O'Bryan adds that the equivalent of half a person on her IT team is responsible for e-discovery. "We deal with unhappy borrowers and distressed debt, so we are constantly [pulling records] for our legal team," she says.

The key to a better IT-legal relationship is to break down language barriers, O'Bryan says. IT must not only explain technology issues to the legal staff, she says, but also "be knowledgeable about risks and translate that to business language so the legal team can understand."

in CIO's Legal Drilldown.