3 Red Flags That Your Contract Management Processes Are Inefficient

If you store your agreements in a spreadsheet that you expect your team to update regularly and have a dedicated folder where you keep your executed agreement, you technically have a contract management process — just not an efficient one. 

Efficient contract management processes don’t rely on manual efforts and won’t fall apart if a team member forgets to update the spreadsheet. Instead, unlike inefficient processes, they contribute to company revenue and reduce unnecessary risks that keep your in-house legal team up at night.

Missing contracts, taking weeks to collect contract signatures, executing each stage of your contracting process in a different platform — these are all red flags that your contract management processes are inefficient.

You Can’t Find All Your Contracts

Ask yourself: If someone on another team or in leadership asks you to send over all commercial contracts from the last 5 years, would you be able to locate them quickly and easily? If the answer is anything other than a strong yes, your contract management process is inefficient. 

Storing all your contracts in a central location is a hallmark of an efficient contract management process. While filing cabinets are marvelously out of date, they are only slightly more acceptable than having contracts scattered across your digital ecosystem. Missing contracts can mean unfulfilled obligations, inability to prove the terms you agreed to, and lack of insight into business intelligence. 

Fortunately, CLM comes with a centralized contract repository that helps you not only centralize your business agreements, but search them for crucial business data.

It Takes Too Many Steps to Collect a Signature

Ask yourself: What steps do vendors, partners, and clients have to take to sign a contract and get it back to you? If it takes longer than a few hours, then you likely suffer from an inefficient contract process.

Collecting signatures for contracts can be frustrating, time-consuming, and slightly risky – especially if it still requires printing and reuploading. Being able to collect signatures digitally saves legal time and allows businesses to recognize more revenue, faster.

CLM with built-in eSignature takes the hassle out of contract execution and is a strong indicator of an organized contract management process.

Each Step of the Contract Process Requires Different Software

Ask yourself: How many different apps and tools do you use throughout the contract cycle? If you cobble together various tools to execute your contracts, there’s a higher chance of your contracts falling through the cracks, which points to an inefficient contract management process. 

Drafting and negotiating in Word, signing in Adobe, and storing in (non-integrated) Dropbox increases your margin for error and puts your contracts at risk. End-to-end CLM helps you to streamline your contract management in a single platform, making it easier to track and manage contracts and other key documents.

CLM unites every single step of your contract process, providing a much-needed audit trail of the contract moving through your business.

Takeaways

If your contract management process requires manual labor or too much human intervention to work, that’s a red flag that your process is inefficient. Thankfully, CLM allows you to streamline the process from beginning to end. 

See how LinkSquares CLM can help you automate your contracting process. Request a demo today.