In this article we look at work flow: loading a case’s documents into MasterFile and keeping it up to date as you create work product or receive more evidence. You’ll find the concepts useful for both litigation and transactional case files.
Here’s what we’ll cover
- Basic strategies – an overview
- What to load
- Keeping MasterFile up to date with work product and new documents
- Retaining paper copies of scanned documents
- Further information
If you’re new to MasterFile, we suggest you have a quick look at our short Quick Start Concepts and Tutorial videos or see the Getting Started section of our knowledgebase here, to learn how to perform the actual tasks in MasterFile.
We also recommend reading the post Getting started right with MasterFile which sets out a simple six step process to start using MasterFile’s fact management system in litigation or research.
Basic strategies – an overview
You can import documents into MasterFile with or without classification meta data if you need evidence to be immediately available for searching and analysis.
- To load documents without required information:
- Use Express Load’s Batch Load Mode. Any omitted or missing required information (document date, type and author, etc. in the red section of document profiles) is flagged for easy identification.
- Image files should be converted to searchable PDF using MasterFile’s Evidence Cruncher so scanned documents can be searched.
- Use MasterFile’s Global Replace, Global Add/Remove and Power Assist Revision maintenance utilities to quickly revise and complete any missing meta-data from such document profiles.
- To load documents with profile information:
- For small document batches, Express Load’s Power Assist Mode is ideal and you can profile documents on-the-fly during import.
- For large batches such as a disclosure or production set, typically you will have received a CSV, Concordance format or similar load file. You can easily import that directly into MasterFile using Express Load’s CSV converter or importer. If no load file exists, for example for your own clients’ evidence, you can easily create a load file in Excel or engage our professional services to do so for you (as well as load your data set into a new MasterFile case for you if you desire*).
The remainder of this article covers other issues to consider, however the basic steps outlined above will let you get started immediately. Apply the suggestions below as needed.
What to load
Once you have picked your client/case/research file and decided what profiling steps to take (as explained above), the next step is to decide what documents to actually load. You can either scan, OCR and load:
- All existing documents and evidence, or
- Just key documents and evidence. These are documents that will be referred to often or those whose content needs to be searched for example contracts, affidavits, or depositions, etc.
Alternatively, you can
- Create only key document profiles without actually loading any document files. In this case, MasterFile becomes a categorized catalogue of your document/evidence inventory.Express Load’s “Profile data only” option was designed to create such “document-less” profiles quickly and rapidly via a CSV load file as (see here for details). A document profile without an attached image or document becomes a ‘stub’. You can still link ‘extracts’ to it that contain key paragraphs or information you’ve pasted (even images) or typed directly. That document and/or its extracts can then be referenced in facts, or linked to your notes or argument, etc. This lets you easily organize and explore evidence, facts, people, and issues to develop your case analysis, strategy and argument. Key documents and evidence can be simply dragged and dropped into the profiles later as you need. We still recommend that critical documents, such as deposition transcripts, be loaded into MasterFile at the outset.
Creating profiles with or without attached document or image files can therefore be done rapidly using Express Load. When loading files however, here are some best practices we suggest you consider:
- First, load documents such as depositions, electronic transcripts, contracts, affidavits and authorities, which contain key evidence that substantiate the facts and your position, so they are immediately available to your team. The remainder of the client/case file and other documents can be loaded in parallel or as resources permit.
- Depending on your workflow and initial document set size, you can easily delegate tasks. That lets you scan, load evidence and review simultaneously, and even these tasks can be split out further to different firm members.
- Near-duplicate processing flags identical documents as well as clustering near-duplicates and e-mail threads to reduce the number of documents to review. Even for data collections with as few as 1,000 documents, if just 20% of the documents were to be flagged and eliminated as near-duplicates, hours of review and reading time is often saved. Near-duplicate is therefore a step worth considering after the initial case evidence has been loaded.
Once preliminary profiling with Express Load is complete, MasterFile is ready to support your work. You will be able to locate and display any document from the client/case file instantly, while post-profiling procedures, such as entering less important profile information, may be ongoing or completed for documents where it’s deemed necessary.
Post-profiling procedures
We also recommend that the native word processing and work product documents corresponding to scanned (signed) copies that were load, be added to the corresponding document profiles so both are saved together and in one place. This not only clears up hundreds or thousands of files from folders on disk, placing them all in lets you browse or search for and find any of these files in future in less time and with less effort. Most users let this task proceed over time as it is not a prerequisite to start using MasterFile.
Keeping MasterFile up to date with work product and new documents
Once a MasterFile database has been created, establish procedures to keep it up to date with new documents as they are received or created. Here are some tips:
Use MasterFile’s Watch Folder Monitor. It was specifically designed so you can simply drag and drop or save new documents to the watch folder, and its monitor automatically brings the document into MasterFile.
- New work product documents should be created and stored in MasterFile, taking advantage of MasterFile’s document management facilities, rather than in folders on disk. By creating new documents directly in MasterFile you’ll get the benefit of all of MasterFile’s features, such as profiling, security, support for mobile users, collaboration with team members, and so forth. Signed copies, filed (and stamped) official copies, or pleadings, should be scanned and attached to the same profiles containing the original word processing files.
- All team members should regularly load e-mails sent or received to ensure case databases have all relevant communications and thereby avoid mistakes and misunderstandings.
- For paper documents, set your scanner to save scanned files to the watch folder too. Scanning requires some internal procedures to ensure that all documents related to the case file are scanned, crunched, loaded and profiled in MasterFile. Doing so, ideally before such documents are physically put away, not only ensures they don’t fall through the cracks, but more importantly makes them immediately available to everyone working on the case file. Doc-links to these new documents can then be e-mailed to relevant team members for review directly in MasterFile. The physical documents should be marked once scanned to avoid re-scanning by mistake.
Retaining paper copies of scanned documents
Depending on your client/case file, you need to establish whether you need to retain paper copies of scanned documents, particularly of signed agreements, correspondence, etc. Research projects that primarily consist of reference material readily available again from journals and so forth typically need no paper copies.
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