Law Insider

Our comprehensive guide, "IP and Cloud Services Risk Analyzer," helps you pinpoint vulnerabilities and safeguard your company’s most critical intellectual property and data.

Part 2 of our series of ebooks on privacy policies. In it, author Shefali Lakhani shares what comes after the first draft. Learn how to make changes to a privacy policy, distribute it well, and use outside examples effectively.

In Part 1 of our two-part series on Privacy Policies, attorney Shafali Lakhani begins with drafting best practices. Download your copy today.

Learn the basics of purchase agreements in this free ebook.

Learn the basics of a Master Service Agreement (MSA) and download a template contract. This agreement facilitates ongoing services between two parties.

Learn the basics of a Purchase Agreement, a contract that facilitates the sale of of goods.

Learn the basics of the Data Processing Addendum (DPA), a document that governs the management of personal data in business relationships.

This ebook discusses how partnership agreements provide both operational clarity and options for exit.

Learn how to update a contractual relationship using contract amendments and restatements.

Discover a new way to think about non-competes by considering the Inevitable Disclosure doctrine. Could it provide a way to protect critical company information without violating new non-compete standards?

This ebook details the value of operating agreements as a shield against personal liability.

Contact management is the process of initial drafting, creating, executing, and risk analysis for the implementation of legally binding contracts. Contact management is done by a specialized person who is trained and has expert knowledge. This reduces the pressure to have legal complications and unnecessary expenditures in the future. 

Vendor contract management manages all vendor contracts to ensure that an organization’s supply chain delivers the best value in terms of quality and cost while meeting legal, regulatory, and ethical requirements.

Contract management automation is a comprehensive method of automatically creating a contract with the help of data saved on an enterprise's system and other fundamental inputs required to create a detailed contract. With the help of contract management automation tools, companies can establish a legal contract automation system to reduce their team's workload and boost productivity. 

Contract data management is the online administration of contracts across all processes, enterprises, and systems. It empowers in-house enterprise teams to automate their contract management procedures efficiently and continuously to obtain business insights from their contracts, even when they are terminated or fulfilled.

Enterprise contract management is an end-to-end, centralized contract administration system that allows large companies to handle their contract portfolio efficiently and effectively across every phase of the contract lifecycle. In addition, establishing a central contract management hub authorizes the involved people across the enterprise to access and cooperate on an agreement throughout its lifecycle.

Security contract management software contains all the technologies and systems used to safeguard contracts from unauthorized loss, access, or theft by outside or inside forces. Security infringements can result in the most extreme consequences for your company, especially in the modern hyper-connected and technologically advanced world of social media. Below are six best practices you can implement to safeguard your contracts. 

Contract management software, also known as a contract lifecycle management (CLM) solution, is designed to increase legal teams' efficiency and agility. It offers an integrated approach to contract management by automating, accelerating, and improving the end-to-end process from creation and negotiation to approval.

An indemnity agreement protects one party of a transaction from risks or liabilities that were created by the other party in the transaction. Signing an indemnity agreement helps protect both parties from liabilities caused due to negligence or breach of contract by the opposing party. When a breach of contract happens, there is no guarantee of its intensity and how it may affect the other person. In this situation, it is essential to protect the rights and property of the affected party. 

A contract clause database helps store all preapproved clauses to keep the contract management processes compliant and mitigate risks related to the agreement designs. The library is considered a secure contract repository for storage purposes. The following blog highlights the significance of a contract clause database and other significant details.

An MSA (master service agreement) is a contract between two parties to settle details and expectations. It states what each party must do to honor the contract and which services apply to their agreement. An MSA, also called a framework agreement, establishes the terms and conditions to govern all activities and responsibilities. This type of agreement is helpful because it makes the contract process faster and allows each party to plan for the future.

Contract management best practices include using contract lifecycle management software to create and execute the most effective methods to monitor, process, and implement contracts for a company. 

An NDA (non-disclosure agreement) is a confidentiality agreement and a binding contract in which one party agrees to provide sensitive information to another, with the latter agreeing not to share it with any outsiders. The agreement helps protect intellectual property (IP) and sensitive information by outlining that everything must remain private with zero release of any details to the public.

Contract repository software stores all contracts in a centralized location so companies maintain an efficient organization system. As per the American Bar Association, an average Fortune 1000 corporation oversees between 20,000 and 40,000 active contracts at any given time. At least 10% are lost, difficult to discover, or otherwise neglected or poorly maintained. In the past, originals and copies of paper documents were frequently stored in contract repositories. A contract repository is a solution that has several distinct benefits over other records management technologies. 

