How to Streamline Contract Delivery Part 2: Technology Changes
Our team has put a lot of time, thought and effort into streamlining contract delivery for multiple in-house legal, procurement and contracting teams. A key part of this streamlining process is the use of technology and the technology changes that you can make to help deliver contracts faster and create better resource efficiency.
Legaltech is one of the most exciting and quickly developing areas within the legal sector. Adding the right technology to your landscape can truly transform your contracting processes by saving time, managing risks, and giving key stakeholders data and reporting capabilities (for example, how long it takes to complete intake, turnaround times, where there are any bottlenecks).
However, when you start to look at the legaltech available in the market, it’s not always a slam dunk. How do you choose the right tech which meets your needs at the right price point? There are so many options out there, all promising so much.
There is no one-size-fits-all, but we’ve helped clients choose and migrate to legaltech options suited to their needs and requirements. Here are a few tips and questions that we ask our clients’ during their legaltech journey:
Match the technology to your needs. Moving to a new solution can be very time consuming and expensive (data migration can be a pain and just think of all the time your contracting team will need to be trained to get up and running). So, ensure that the tool you are moving to is 100% the right one for your organisation. Legaltech options can cover one or multiple stages of the contracting process. Have a view at the outset of what your contracting process needs are. If you have clearly mapped your process (see https://lighthouse.law/blog/how-to-streamline-contract-delivery-part-1-process) then you should have a good understanding of where legaltech can fit in. Avoid choosing a legaltech solution that can do far more than what your organisation actually needs. The unused parts of the tech can be confusing, result in poor adoption, and it could cost more than you need to pay. Also, be wary of adopting technology which only solves part of your current requirements as this has its own issues if you want to adopt additional tech later on. This may complicate your tech landscape, and you may have to deal with complicated integration or migration challenges.
Do a free or paid trial before buying. This way you will know whether the technology can meet the needs of your organisation. It is hard to assess technology from a demo, or a description online. It often takes getting your ‘hands dirty’ (logging in, doing lots of tests, running your process through the system) to discover the real potential or limitations of the system. While the trial may cost additional money and effort, it allows you to know whether you are buying what you think you are buying. And if you don’t buy after the trial, the time spent isn’t wasted – it better clarifies your actual needs and preferences.
Adoption and training are key. We have found that where adoption and training is mandated, the new technology is far more likely to be a success. The most successful adoption we’ve seen is where the organisation: (1) had compulsory training sessions; and (2) took the view that a matter didn’t exist unless it was recorded on their legaltech system. Where adoption and training are optional, regardless of the quality of the technology you have purchased, its uptake within the business teams and its success as part of your strategy is always going to be limited. As an example, if you use a technology to do your intake process but also accept instructions in other ways (like email, for example), you will skew your data, confuse the business, and have two different places to go to find your intake information. Rather mandate the use of the technology.
Consider your broader technology landscape. You need to ensure that the new technology is compatible with other tools that your team is using, or that they can be integrated with one another. Generally, where you have multiple log ins, or where you need to move between multiple tools to get through the contracting process, adoption is likely to be low. You may also find that the data generated by separate tools is difficult to combine and ultimately, interpret. Consider tools that can work together.
Recognise that once you are using a technology, you are often locked in. That may not be true from a commercial perspective, e.g. you only signed a one-year contract, but practically, the more data you store and time your teams spend using it, the harder it is to move away. So, do your homework upfront. If you put in the time and effort to choose the right technology, then it will be unlikely that you will have awkward conversations about migration to a new one in a few months. And even if you’re certain you’ve chosen well, discuss as part of the upfront conversations how your data can be extracted at exit and what assistance will you receive from the tech provider when exiting.
If you found this useful, look out for part 3 of this series where we’ll be considering the factors to keep in mind when developing your template and knowledge resources.
