turning to librarians for high-level research expertise.

As practices have become national if not global, concerns for a litigator stretch beyond his or her jurisdictional base. They need access to resources beyond their state and their nation.

Q. How have these changes affected the type of information litigators need and how they get it?

O’Grady: Cost pressures, especially in today’s economy, have heightened sensitivity to resources used. But there is a cost vs. quality aspect to consider. It’s a tightrope to balance. There is a constant pressure for attorneys to be rainmakers and know their discipline and the industries their clients work in.

DiGilio: Also, they need a lot more information than they have ever needed before, and again it goes beyond their jurisdiction.  They need access to national and international material and, increasingly, non-legal information like scientific, medical and sociological.

As for access to this information, it is not possible for a library to meet all of the needs mentioned above.  There needs to be both an electronic means to this information as well as the traditional means.

Q.  Considering the “survival mode” we seem to be in, what tools are most important to successful legal research in litigation?

DiGilio: As librarians, we know we cannot provide everything our litigators need within the physical confines of our libraries. There are constraints with shelf space and budget. We need to partner with quality information providers like West to provide online tools that dive deeply into the legal realm, and at the same time provide national and international breadth.  Tools that leverage external and internal content, as well as integrated KM tools, such as West KM and West KMT, are incredibly useful for us and help us provide better service to our clients.

O’Grady: It’s critical to have reliable case law and the related resources, briefs and pleadings – as well as flagging cases with KeyCite within a short time. When I learned how to do legal research, you had to read through a case and then check another book just to see if that case was still relevant. Now, before you even start reading a document you know whether or not it’s been criticized. Pulling primary and secondary citing resources into a single view is phenomenal.

Our attorneys also rely on Westlaw Watch and CourtExpress to monitor client news and developments and newly released dockets. Traveling attorneys live on their BlackBerries and they can receive these updates in a way that’s relevant to them.

Q. Describe the value that products like Westlaw’s litigation offerings provide.

DiGilio: The value includes increased productivity and efficiency, but it also goes back to my previous comment about working smarter. When you bring so many excellent resources to one place where they are intuitive, interactive and seamless – a place like Westlaw Litigator – you enable the attorneys to work smarter.  The interconnected linking to additional content enables a litigator to feel confident in their research, knowing that they have covered their bases using the best sources in a seamless and efficient fashion.

O’Grady: Even, or perhaps especially, for those without a physical library in their office, West has made the information easily accessible for everyone, no matter where they are.

KeyCite flags are invaluable for reliability. They create a presence within the document that there is always more to research (which is a continual process of updating). The law is a river. You step into a different river every day.

Q. What are your customers asking you for?

O’Grady: Transparent pricing, especially in this environment. There is a continual emphasis on the value of treatises as a repository of real legal expertise.

DiGilio: They are asking for lunar real estate at efficiency apartment prices! What they want are the best tools delivered in a way that is not only cost effective, but practically responsive to what they do. They need tools that mirror the way they think and practice.  Even the best, most economical tools will not be used if they are too complex.  Litigators just do not have the time.

Q. What would make your job easier?

O’Grady: An increased understanding and strategic thinking in the legal community about the importance of the resources used. Librarians take large, real risk management efforts to address information quality issues and appropriate use issues. I wish more people knew how much effort goes into this. And, it would be great to have information that addresses cross-border litigation!

DiGilio: Practical research education that starts on day one of law school, continues through graduation and does not stop as long as an individual is in practice. The emphasis is on practical. Litigators do not practice in a vacuum; legal research should not be viewed as though it exists in one.

This trend will continue, and part of our job as librarians is not only to seek out the right resources, but also partner with providers like West to develop resources in ways that benefit our librarians and our ability to better serve our litigators and clients. It makes our jobs easier, our litigators’ jobs easier and we become stakeholders in the tools we use.