Blog Post

An Update On In-House Contract Management | Exigent

June 12, 2017

In a recent contract management survey conducted by a US-based consulting group over existing contract management procedures, 57% of legal technology and contract management professionals expressed concern about their companies’ existing contract management procedures. This article throws light to the technology solution that’s being embraced by today’s in-house in contract management.

The continuing development of contract management isn’t about providing ‘off-the-shelf’ or ‘recipe’ solutions, but more of creating a deeper, meaningful change that will deliver extra value to your in-house. With external service providers engineering pathways for General Counsels (GCs) to transform themselves in a measured, controlled and sustainable way, today GCs are more open to the adoption of technology and processes to drive their organisations effectively. These might be key drivers, but success will be ever more closely aligned to the core demands of the business.

Embracing the trend

As the most important purchasers of legal services, in-house counsel have fundamentally altered the legal marketplace, challenging the traditional law firm model and fostering legal process outsourcing. This aims at enabling compliance, increase accountability, reduce overall external costs and demonstrate value through innovation and resourcing.

Thus we see a significant shift under way in how legal services are bought by corporations to increase efficiency and control costs. For example, modern contract lifecycle management (CLM) demands the adoption of technology that provides a complete solution that drastically reduces the need for human input by delegating many tasks to the software, going beyond being just an electronically maintained centralised system.

Why is this so important?

In a changing regulatory environment, keeping contracts current is a headache for many clients. Given the sheer number of contracts under management by organizations today, it’s critical to have a clear picture of how contracts are created, how many there are in total and where they are ultimately stored. Thus having a central point of storage and delivery that allows new and existing contracts to be kept up-to-date, either by external advisors or in-house teams is crucial to your business growth.

The real problem

The problems faced by corporate legal departments are that CLM, as currently handled, are manual, slow, inefficient and ineffective. In a recent contract management survey conducted by a US-based consulting group over existing contract management procedures, 57% of legal technology and contract management professionals expressed concern about their companies’ existing contract management procedures.

In addition, increasing competition has resulted in legal teams coming under resourcing pressure. Partnering with an external legal services provider will therefore support the in-house team, resulting in less manual intervention and faster turnaround – often of large amounts of information ‑ so that business can be transacted faster.

Improving contract visibility

Contracts represent the most important documents for corporate legal departments. Companies must manage multiple contractual obligations that are usually numerous and convoluted.

Given today’s economic realities, legal departments must operate efficiently and effectively to lower operational costs. To do this your in-house needs to operate in a smarter way and more profitably through strategic partnership with external service providers that cover cost management, client services, information governance and end-to-end CLM.

For example, Exigent Group, a global legal services outsourcing firm, ensures your whole business wins through ‘Chameleon’ – a versatile risk reduction, service-led, technology-based contract management solution. Chameleon has the look and feel of being designed by you, for you and your stakeholders. It is a flexible, cost-effective contract management tool; a cloud-based, maintenance-free, easy-to-use solution that is customisable and accessible from any device. Improving your overall enterprise contract visibility is now just a click away!

One cautionary note

Technology without legal awareness and fundamental analysis is less than effective, creating a huge challenge in today’s legal services market. Vendors consistently dangle new, shiny technology which is lacking appropriate services, with resultant dissatisfaction amongst legal organisations. The importance of the services aspect of outsourcing suppliers cannot be overstressed.

So it’s about finding that balance point around using technology to help achieve business goals more efficiently and cost-effectively, as opposed to leaving counsel to their own devices. Today’s technology-enabled services providers are delivering those knowledge prompts to address many of these issues, and contract management is one such area!

See www.exigent-group.com

See Chameleon: Chameleon