Managing contracts across scattered emails, shared drives, and spreadsheets (in other words, without a single source of truth) can create massive bottlenecks that leave your legal, procurement, and finance teams blind to active obligations. This lack of visibility can lead to costly missed renewal deadlines, overlooked obligations, severe regulatory compliance penalties, and lost revenue as frustrated counterparties walk away from stalled contracts.
Thankfully, a comprehensive CLM platform centralizes your entire contract portfolio - automating everything from AI-powered redlining to proactive milestone alerts and more. In turn, you can accelerate contract lifecycles and reduce legal risk.
To that end, let's review seven contract lifecycle management features to consider when selecting the right provider.
A centralized contract repository is arguably the most in-demand feature for contract lifecycle management, and it's easy to see why. Rather than a set of disparate digital filing cabinets, your organization can enjoy a single source of truth that is easily searchable with advanced filtering, history, and saved search options. With OCR and automated AI-powered data extraction, you can sit back and watch key metadata and clauses be converted into actionable and searchable contract assets for dynamic CLM.
Make sure to look for dynamically triggered workflows that can be created off of virtually any metadata field. You should be able to build parallel, serial, or hybrid approval structures on an easily configurable interface. Advanced workflows can automatically assign numerous tasks to individuals, internal teams, or external parties. Also, look for a solution that lets you configure completion, approval, or rejection of a workflow task to be tied to rules that automatically modify or update specific contract fields.
BONUS TIP: Seek out a tool that lets you configure tasks with automated escalation rules if they become overdue.
The solution you seek should support a library of contract templates for you to merge with pre-approved contract metadata. You should be able to author, edit, and draft contracts in-system or via a seamless Microsoft Word integration. While actively drafting, you should be able to easily insert standard, pre-approved clauses from a central repository into the document body. When working with an uploaded contract, you should be able to replace clauses in the document with their preferred versions.
AI features should be on your radar as well. Look out for AI-powered clause generation and smart clause comparison.
NOTE: Make sure your CLM system can isolate individual sections of an incoming third-party document for redlining, rather than outright replacing an entire clause. This is a key differentiator.
Surgical auto-redlining cross-references specific sections of a contract against your organization's clause library to quickly flag deviations from standard language. This helps ensure that contracts comply with your organization's internal standards and regulatory requirements.
Date-based warning triggers, proactive emailed and system alerts and notifications, calendar views, graphical dashboards, and ad-hoc reports are all non-negotiable features for post-award contract management. With them, you'll likely never miss a contract renewal again. Auto-obligations features automatically scan documents and quickly convert hidden commitments into actionable tasks.
In addition to the almost limitless potential afforded by open API, advanced contract lifecycle management solutions should offer leading integrations with CRMs, ERPs, financial systems, and more. Be on the lookout for integrations with:
No matter which industry or department you come from, security is paramount - especially as it pertains to contracts and associated data. In terms of security infrastructure and access control, prioritize multi-factor authentication (MFA), the ability to enforce stringent password policies, single sign-on (SSO), and a solution that regularly conducts vulnerability testing and patch management.
Make sure your provider is SOC 2 Type II compliant and follows strict data security protocols, make sure the software offers granular permissions, and embrace a solution that provides comprehensive audit trails.
Now that you know which features to look for, want to explore an award-winning CLM in action?
Book a free demo of CobbleStone today! It's free - and risk-free.
*Legal Disclaimer: This article is not legal advice. The content of this article is for general informational and educational purposes only. The information on this website may not present the most up-to-date legal information. Readers should contact their attorney for legal advice regarding any particular legal matter.