In Kim v. Cushman & Wakefield U.S., Inc., No. 2:25-cv-4783-CAS (SKx) (C.D. Cal. Apr. 24, 2026), California Magistrate Judge Steve Kim, stating “Keyword searches alone, without more advanced and thoughtful search techniques, will be inadequate for Teams data—a medium where conversations are shorter, more informal, and less likely to include full names than email”, granted Plaintiff’s motion to compel supplemental discovery in part.
Case Discussion and Judge’s Ruling
In this pregnancy discrimination case, Plaintiff argued that Defendant’s searches for relevant electronically stored information (ESI) were deficient. Originally, Defendant had not searched Microsoft Teams. But MS Teams, as one of Defendant’s own witnesses (Kathryn Raney) testified, was one of the primary communication methods used at Defendant’s company. So even though Defendant’s counsel had prepared search terms, identified custodians, and determined date ranges for ESI searches, those efforts didn’t extend to MS Teams. That oversight was not discovered until April 20, 2026.
Judge Kim stated: “To Defendant’s credit, upon discovering the MS Teams gap, counsel immediately ran the existing search terms against MS Teams and produced 47 pages of messages on April 21, 2026…But the production itself proved the gap was consequential. Among the 47 pages: a July 8, 2024 Teams message from Plaintiff to Raney about transitioning her duties before maternity leave, and an August 13, 2024 message from Raney inquiring about transition meetings…These sorts of communications are relevant to the pretext analysis in this case.”
Continuing, he said: “That does not mean, however, that Plaintiff gets to enforce the broadest version of a document request—seeking ‘all documents and communications relating to Plaintiff or her allegations’—or to demand an expansion of custodians or data sources with no concern for proportionality. At the same time, overbroad requests do not excuse incomplete searches. An objecting party that elects to search and produce—rather than move for a protective order—undertakes an obligation to search reasonably…Defendant just didn’t search everywhere it should have. And the proportionality analysis under Rule 26(b)(1) weighs in Plaintiff’s favor with respect to MS Teams. This is a pregnancy discrimination case in which the timing and circumstances of the termination decision are among central disputed facts. Defendant has exclusive access to its own internal communications about termination decisions before any final termination news was delivered to Plaintiff. The transition-related Teams messages already produced confirm that relevant communications exist in this repository.”
Judge Kim also stated: “The harder question is what a supplemental search should look like. Plaintiff asks for a nearly indiscriminate search of ‘all reasonably likely repositories.’ Defendant says it already ran the search terms against Teams and there’s nothing left. Neither position is quite right. The problem with simply rerunning the existing search terms on Teams is that those terms all require ‘Connie Kim’ as an anchor—e.g., ‘Connie Kim’ NEAR ‘terminat!’…It is arguable whether that may work well enough even for emails, but it cannot work for MS Teams chats about transition planning among managers who might say ‘the Smartsheet’ or ‘Brooke’s workload’ without mentioning Plaintiff by name. Keyword searches alone, without more advanced and thoughtful search techniques, will be inadequate for Teams data—a medium where conversations are shorter, more informal, and less likely to include full names than email.”
So, Judge Kim ordered as follows:
“To that end, unless the parties agree to different parameters based on good-faith discussions among counsel and eDiscovery consultants, the court finds that the scope should be limited to:
- Custodians: Kathryn Raney, Ashley Roedemeier, and Brian Jaffe—the three individuals identified in deposition testimony as involved in the leave-transition process and the termination decision.
- Date range: July 1, 2024 through December 3, 2024.
- Search: All non-privileged Teams communications (1:1 chats and group chats) concerning the leave-transition process and the termination decision during the relevant date range between (a) any combination of the three custodians, and (b) between any of those custodians and Plaintiff, Brooke Edwards, or Emilce Calderon.
Defendant shall review the collected messages for responsiveness and privilege before production. Any documents withheld on privilege grounds shall be identified on a privilege log served concurrently with the production.”
Also, in response to Plaintiff’s contention that Defendant’s designated witness for its Rule 30(b)(6) deposition—Hilary Aue—wasn’t adequately prepared to testify on Topic 63: the reason(s) and decision to eliminate Plaintiff’s position and terminate her employment, “including all relevant dates and the names of the individuals involved in the decision-making process”, Judge Kim ordered: “Defendant shall produce a further-prepared Rule 30(b)(6) witness on Topic 63 for a continued deposition limited to no more than one hour of recorded testimony to be completed by May 8, 2026, unless the parties stipulate to a later date or Judge Snyder extends any deadlines in her scheduling order.”
So, what do you think? Do you agree that keyword searches alone are inadequate for Teams data? Please share any comments you might have or if you’d like to know more about a particular topic.
Case opinion link courtesy of Minerva26, an Affinity partner of eDiscovery Today. Hat tip to Michael Berman for his coverage of this case here.
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