The number, size and complexity of contracts managed by enterprises has increased dramatically in recent years. At the same time, company executives have become more aware of the material risks associated with contractual obligations and rights and the need for better document control. Contract management software needs to focus on streamlining the communication, collaboration and contract assembly process to create accurate contracts with accurate terms and conditions as efficiently as possible.
Quite often contract management software does not meet the needs of today's organizations. With workgroups spread across the globe exchanging contracts and managing changes can slow the document review process to a crawl. Current practices for dealing with large purchase agreements, outsourcing arrangements, sales contracts, and lease and licensing contracts can create a litany of problems.
Are you losing opportunities due to contract management inefficiency?- Slow contract turnaround times are often due to manual processes
- Paper based documents are hard to manage and hard to find in paper-based archiving
- No central storage or consistency in contract templates slows you down
- Lack of proper processes and controls affects the process
Are you at risk? Do you lack security?- Missed renewals and liabilities often occur due to out of date or inaccurate contracts
- Inconsistent language and sub-optimal contract terms and standard templates is a risk
- Accidental leaks of hidden or sensitive information occur in contracts
Are you ready for the cost of legal discovery?- Slow responses to discovery requests affects your bottom line
- Lack of automated reporting of contract activity and history is an issue
- No search capabilities to find relevant contracts is a problem
There are better ways to track, manage and secure business documents using document control software.
Common contract management software issues:
- Slow user adoption
- Process redesign inefficiencies
- Software training costs
To manage contract lifecycles accurately and cost-effectively, a solution needs to include:
- Event management of contract changes: Change control to alert on changes to key contract milestones, terms and conditions
- Multi-party parallel review and authoring: Streamlines document review and approval processes and allows for easy contract authoring
- Contract lifecycle auditing and reporting: Contract and email activity reporting to refine standard contract templates and to respond fast to legal discovery requests
- Policy-enforced content security: Classification and policy-based content analysis and security removes hidden metadata and alerts to sensitive information in order to more easily control who can open, copy, print, or forward information at any stage of the contract lifecycle
- Tight integration with Microsoft Office and Document Management Systems: Fast user adoption and reduces process redesign issues as users work with tools they are familiar with
Complete document lifecycle control is not easy, but with effective solutions you can manage contracts efficiently with fewer mistakes and security risks.