Years ago, I wrote a post stating that Information Governance is the Rodney Dangerfield of EDRM phases.  That has changed a lot in recent years.  But when it comes to eDiscovery services, Data Conversion may be the new Rodney Dangerfield.  A recent post by Doug Kaminski of Cobra Legal Solutions discusses scenarios where data conversion is needed and how everybody needs it at some point.

Doug’s article Data Conversion: The Service That Nobody Talks About, But Everybody Needs starts by discussing the assumption that many in eDiscovery have “that data just automatically moves from platform to platform with no intervention needed”.  And that “[p]roductions from opposing parties just load right into your review platform because they’re all the same and productions received are always consistent.  Right?”

Of course, if you work in eDiscovery, you know that nothing could be further from the truth and moving data around is often like trying to fit a square peg into a round hole – you can’t accomplish it without needing the service that doesn’t get no respect, er, nobody talks about: data conversion.

So, what are three scenarios where data conversion may be needed?  I won’t steal Cobra Legal Solutions’ (and Doug’s) thunder, you can check out the article here on the specifics.  If you know this, you’ll get plenty of respect!  😉

So, what do you think?  Have you had to manage a data conversion effort before?  Not as easy as you think, is it?  Please share any comments you might have or if you’d like to know more about a particular topic.

P.S.: Maybe I used the wrong analogy?  Maybe it should have been the first rule of data conversion is that nobody talks about data conversion and the second rule…well, you get the point… 🙂

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