Insights Articles

The Limitations of Spreadsheets for Legal Hold 

Spreadsheets might seem convenient for tracking custodians, data sources, and hold statuses. However, they fall short in several critical areas: 

1. Lack of Automation: Manual spreadsheets require constant updating, sending emails, and tracking acknowledgments manually. Missing a single step can compromise compliance and expose the organization to risk.
   
   
2. No Audit Trail: Courts and regulators often require proof that a legal hold was issued, communicated, and acknowledged. Spreadsheets cannot provide the detailed, timestamped audit trails necessary to demonstrate defensible preservation.
   
   
3. High Risk of Human Error: Data entry mistakes, accidental deletions, and outdated information are common in spreadsheets. When dealing with critical litigation data, even minor errors can have significant consequences.
   
   
4. Limited Collaboration and Scalability: Large organizations or law firms often have dozens, or even hundreds, of custodians and data sources. Spreadsheets struggle to scale, making it difficult to coordinate large, multi-location legal hold programs efficiently.
   

Why Compliance and Data Preservation Require More 

Legal hold is not just a checkbox – it’s a compliance requirement and a foundational component of litigation readiness. Effective legal hold ensures that relevant data is preserved, protected, and easily accessible for review. Without a reliable system, legal teams risk: 

• Spoliation of evidence: Failure to preserve relevant information can lead to sanctions or adverse judgments. 
  
  
• Regulatory violations: Courts and regulators increasingly scrutinize data preservation processes, making defensibility essential.
  
  
• Inefficient workflows: Manual tracking slows down your ability to respond to litigation or audits. 
  
  
• Business interruption: Sending holds and tracking responses outside of a legal hold platform requires more time in drafting, tracking and responding to holds, diverting attention from critical business matters. 

A dedicated legal hold solution addresses these issues by automating notifications, tracking acknowledgments, and maintaining detailed audit logs. This ensures that your compliance and data preservation efforts are efficient, defensible and reliable. 

Modern Alternatives to Spreadsheets

Today’s legal technology provides purpose-built tools designed to handle the complexity of legal hold programs. Features to look for include: 

• Automated Custodian Notifications: Automatically notify custodians, send reminders, escalate non-responses, and track acknowledgments. 
  
  
• Centralized Data Tracking: Maintain a single source of truth for all legal hold activities across your organization.
  
  
• Comprehensive Audit Trails: Document every action for defensibility in court or regulatory review. 
  
  
• Integration with eDiscovery and Litigation Workflows: Seamlessly transition from hold to collection, review, and production to reduce risk and streamline processes. 

By moving away from spreadsheets and leveraging these modern solutions, legal teams can ensure compliance, preserve data effectively, and maintain defensibility throughout the litigation lifecycle. 

Key Takeaways

Spreadsheets may be a great solution for data analysis, but they are inadequate for managing legal hold. Legal hold is about compliance, data preservation, and defensible processes – areas where manual tracking falls short. Adopting purpose-built legal hold solutions: 

• Reduces risk of spoliation and regulatory issues.
  
  
• Improves operational efficiency and oversight. 
  
  
• Supports defensible compliance and auditability. 

At Array, we help legal teams implement scalable, compliant legal hold programs as part of a broader approach to litigation support. Our solutions integrate with your existing technology stack, ensuring data preservation is automated, defensible, and aligned with best practices. 

Don’t let spreadsheets put your organization at risk. A modern legal hold program is essential for compliance, effective data preservation, and litigation readiness. 

Julia Helmer, Director of Client Solutions

With 15 years of expertise, Julia excels at optimizing enterprise eDiscovery workflows from start to finish. With a deep understanding of how to seamlessly integrate workflows across various eDiscovery platforms, Julia creates tailored solutions for data identification, legal holds, ESI collections, and productions. By harnessing the power of Technology Assisted Review and Analytics, she delivers efficient, cost-effective results that align with best practices and budgetary constraints. Julia’s exceptional communication and customer service skills have fostered strong, lasting relationships with both clients and Project Management teams, enabling her to effectively problem-solve and drive success across numerous projects.