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Women in e-Discovery (“WiE”) is a pioneering organization that primarily provides educational opportunities regarding technology in the legal industry to its members. The organization offers networking and leadership avenues, promotes personal and professional growth of women, and donates mentoring and charitable contributions to its communities.  WiE is comprised of professionals within the legal industry including attorneys, litigation support professionals, paralegals, legal IT staff, court reporters, consultants, recruiters and vendors.  The Central Texas Chapters holds monthly meetings over lunch where panels or guest speakers conduct presentations regarding electronic discovery or professional development.  The organization is free to join and meetings (often with lunch!) are free to attend. 

• Date / Time:  Wed, Aug 17 from noon to 1:15
• Location:  Brown McCarroll,  111 Congress Ave, Plaza Level
• Lunch provided by Rainmaker Document Technologies
• Speaker:  Hope Swancy-Haslam of RenewData
• Topic:  The Latest in Cloud Computing 

In addition to the monthly meeting and speaker, WIED is collecting school supplies to assist Brown McCarroll in their annual school supply drive.  All supplies are donated to Sims Elementary.  If you or your firm is interested in donating please bring your items to the Aug meeting.  Some of the items needed are: 

• Pocket Folders
• Wide rule spiral notebooks
• Crayons
• Markers
• Glue sticks
• #2 pencils

We look forward to seeing you there!

You may see us around town in our Rainmaker delivery vehicles, or visiting clients in your building, but how much do you know about the Rainmaker Team?  With a combined industry experience of over 70 years the team at Rainmaker fully understands the nature of the business and how to improve the entire process.  From managing a project efficiently to strong communications skills throughout the process, we act like an extension of your firm – a trusted partner – saving you valuable time and reducing litigation costs.  Take a moment to learn a little bit about us – we are always here to help!

Jarrel Maurice – President

Jarrel Maurice has over 20 years of experience serving the Austin legal community.  Prior to co-founding Rainmaker, Jarrel built successful sales teams and improved operations at several litigation support companies in the Austin area.

Thomas Rutledge – Managing Shareholder

Thomas Rutledge is a co-founder of Rainmaker Document Technologies, Inc. and has over 16 years of experience serving the Austin legal community.  In additional to his administrative duties Thomas consults with clients on electronic discovery matters and is focused on growing our impact with our current clients and in the corporate legal marketplace. 

Mark Lischka – Partner & Sales Manager

Mark Lischka has been with Rainmaker since it was founded in 2003 and has been instrumental in its continued success.  Mark began his career in the legal services industry in 1998 with IKON as a Customer Service Representative and was promoted to Account Manager in 1999, where he served 2 years.  From 2001 to 2003, he worked for RLS Legal Solutions in Beaumont, Texas, where he assisted in opening and establishing their legal copying and scanning division. 

In his spare time, Mark enjoys being outdoors and spending time with his wife, son and two daughters.

Andy Gamez, Jr. – Account Manager

Andy Gamez, Jr. joined the Rainmaker team in 2009 and has over 15 years of experience serving clients in Austin and Houston.  Andy is focused on providing unparalleled customer service and his clients benefit from his attention to detail and sense of urgency.

In his free time, he enjoys spending time with his family and Longhorn football.

Kimberly Cox – Project Manager

Kimberly Cox joined the Rainmaker team in 2009 as a Project Manager.  Her strong computer skills and experience in marketing communications allow her to provide clients with a unique mix of organization and creativity.  She welcomes big projects that require attention to detail! 

In her free time, she enjoys spending time with her husband and friends, as well as decorating, painting, shopping and Aggie football.

Daniel Lara – Customer Service Representative

Daniel Lara graduated from St. Edward’s University in 2007 and began working at Rainmaker as a Customer Service Representative, eventually taking over several existing accounts, as well as acquiring several new clients.  After working at Rainmaker for 2 years, he left the company to pursue a different area of the legal field and worked for Dallas-based America First doing records retrieval.  He returned to his position as CSR with Rainmaker in the fall of 2010 and we are happy to have him back as a member of our team.

