Early Case Assessments in Employment Disputes: Minimizing Risks, Controlling Costs and Efficiently Resolving Claims

ECAs provide the parties and their counsel with an opportunity to identify key issues, establish the client’s interests and perspectives, and anticipate the other side’s counterarguments and concerns. ECAs also involve assessing quantifiable costs, including the client’s investment of resources in resolving disputes as well as inexact costs, like reputational risks or enhanced risk of other claims, if the dispute escalates.

Such assessments can be conducted as soon as a claim is foreseeable and certainly once a demand letter, charge or complaint is received. Analyzing the critical evaluative factors enables practitioners to build a framework for approaching the conflict to identify and mitigate potential risks throughout a settlement negotiation, litigation, mediation or arbitration. The ECA should also address e-discovery litigation holds and tools to preserve and manage in-house resources, a budget and clear agenda for outsourced services especially in light of the amendments to the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure concerning discovery.

Listen as our panel of experienced practitioners explains how to best utilize, structure and conduct an ECA as a tool to minimize risk, control costs, and hasten appropriate resolution of employment-related disputes.

1. Elements and structure of an effective ECA program
2. When to use an ECA program
3. Preventing runaway cases with effective ECA
4. The intersection of ECA programs and e-discovery
5. Best practices for implementing and utilizing ECAs

The panel will review the following key issues:

• How using an ECA promotes evidence based decisions on whether and when to settle or litigate.
• What cost categories can an ECA be used to identify, and can an ECA be used to reduce anticipated costs?
• How does an ECA intersect with e-discovery tools and other pre-litigation or pre-arbitration practices?