Discovery is usually the most expensive phase of litigation. Due to the proliferation of e-mail, social media and text messages, the volume of potentially relevant documents has exploded and continues to grow. In response to their clients' increasing demand to control costs, litigators are turning to legal process outsourcing (LPO) for an effective way to manage the expense of reviewing and coding a large volume of documents. LPO may have associated risks, however, including privilege preservation, data security and ethical concerns.

In a formal opinion, the American Bar Association's Standing Committee on Ethics and Professional Responsibility approved offshore outsourcing of legal services, provided that counsel:

These priorities mean that counsel should establish rigorous communication protocols for everyone involved with the LPO team. This usually starts with drafting and implementing a document review playbook that contains the entire procedure for execution of the outsourced tasks.

Multiple factors impact which LPO provider counsel ultimately selects, such as:

For a detailed explanation of the issues that arise when considering whether to engage an LPO provider, see Practice Note, Legal Process Outsourcing in Litigation. For more information on options for document review, see Practice Note, Responding Parties: Document Review Overview: Review Team.