Contract management is a glaring example of how this digital transformation is not an end in and of itself. You can immediately improve the contract lifecycle across all departments in your company with the aid of contract management software. All of this will be based on the digital contract lifecycle management process’s seven steps, which are used to handle contracts in businesses in a professional manner.
1. Creating Template:
When a department requests a new contract, an employee simply creates a digital copy of an existing contract and modifies the text file to reflect the new contractual terms. This is how new contracts are frequently generated in many businesses where contract management isn’t digitized.
Although it sounds like a straightforward operation, it is actually very error-prone and fiddly. If all pertinent text portions are not modified appropriately, unintentional errors quickly enter into the contract structure. This is a typical flaw in any process that is carried out by hand.
However, with digital contract lifecycle management, employees have access to a library of checked text blocks that the legal department has previously prepared in collaboration with the appropriate teams. Additionally, you can develop templates for creating contracts that adhere to the corporate identity and design standards of your business.
2. Creating Contracts:
These templates allow for the quick and secure generation of contracts while also ensuring that all contracts created by the organization adhere to the same criteria. The digital contract management system should ideally be integrated with your business’s ERP or CRM platform so that all pertinent data about the contractual partners may be accurately loaded into the contracts.
Another advantage of digital contract lifecycle management over the conventional copy-and-paste method is highlighted by this process phase. The program frees specialized lawyers from having to carry out simple repetitive activities, regardless of whether you have your own legal department or collaborate with an outside law firm. The outcome? By cutting down on the number of hours spent paying high-priced hourly attorneys, your business can save money.
3. Contract Evaluation:
Contracts include a lot of facts and numbers that are specified in the contract together with any supporting documents in addition to legalese. Among other things, this may entail setting prices, establishing product names, laying down delivery details and timelines, providing confidentiality and termination provisions, clarifying liability and service agreements, and much more.
Therefore, numerous further contract revisions are frequently made after the initial contract drafting procedure to work out these little aspects. In corporate practice, numerous management staff members—even those from outside the legal system—might be in charge of this procedure.
As long as they have the necessary access authorization, digital contract lifecycle management ensures that all participants are engaged in this process in a transparent manner and can make changes to the contract at any time and from any location.
4. Contract Acceptance:
The parties responsible for contract negotiations are not always also accountable for its acceptance. Because of this, this stage of the procedure frequently necessitates a smooth transition between several accountable parties. If all parties are able to collaborate on a contract document, this phase is substantially streamlined.
All parties can flexibly access the full contract and the contract generation process at any time, from any location, with the help of digital contract lifecycle management. All contract modifications can be tracked and attributed to specific people. It is simpler to indicate agreement with the most recent version of the contract utilizing the software at the conclusion of the discussion session.
5. Contract Performance:
This procedure step is the most significant one in contract lifecycle management from a legal standpoint. That’s because, during this stage, the paperwork is signed. Digital signatures have long since replaced handwritten signatures as the preferred method for signing contracts in businesses today.
These procedures are supported by a digital contract lifecycle management system, which provides the highest level of security for the relevant institutions and the greatest level of ease for all other stakeholders.
6. Compliance with Contract:
Actual compliance with all the requirements outlined in the contract, such as making payments, delivering, and receiving products or services, is known as contractual performance. By being integrated with the business’ ERP or CRM system, software-based contract lifecycle management makes it possible to locate and access all pertinent information whenever needed, assisting in the monitoring of contract compliance.
7. Expired Contract:
Once a contract expires or is terminated, the contract lifetime is by no means finished. After all, there are rigorous legal requirements regarding the keeping of such crucial documents, and every organization must have access to previous contracts. You can avoid archiving previous contracts in file folders, which would require expensive documentation, storage, and eventual destruction. Instead, use digital contract lifecycle management.
Here, the sensible digitalization of contract administration demonstrates to be yet another significant advancement. Authorized personnel have very easy access to all historical contracts in the smart digital archive via the search feature.
It’s always good to let experts handle your Digital Contract Management cycle for you. Boost your legal documentation and create encumbrance certificate workflow through DOQFY’s secure, affordable, time-saving platform.