Extract from Barry Schwartz’s article “How to Manage Manual Litigation Holds: A Step-By-Step Guide”
Manual litigation holds come up in discussion less and less these days, as automated litigation hold software continues to increase in variety, capability, and popularity. Organizations of any size or scope have a legal duty to preserve any data that is potentially relevant to a new, imminent, or anticipated legal matter. The first step in complying with that duty involves issuing a litigation hold notice (or legal hold notice) which mandates the preservation of data and electronically stored information (ESI) as well as other pertinent information that might live in the form of hard copy documents.
For companies facing frequent litigation, the reasons to enlist the help of software to navigate their litigation holds are obvious. But what if your organization is involved in only a handful of legal matters per year? What if you don’t have room in your budget to invest in a license for litigation hold software? Whether your organization deals with one, ten, or hundreds of legal matters each year, your legal duty to preserve data remains the same. The question then becomes: How can you successfully manage the litigation hold process manually, without automated software?
