Mike Quartararo Mike Quartararo, president, ACEDS. Courtesy photo.
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Editor's Note: Article has been updated with comment from Quartararo on Tuesday afternoon.

The Association of E-Discovery Specialists (ACEDS) has a new president, and it's a familiar name for many in the e-discovery community.

Yesterday, BARBRI, the parent organization of ACEDS, announced that Mike Quartararo is taking over the role of president and head of professional development at the e-discovery certification organization. Quartararo has a long history in e-discovery, previously working as the director of litigation support for Stroock & Stroock & Lavan, and leading e-discovery projects at Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom. He has been a member of ACEDS since its founding and himself holds a CEDES certification. Quartararo also comes with a project management background, having last year launched legal project management consultancy eDPM Advisory Services and writing in 2016 the book Project Management in Electronic Discovery.

Quartararo takes over from Mary Mack, who announced last month she was transitioning to a new role. Stephen Fredette, CEO of BARBRI, told ACEDS community members in an email that Quartararo will be tasked with building on the work Mack has done with the organization, while leveraging BARBRI's legal education talent and resources "to create new education solutions and certificate programs for ACEDS members and the legal community."

"I look forward to Mike's leadership and contributions as we grow our membership, local chapters, and continue meeting the expanding educational and certification needs of the ACEDS community. Mike has been engaged in a smooth transition with Mary since last Tuesday and will continue that process over the next couple weeks, in addition to building out additional members to his team," Fredette said in the email.

Speaking with Legaltech News on Tuesday, Quartararo said that the genesis of his interest in the role actually sprung up one year ago, far before it was ever open. After leaving Stroock, he interviewed for a corporate legal department job. In that interview, he was asked a question that caught him off guard, one that he's thought a lot about since: "Who do you consider yourself to be?"

"The answer became, I'm an educator," he explained. "If I look back at everything I've done ever, whether it was raising my kids; or training lawyers, e-discovery and lit support people; building a curriculum for Bryant University; or any of the speaking or presentation events that I go to, what am I doing? I'm educating."

That education-focus is something Quartararo will look to build upon in his new role. He doesn't expect many immediate changes with the organization—he noted that he's friends with both Mack and fellow ACEDS departee Kaylee Walstad, and "things have been going smoothly."

But he added that part of his role is to "identify different directions, not because they're better or there's something wrong with what was in place. A new leader comes in, and it's part of their obligation to keep something like ACEDS relevant." Among those directions, he said, will be integration with other BARBRI platforms such as the Center for Legal Studies online course management system, and working closely with the ACEDS and BARBRI teams.

One of the team members Quartararo will be closely working with is Ari Kaplan. BARBRI also announced that the legal technology consultant and author has been tapped to help build a new ACEDS advisory board and act as chairperson for the group. In a conversation with Legaltech News in September, Fredette pointed to the advisory board as one of his key initiatives in growing the future of ACEDS.

Quartararo agreed, noting of the advisory board expansion, "No matter how knowledgeable or broad I think my experience is, there's always someone who's got some other experience, some added experience, some deeper knowledge of a subject. If you're going to be the Association of Certified E-Discovery Specialists, you need to have a pretty deep bench."

And primarily, whether it's to the enhanced advisory board or to a staff he stated he wants to be diverse and inclusive, Quartararo's goal in his new position is to listen.

"A lot of people in our industry talk—and I'm one of them, frankly, I do a lot of speaking. But I think in this kind of role, what you really need to do is listen," he explained. "So my goal is to keep my mouth shut a little bit more, listen to the community, listen to what they want, make some decisions about what's best needed in the space, and do my darndest to deliver it."