The contract lifecycle process is a series of steps that assist you in developing comprehensive processes for handling each business agreement and seeing them through to completion to make up effective contract management. These steps are listed below.
Use a contract management solution like contract safe which will meet all the criteria if you understand what happens at each stage of the process. This will also ensure that you get the best possible results. There are seven stages involved in contract management.
Planning
Create a system that satisfies the requirements of your firm and the resources it possesses before you go about building a process. To maintain order, use enterprise-wide contract management solutions. Your contract management strategy is a versatile road map that considers all business agreements, from basic employee contracts to complex deals. It is important to have this strategy in place. First, you must determine your requirements, such as:
- How many different sorts of contracts do you manage, as well as the total number?
- Do you have contracts that involve payments that are made regularly? What exactly is needed?
- Who is responsible for each step of the contract, and what are the requirements for each step?
- What sorts of challenges have traditionally been encountered with managing contracts?
- How do you put your roach for negotiating contracts into action?
Your business will run more smoothly if you know the remaining steps in the contract administration process.
Implementation
Before hiring it, you must put your plan for managing contracts into action. This includes the installation of software for contract management as well as the transfer of contracts to a centralized repository. The onboarding process should be considered a vital part of your implementation plan. Make sure everyone is familiar with the tools they will be using and understands the vision and objectives of the contract management system you have implemented.
Precontract
You can start new contracts now that the framework you were working on for contract management is finished. This necessitates the drafting of brand-new contracts or the utilization of pre-existing contract templates. At this stage of contract management, you will be responsible for producing a document that not only satisfies your criteria but also reduces potential risks.
This stage may require making a few tweaks, selecting the proper contract form, and providing the relevant data. Complex contracts may require a new document. It is far simpler to write a contract from scratch if you take clauses from earlier agreements and use those instead. Do not ignore your responsibilities for compliance or the rules governing branding. E-signatures are a useful tool for keeping things moving forward once a contract has been established and its conditions have been agreed upon.
Transitional phrase
It is common practice in businesses with a greater employee headcount to separate the roles of contract negotiators and contract executors. As a consequence of this, the fulfillment of the contract demands an uninterrupted transition. Rather than presuming that stakeholders have what they require, you should restate the roles, responsibilities, and milestones.
Agreement
The contract stage is where your goals will become a reality if you have effectively managed your contracts up until this point. Your prior experience managing contracts has equipped you to handle this situation well. The contract phase is not self-managing, so you need to pay close attention to all of the conditions of your agreement and evaluate it regularly to ensure that everything is going according to plan. To check that everything is moving as intended or to create an early warning system should difficulties develop, it is beneficial to design a strategy with clear targets and performance indicators
Pre-renewal
Even contracts expire. There are several different ways in which an agreement can come to an end: Temporary contracts can run their course, be renewed, or be terminated. It is of the utmost importance to start thinking about the conclusion of your contract as soon as possible since certain criteria may determine the outcome, and failing to comply with these requirements may result in penalties or actions taken by default. Now is the moment to evaluate how well your contract has worked out for you and decide whether to renew it or make changes. Make certain that all parties are aware of the termination and renewal dates and that you have adequate time to investigate all relevant information before deciding on anything thoroughly.
Post-contract
Even after the term of a contract has passed, there are still administrative responsibilities to fulfill. This includes delivering any final invoices and archiving the contract after completion of the termination procedures outlined in the contract. A post-mortem examination of a contract can yield important insights that may be used to improve future contracts.
Final thoughts
Contract management can be challenging, but if it’s done in a way that generates profits, the potential benefits are, to put it mildly, immense.