In his spare time, Daniel enjoys cooking, playing softball, basketball and golf.

MINNEAPOLIS, MN – May 9, 2011– Women in eDiscovery, a non-profit organization that brings together women interested in technology related to the legal industry, marks its four-year anniversary today. Women in eDiscovery provides women the opportunity to help each other grow personally and professionally through leadership, education, networking support and national recognition. In 2007, the organization held its first meeting in Washington, D.C., with 30 women in attendance. In a short period of time, the organization has achieved global reach with more than 5,400 members.

Women in eDiscovery has 30 chapters across three countries and recently started three new chapters located in Detroit, Iowa, and Orlando, and the much-anticipated Philadelphia chapter will launch this summer. The organization’s 5,400 members comprise women from all walks of life, including general counsel, secretaries, partners, associates, chief operating officers, paralegals, litigation support and e-discovery professionals.

The organization also launched a new website (http://www.womeninediscovery.org). The website brings to life the activities within the organization and promotes a sense of empowerment and inspiration to its members. It is photo-centric and includes a brand new blog. Each chapter has its own page within the site to promote their events. There are new input forms for automated submission of sponsor logos, event photos, speaker offerings and support tickets.

Amy L. Bowser-Rollins, national assistant director of Women in eDiscovery and website developer, stated, “I am very excited to launch our new website. My hope is that it will provide a better perspective of what our non-profit organization is accomplishing as a whole and encourage more new members to join us as a mentor or mentee.”

Local chapters typically hold an educational session each month and the national board organizes larger events around major legal technology trade shows and association meetings throughout the year such as LegalTech, ILTA and Masters Conference.

National co-founders include Margaret Havinga, Shawnna Childress and Lana Schell.

Lana Schell, co-founder of Women in eDiscovery, said, “We want to help legal professionals be the most they can be in their careers and in their lives as a whole. Our members are going to enjoy a whole new dimension from our new website and the other forward-thinking tools and offerings that Women in eDiscovery will provide. As we head into our fifth year of operation, we are excited for continued growth and helping our members thrive in the ever-changing world of e-discovery.”

Rainmaker Project Manager Kimberly Cox is proud to serve as 2011 Secretary to the Central Texas Chapter of this great organization.  If you or someone you know is interested in joining this FREE organization, please contact her at kimberly (at) gorainmaker (dot) com.

Have you ever spent time looking for documents in a filing cabinet, only to find that someone has removed them?  Have you ever needed to quickly access a file, only to discover that it is stored off-site in a warehouse facility somewhere 20 miles away?  The New Year is almost here and now is the perfect time to convert your mountains of paper into digital format.  When these important information resources are converted from a traditional paper-based system into an electronic format, such as PDF files, the resulting improvements in accessibility, office productivity, and information distribution can be quite dramatic.

Rainmaker provides high-quality, cost-effective document scanning of a wide range of records, from former case files, medical records, insurance claims, and mortgage documents to builder files or architectural drawings.  We can convert virtually any documents you have accumulated over the years.  To further improve accessibility, folder organization, custom file naming and searchable formats are also available.  Once scanning is complete, we can return or safely destroy your documents and provide you with the electronic files on disk or other electronic storage media.

In addition to scanning services we can also provide you with an electronic document management system that allows records to be accessed across an entire enterprise.  This web-based, on demand solution archives critical documents and records and puts your information to work across different departments and locations, enabling you to effortlessly access, edit and share files.

Take control and call Rainmaker today at 512-472-9911 for a free project estimate and to learn how our back file conversion services can help your organization become more efficient.

Simply stated, metadata is data about data.  Information about all of your electronic files is there, frozen in time, just waiting for you to take advantage of it and the benefits are endless.  Let’s say you have a set of exhibits, named for each exhibit, in PDF form.  If you want to load these documents into a review database, wouldn’t it be nice to have the “filename” field given to you don’t have to go through each exhibit and code it with the exhibit number?  For more complex cases involving emails, attachments and loose files, metadata can save hours of time and be a useful sorting and searching tool, easily putting your files in chronological order or allowing you to locate a particular document in a short amount of time. 

