The Challenge
Due to growth, acquisition and development, a Fortune 100 corporation in a highly regulated industry needed to analyze, integrate and make consistent thousands of contracts. The contracts were located in two legacy databases, and the company wanted to migrate them to a new custom built contracts management database which they had recently designed and completed.
The company’s instinct was to build an interface for review into their new, tailored contracts management tool to manage, review and track more than 150,000 documents representing 68,000 contract relationships; but it had a limited budget. Recognizing that some relationships were tracked multiple ways and there was significant duplication, the company thought it needed to review every document within every contract relationship to have a full understanding of its exposure and opportunities to leverage partnerships.
The Solution
Legility developed a strategy to look at the 68,000 relationships versus the 150,000 documents and thereby reduced the data that needed attorney review by more than 50%. This meant the client was able to:
Eliminate duplicate documents
Find amendments that changed contract terms, and let them serve as the “master” document for certain data points
Create a standard way to log, sort and manage contracts moving forward
By all objective measurements, Legility’s model was 150% to 225% more efficient than the original plan of action, virtually eliminated technology development costs, and created a more consistent system to capture and track contracts data for the future. The Legility team’s work – which included technology design and development, project management, attorney review and quality control – was significantly less expensive than traditional hourly rates for this work.
The Process
Instead of conducting a review of more than 150,000 documents and categorizing each one, Legility’s Managed Services Division advised the client to look at the 68,000 relationships. Utilizing technology, the client could search the legacy databases and find the single document most likely to represent each individual relationship, saving significant dollars in the process. The issue was more about how the client categorized its contracts and associated documents, work that an integrated team and the right technology could manage efficiently. Additionally, using modern management and review software tools, Legility knew the client could save significant time and money and not have to develop a tailored platform.
To do this – and review and integrate 68,000-plus documents into a unified format and system – Legility and the client had to create a detailed but flexible process that was closely monitored for successes and challenges both immediately and downstream:
- Identification of relevant documents
- Loading all relevant documents
- Review all relevant documents
