Mark Lyon

Project schedules are always unpredictable. Populations and deadlines change, team members move faster or slower than expected, the database takes a nose dive on the Thursday before a production deadline or (my personal favorite) the day before you’re done, someone “finds” a population of data roughly the same size as what you just finished.

When I’m staffing a review, I tend to assume a conservative review pace and also account for some absences by rounding my estimates down. If the population is known at the outset, it’s rather easy to give a predicted duration. If not, though, sometimes the best one can do is guess with the information available. Generally, I try to err on the low side – it’s terrible to have a team come to a project expecting a month of work only to run out of docs ten days in.

Poor estimation, though, sometimes results in team members having conflicting commitments. If a team member has worked the amount of time initially estimated, I can’t find much room to criticize leaving a project before it’s done. Review Attorneys need to keep their dance card full – downtime gets expensive fast. Similarly, I’m thrilled to hear that members of my team have accepted full-time positions during any part of a project. In those situations, it’s easy to alert the project leadership that you’ll be leaving. Give as much notice as you can. The team leader may be planning to train new people or to make other changes; knowing your plans can help inform those decisions.

It’s less exciting to have team members leave a project within the duration outlined at the beginning of a project. The reasons people leave projects early are far too numerous to list. Some are clearly false, many are not, but some can make an attorney seem incredibly unreliable. The absolute worst are pre-planned, long-term vacations in the middle of a short project. If you’re not available, tell the recruiter in advance. Not all absences will prevent someone from participating in a project, but it’s far better to know about such things in advance.

When emergencies come up, try and provide an expectation about your availability. If your grandmother dies and you’re going to fly to Iowa, alert the appropriate person about the trip and when you plan to be back. If the project is ongoing, your team may likely want you to return. Don’t just show up a week later without approval to return, though (yes, it’s happened).

If a project is just not the right fit for you, it’s likely that honestly approaching your team leader about the issue will result in a far better resolution. Having someone leave with no explanation is confusing and frustrating. Sometimes the subject matter just doesn’t make sense, the platform is too hard to navigate or some administrative change doesn’t meet with your expectations or tolerances. Maybe it can be fixed, maybe not. At a minimum, though, the problem can be understood and any disappointment tempered.

Keep in mind that, even in a city like New York, the document review community is quite small. If you leave a project because you were “hit by a cab”, hearing from other team members that you were trying to get them to leave and join you on another project the next day can be infuriating. Similarly, the things you post on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram might also be seen by your recruiter or staffing agency; it’s not good when it conflicts with what they’ve been told.

Often times, review attorneys fear sharing information about their plans, worrying that they’ll be immediately tossed from a project or not considered in the future. While this concern should be considered in some workplaces, I’ve generally found these concerns to be overblown. Most prudent project managers realize that it is best to make the best use of a person’s time while they can participate, particularly once they’ve been trained and understand the matter. Waiting until the last minute to announce an absence or departure that was known in advance, though, makes completing the project more difficult and can put your team in a bind.

Resignation Letter image courtesy of Carey Ciuro.

New reviewers often express frustration about the number of rules involved in document review. Review attorneys are generally quite intelligent and hardworking people – being told what to wear or what to do seems, for many, insulting. Rules are necessary, though, because not everyone conducts themselves in a way that respects everyone working around them. I often struggle with presenting facility rules in a way that gains the maximum amount of compliance while also making it clear that team members should be open with their concerns. Often, though, explaining the reasoning behind the instructions is the most effective method.

In my office, we hand out our office policies along with project training materials, outlining basic rules that tend to stay the same between projects. One of these rules is a prohibition on the use of cell phones when at your desk. In today’s connected society, this creates more than its fair share of controversy.

The rule does not exist to make working miserable. It exists because (1) clients demand it as part of basic information security and (2) there are significant productivity benefits gained when team members aren’t constantly checking their personal devices.

Information security is a huge issue for clients outsourcing document review. Team members are usually engaged for a single project, carrying (in the client’s mind) little loyalty to the client, law firm or vendor. The information being reviewed is often quite sensitive. The possibility of collecting and transmitting client information using a cell phone is not just the plot of a bad Grisham novel; it can happen. Having enforced policies in place at the review facility to prevent the dissemination of that information is a requirement when working with almost any client. Use of cell phones and Internet come up during almost every client visit to the review facility. My office is also routinely audited by clients for compliance and we test our controls regularly to maintain our ISO 27001 certification.

While I have mixed personal feelings about the performance impact of access to outside connectivity while working, I have seen strong evidence that groups perform better without the significant distractions offered by mobile devices. Certain individuals are able to task-switch seemingly without issue and use the short downtime as an opportunity to personally recharge, but far more dive into a cycle of distraction at the slightest interruption. For some, even seeing others being distracted can lead them to stop their own work.

The days of being able to lazily move through a review population (often littered with easily non-responsive material) are long gone. Productivity expectations are high and, with advances in technology, much of the irrelevant content of the past never makes it to a reviewer’s eyes. Many more of the documents in an assignment are going to require serious concentration to ensure they are properly coded.

On an administrative side, the rule is a pain to enforce. I can’t – nor do I want to – monitor every moment of my team’s day. I prefer to allow reviewers the maximum amount of autonomy possible, walking by but not interrupting the work unless necessary. But, once I start seeing people sneak cell phones from their pockets and bags for a quick text or to check their personal email, I’m obligated to step in with a warning. If there’s a special concern like a hospitalized family member, requiring you to constantly monitor your messages, alert your supervisor. Usually a solution can be found.

Some facilities alleviate the administrative burden by abolishing phones from the room completely. In one office I worked with, each reviewer had a private, lockable cubbyhole in a lounge area. Cell phones, purses and all other electronics had to be stored there before entering the office. While there are some situations and clients for which this is necessary, I prefer extending enough trust in people to have them keep their devices in pockets or purses during the day.

In my office, we have dedicated non-review spaces for phone calls and surfing the Internet. If your review facility doesn’t have clearly-identified locations, make certain to ask. People get quite angry when someone has a phone conversation in the hallway outside their office or – and this has actually happened – in the handicapped stall of the restroom. We try to keep a small conference room available for private conversations (it even has a nice speakerphone that works far better than anyone’s cell); it’s available to anyone who asks, so speak up. It’s the perfect spot for taking a phone interview.

As with any non-work activity, it’s important to also mention billing and time allocation. Unless you have remaining time under a compensated break policy, don’t bill for time spent checking your personal email, texts and making phone calls. In my office, a certain amount of break time is included with every billable hour, but every office will have its own policies. Properly billing your time is an important responsibility. Make certain to understand and properly apply your workplace’s rules starting with day one.

I have the benefit of working in a facility dedicated almost exclusively to review – things get much more complex when working in a temporary setting at a law firm or client site. I once did a project in a temporary space in a client’s building, only to find that the rest of the floor was leased to a third party. Things like using the restrooms on our own floor or even getting water from what we thought was a shared break room caused significant problems. One law firm I worked with wanted us to track any time away from the computer (even though we never actually had much work to do at the machines) and needed us to ask permission to step away from our area. When working in a temporary setting, be doubly cautious about inadvertently offending those whose space you’ve invaded. Seek out advice and instruction from the project’s leadership on the policies and expectations and gently point out any specific concerns you encounter as soon as possible.

In any situation, unless it’s clear that you’re on a personal break, keep your cell phone safely stashed. Get up and take a break from time to time; it provides a perfect opportunity to check your messages.

No Texting While Flying the Space Shuttle image courtesy of Ian Kitajima / Oceanit.