Thought-provoking Things Worth Sharing - Issue #191
Talking about AI and eDiscovery
If you haven’t seen it yet, Tom O’Connor and I spent some time chatting about the Evolve Conference, AI, and Jazzfest last week:
Welcome to this week’s collection of thought-provoking things. For each issue, I will share information on careers and workplace culture, workplace mental health, talent development, and key insights into privacy, security, and legal technology.
You can learn more about me here: Mike McBride Online.
I also spoke to the San Diego Paralegal Association about stress and anxiety, which there’s no recording of, to foster an open conversation, but it was a good one. Trust me, you missed out. 😏
I’m always glad to get an invite to talk about the things that interest me. I’m very thankful to Tom and Sheila Grela for inviting me!
Speaking of which, I’m going to give a short presentation and demo for the International Data Security User Group on June 10, explaining how Copilot and other interactions appear in Purview eDiscovery. You can register for the event and start getting involved in future events here: https://luma.com/international-data-security-user-group
I’ve attended some of the previous sessions, and it’s a great way to learn more about Microsoft Purview. They also like to encourage open dialogue and questions, so don’t expect a recording, come catch us live!
It always feels good to get to share knowledge with folks virtually. If you’re reading this, you obviously know what sharing things I learn means to me. It also pushes me to keep learning, which has been helpful throughout my career.
What kinds of things are you learning?
Careers and the Workplace
This might be helpful. - 80 One-On-One Meeting Questions for Managers and Employees
This too:
The easiest way to make a problem seem to go away is to stop measuring it. - EEOC Is Done With Tracking Race And Sex In The Workforce. Right now it’s just a proposal, but I have no doubt about the reasons behind it.
Artificial Intelligence
Worth Reading - Is Microsoft 365 Copilot Tracking Your Prompts? The Real Enterprise Answer
You may read that and think that means your employer can see every prompt you enter in Copilot. To some extent, that is true; in the same way, they can see every email message or Teams chat you type with your work account. It is a work account after all. The key piece missing from that simple statement is that it's not easy to do, and, by design, there are usually very few people who can collect and review that data.
Isn’t this just announcing what we all see every day?
Google Search, as you know it, is over
This is worth spending some time thinking about:
This should be the thing you focus on in terms of AI - AI governance overview: stop panicking and fix the basics.
Related to that:
Worth Reading - The AI Didn’t Go Rogue. Guardrails Were Never There.
If you don't put the guardrails in place, you are inviting someone, or some agent, to go rogue. The only difference is that if this were a contractor or an IT person with more access than they should have, you could fall back on their ethics. AI doesn't have ethics and doesn't understand the concept. If it can do it, it will do it.
Mental Health in the Workplace
Obviously - The World Is On Fire (Literally), and Your Employees Are Feeling It
Workplace Mental Health - Why Self-Care at Work Isn’t Optional—It’s Essential - The question isn’t whether it’s essential, it’s whether your workplace makes it possible.
Worth Reading - Most workers told Monster their job harms their mental health
If you look at the contributors to the mental health damage, though, you see things that are avoidable if organizations wanted to avoid them. Fix poor management, address understaffing, pay people what they're worth, and don't lay off workers just to tweak the stock price. Unfortunately, in the current political and economic climate, I don't see enough organizations that want to do any of that.
This has been lost on too many people I know - The Forgotten Art Of Doing Something Just For You (No Productivity Required)
Privacy, Security, and Legal Tech
More data, fewer resources: What 100+ legal professionals say is holding ediscovery back in 2026
I think you could say the same thing about all areas of the legal tech industry. More data and fewer resources to deal with it.
Worth Reading - More than half of all Polymarket “long shot” bets on military action pay off
Analysis by the Anti-Corruption Data Collective, a non-profit research and advocacy group, found that long-shot bets—defined as wagers of $2,500 or more at odds of 35 percent or less—on the platform had an average win rate of around 52 percent in markets on military and defense actions.
That compares with a win rate of 25 percent across all politics-focused markets and just 14 percent for all markets on the platform as a whole.
The research is likely to add to growing concerns among regulators and lawmakers about insiders placing bets on the timing and success of military actions, amid fears that this could reveal classified information in advance.
That’s all, folks. If you found something interesting in this week’s newsletter, please share it with your friends. It’s the best way to help support the effort I put into sharing this with you each week.