Archive for August 2011
Information Management – The Big Picture
Given the explosive growth of electronic information in corporate America, managing electronic discovery is increasingly a challenge for corporate IT departments, in-house and outside counsel, each of whom are stakeholders. In December of 2006, the Judicial Conference of the US amended the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure (FRCP) to clarify the roles, responsibilities and discovery obligations of the various parties to litigation. The amendments, for the first time, made specific reference to electronically stored information, or ESI, as it is now commonly known. The changes in attitudes toward e-discovery are noticeable and the amendments have, without question, helped create an unprecedented level of dialog and collaboration to understand how electronic information is created, used, managed and disposed of in the corporate environment.
Why, then, have the amendments, intended to reduce confusion, also introduced a level of complexity to the e-discovery process that has left a lot of people scratching their heads?
For example, corporate counsel in a defense posture is keyed in on everything from creating corporate data maps to handling multiple and complex litigation holds, as well as establishing repeatable and defensible guidelines for discovery. What happens the following week when the storage administrator retires a key server and implements his data consolidation strategy? How good is the data map then?
Records retention managers have also been significantly affected. For years, they have been seen as silent corporate operatives who had murky roles and dealt with boxes of old documents. Today, nothing could be further from the truth. They are on the front lines of protecting an organization from a data management policy perspective.
Another role that has seen significant evolution is that of the “storage administrator.” Corporate data storage administrators are IT personnel whose roles are largely characterized by their knowledge of an organization’s data growth and proliferation patterns – key factors that allow them to make recommendations as to how, when and if an organization’s data management hardware and associated software platforms need modification or change.
Another driver is the evolution of technology for e-discovery to serve both proactive and reactive use cases. The vast majority of matters today are addressed in a reactive fashion with a mind to quickly address pressing, active concerns that demand rapid retrieval of responsive ESI for early case assessments, meet and confer and other matter-specific requirements. However, the future is clear in that there is a need for consistent, repeatable and targeted e-discovery processes that can also be deployed across a company, creating an “e-discovery ready,” proactive environment.
Therefore, the answer may lie in the fact that while the amendments impose obligations on the parties, they don’t specifically state how one should go about fulfilling them. When it comes to corporations today, the old silo-based information management paradigms will not work when it comes to information discovery of any kind, for any reason. The bottom line is: litigation, storage management/data consolidation, records retention, regulatory responses, internal investigations, information security initiatives, personnel policy management, business intelligence, data mining, compliance and monitoring are all effectively subsets of what we call “e-discovery.” This new paradigm of e-discovery subsumes many previously compartmentalized departmental initiatives that are under the auspices of legal, IT, records management, HR and finance. It is predicated on the degree to which an organization has information access and the ability to perform effective data classification. In short, companies should be able to leverage enterprise data for multiple business needs from a common underlying information access and classification platform.
Strategic Management Process – The Operating Stage
The Operating Stage of a strategic management process is the fourth and final stage of the process. During the Operating Stage, a company will stabilize its operating environment, refine its business and market strategy, and identify opportunities for improvement. Coming after the Building Stage, and the growth that normally occurs during it, the Operating Stage can seem boring, like the business has plateaued. However, this feeling is not reality. There is still much work to be done during the Operating Stage, and additional growth in revenue and profitability to be realized.
A key attribute of the Operating Stage is that it forms a feedback loop with the other stages of a strategic management process. After the initial work-through of a strategic management process, a company stays in the Operating Stage forever, or until there is a major revamping of the business. Information is captured in the Operating Stage that is fed back into the other stages in the process, where refinements and adjustments are made as appropriate.
The remainder of this brief article summarizes a few of the more important activities that take place during the Operating Stage.
Making Adjustments
Making adjustments to the outputs of all three of the other stages of a strategic management process can be extremely beneficial if they are done carefully and thoughtfully. Adjustments can serve to refine a company’s market strategy, business philosophy, and performance management system, and are usually the result of decisions made regarding transactions that are raised during the Operating Stage. These of course can be of many different types, but here are a few of the more common adjustments that we have seen:
Tweaking the Market Strategy. Normally, there are no major adjustments to market strategy, but minor refinements can be valuable.
Discontinuing Activities That Are Not Consistent with the Market Strategy. Unfortunately, these adjustments are all too common, and they are difficult decisions for a company to make. However, they are necessary. Continuing activities, whether they be products or services, that are not consistent with a company’s market strategy will only undermine the defined market strategy, and render the entire process invalid.
Further Refinement of Segments and Buyers. This also is typical. As more is known about customers and buying factors, it is natural to use that information to create deeper segmentation of markets. This can be a valuable exercise.It probably goes without saying, but decisions regarding transactional adjustments must be made very quickly and implemented without delay. Transactional decisions should not interfere with the timing of the normal daily business flow.
Capturing Information for Improvements
Other information captured during the Operating Stage may not be associated with specific transactions, but is equally as valuable, maybe even more so, because more general information lends itself to broader, longer-term strategic decisions. Information is critical to managing a business strategically. So, it is important to capture as much information as possible on a routine basis. Of course after being captured, the information must then be summarized, triaged, and categorized before being fed back into the other stages of the strategic process.
Here again too, the types of information captured can range widely. However, here are a few of the more common categories that we have seen:
Market Feedback. This type of information typically comes from the sales force. There are always customers or other types of stakeholders that do not like a company’s market strategy. Of course, there are also stakeholders that do like it, but those are normally not as vocal. It is important to capture all of this type of information and understand the motivations behind it.
Revenue Enhancements. These opportunities are normally associated with pricing structure, but they can also lead to expansion of markets.
Cost Reductions. At times, these suggestions can be real gems. Most companies are surprised at the suggestions they receive in this category.
Quality Improvements. Enhancements to quality, whether they be for products, services, or delivery, ensure long-term success
Who participates in capturing information? Everyone in the company should be encouraged to participate. The quantity of information that flows in is normally quite large. Therefore, a database application of some type for information capture is normally required. There are typically two methods of capturing information:
Facilitated. In this method, a small group is formed to facilitate the capture of information. This group provides assistance with classifying opportunities and quantifying potential payback. Some companies use outside consultants for this purpose to ensure objectivity. Reports are provided periodically to management for decisions.
Non-Facilitated. In this method, a process is created for employees to follow when submitting suggestions. Employees are responsible for all information submitted, including the quantification of payback. In this method, management normally plays a more significant role in classifying and prioritizing suggestions prior to decisions being made.Over time at some companies, the capture of information can begin to wane. This should not be allowed to happen. The level of information flow during the Operating Stage is a good indicator of how well the strategic management process is working.
Rewarding Performance
Employees who make suggestions, based on specific transactions or otherwise, that are adopted and lead to improvements for the company should be rewarded for those suggestions. These can be treated as an addendum to a company’s performance management system. However, perhaps the best way to handle them if possible, is to work them into the performance measurement system created during the third stage of the strategic management process. This can be time consuming, but it ensures that rewards for suggestions are handled equitably with other performance rewards.
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The final stage of a strategic management process is the Operating Stage. A company that moves through the first three stages of the process, remains in the Operating Stage forever, or until the company’s business is totally revamped. During this final stage in the process, a company captures information that is fed back into the other three stages for management decisions regarding adjustments to key outputs of the process or improvements to operational performance. If implemented properly, the Operating Stage provides a solid foundation for a company to manage strategically and successfully over the long-term.