ABSTRACT
The chapter explores the increasing complexity of providing legal services and the relationship between that complexity and data growth. It discusses the increasing competition among legal service providers, the decline in differentiation among legal service organizations, and how data mining could provide differentiation. The chapter considers the risk to clients of advice based solely on experience versus advice based on data mining plus experience. It explains how data mining creates a basis for improving advice. The chapter aims the challenge created by the growth of data. In the third part, and describes the need for and components of a data mining program. It explains the importance and features of a data management plan and why data mining should include text data and not just numerical data. The chapter talks about emerging data sources the legal service providers should consider. It summarizes why legal service organizations should start now on data mining programs.