Rainmaker is happy to work with you to customize load files for your specific database, complete with any available metadata you might need.  For more information on how we can help you, give us a call at 512.472.9911. 

Tip: Metadata is a helpful tool for internal use, but it’s important to remember its existence when producing documents to another party or opposing counsel.  If you produce a document in its native format (the format in which the files were created and in which they are normally maintained), it will typically include metadata that is easily accessible.  By producing documents as images like TIFFs or JPGs, PDF files or printed paper, you can avoid producing metadata.

That being said, Rainmaker is pleased to announce that we have joined the social revolution and you can now officially find us on Facebook and LinkedIn.  For Rainmakers official Facebook page you can click below and “like” us.  This will allow you to receive updates on our products and services, as well as articles of interest from the blogosphere.  If you are a visual person, our Photos section features shots of a few of our product offerings, including binding options and paper colors.  Or, check out the Notes tab for short team bios.

Rainmaker Document Technologies

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Don’t have a Facebook account?  You can also connect with the Rainmaker team via LinkedIn, a professional network that allows you to connect to companies, clients, collegues and friends in a more professional, business-like setting.

Want to read more on the topic of social media and law firms?  Check out these articles and posts by other bloggers:

• Virtual Marketing Officer: A blog by Jayne Navarre
• Social Media Law Student: Blog by Rex Gradeless
• FindLaw: 5 Ways Law Firms Can Market with Social Media by Neetal Parekh

**above blogs not affiliated with Rainmaker Document Technologies, Inc.  For informational purposes only

For example, let’s say you have the first 5 digits of a zip code in column A, followed by the last 4 digits in column B.  To join them together:

1. Insert a column where you need the merge to be
2. Click in the cell where the first instance of your desired merge will go
3. Create a formula by typing in the = sign, then click in the 5 digits zip cell (which adds the cell location to your formula)
4. Enter the + sign, then click in the cell that contains the last 4 digits
5. To add a  – or any other symbol between your cells just add &”-”& between the 2 cell locations.
6. At this point, your formula should look something like this: =A1&”-”&B1
7. If you have rows zip codes to create, you can use the same formula in each merged cell by using the hovering your mouse on the bottom right hand corner of your merged zip code cell until you see the little + sign.  Simple drag it down to auto-fill the entire column with your merged zip formula.
8. Lastly, highlight the entire merged zip code column and copy, then paste special , values.  That will keep your merged zip code permanent, even if you move the column or delete any of the columns that contributed to it.

I use this concept weekly to add a bates prefix to a column that just contains bates numbers.  For this situation I create a column with my bates prefix by typing it in one cell and dragging it to auto-fill the entire column.  I then create a formulate that merges the letter prefix and the bates number into one cell.

• Open the document
• Go to Document in the top menu
• Click Watermark, then Add
• Type whatever text you want, then adjust the size (I used 80), the Opacity (I used 20%) and the rotation (-45).

Its really that simple!  Perfect for adding CONFIDENTIAL or a company name in the background of documents.  Play around with the settings and see what works best for you.  Just remember to save a copy of the document pre-watermark so you can easily revert back to the original version if necessary.

Stay tuned for more Quick Tips including MS Excel shortcuts and hints.

• In Outlook click on File, Import and Export and the Wizard opens up
• Select the option to Export to a File and click on Next
• Select Microsoft Excel 97-2003 (or a CSV file) and click on Next
• Select the folder you want to collect from and click on Next.  For starters, try you sent mail and inbox.
• Click on Browse to select a location and then type the file name that you want to export the information to and then click on Next
• Here is the important bit – click on Map Custom Fields. This will bring up a list of all the available fields that are available in that folder.
  If you are only interested in Email address, click on Clear Map and then from the Left side click on From: (address) and To: (address) and drag that to the Right list
• Click on OK
• Click on Finish

The file it exports may look kind of crazy, but it is simple to clean up.  If you want to delete personal emails (hotmail, gmail, etc), just find and replace *hotmail.com and *gmail.com with nothing and delete the blank lines in excel.  Now, that wasn’t as hard as you thought it would be, right?