Following the best contract management practices helps you manage contracts and clients and accommodate their needs to draft fool-proof agreements. Here are some best practices to consider.

There are many types of commercial contracts that are signed among companies like NDAs, Employment Agreements, Settlement Agreements, and more. Commercial contracts legally bind all the parties involved and obligate them to perform their duties and meet the terms of the contract. Commercial agreements can be signed for commercial rental properties while hiring candidates or exchanging goods and services. Within a contract, everything is clearly stated, such as the cost, tenure, and what each party must do. 

Contract renewal strategy focuses on maximizing existing accounts instead of relying on new business for companies. When contracts are signed, a fixed duration is also stated. The contract is applicable only within this period, known as tenure. After the tenure ends, the agreement is null and void. If all parties are satisfied with the contract, they may renew the same agreement. While renewing the contract, the parties can also change the existing terms as needed.

Contract review automation technology examines and evaluates a contract's important clauses using artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning. And by doing this, the automation software streamlines the contract review procedure, making it simpler than utilizing a human approach to screen contracts for mistakes and potential threats. 

A contract management strategy is a tool used by businesses for implementing and overseeing all stages of a contract to increase efficiency and decrease risk. Examining your contract management duration and finding areas for efficiency improvement is the first step in improving your contract management approach. 

Contract management organization is the extensive process of overseeing contracts, from their creation to their implementation by the selected person and the eventual termination of the agreement. Moreover, fundamental activities involve performance research against the contract provisions to improve functional and economic performance and to determine and reduce financial and reputational threats through non-compliance with contractual prerequisites. 

Contract management, also known as contract lifecycle management (CLM), is the comprehensive procedure of handling contracts, from creation to implementation and eventually to renewal or termination of the contract. Furthermore, fundamental activities incorporated in contract management comprise clause negotiation and contract drafting, maximizing functional and economic performance, and performance analysis and risk mitigation, both reputational and financial (e.g., business associations get sabotaged by defaulting on contract provisions).

An SOW (statement of work) is a contract between the contracting officer and the service provider. All the terms of the agreement are clearly stated in this contract. It is essential to both parties and helps protect and safeguard their rights. An SOW contract is often a part of the request proposal so that the exact terms of the agreement are highlighted and cleared out before starting the project. 

A secure contract repository is a place - online, in an office, or in an off-site storage facility - where all contracts and agreements are filed and stored securely. While in-office files are traditional, online private contract repositories run by professional contract management companies such as LawInsider are best for security and document retrieval.

Contract Lifecycle Management (CLM) is streamlining and automating contractual procedures. CLM software offers improved enterprise spending visibility, builds greater contract cycle efficiencies, and reduces administrative expenses. 

Contract analytics is the extensive procedure of evaluating and obtaining data from a business's contracts to improve risk governance. The data extracted from statutory records and paper documents are converted into an organized format using artificial intelligence and machine learning.

Automatic Renewal Clauses are contract clauses that automatically renew the contract after a specified period. If you want to stop using the product or service, you must contact the company and cancel your subscription before the original term expires. Otherwise, you will continue paying for another term, at the end of which, you will likely receive another renewal notice prompting you to renew your subscription again.

The process of contract management defines a company's relationships with its stakeholders, suppliers, partners, and customers. The most effective contract management builds strong ties and creates long-term benefits for your company. The success or failure of the organization depends on the contract management procedure that will direct the contracts throughout their lifecycle.

The contract process involves various stages and tasks to manage and organize the contracts that all companies need. A contract is a legally enforceable agreement between two or more parties and can be either verbal or written. Oral agreements are more difficult to uphold and should be avoided, however, specific contracts, such as those involving sizable sums of money, are legally binding.

A contract repository is a centralized database where an organization stores its contracts. It helps manage the contract portfolio by offering advanced capabilities to keep past and existing documents under a single platform. So, the repository becomes a rich storehouse of data from which the teams can access documents at any time without juggling between files and folders. 

Contract automation refers to the process of streamlining admin tasks, reducing business overhead, and providing an overview of all contracts. The technology-assisted process enables legal and non-legal teams of an organization to use software to draft and review contracts while saving the time of conducting the task manually and reducing errors and discrepancies.

Contract renewal is the final stage in a contract lifecycle where there is an extension of an existing contract for a new term. This stage comes when businesses decide after the end of an agreement and the parties decide if they would like to continue the business relationship.

Lawyers for contract management certification help with the process of supervising contracts, from their formulation to the designated party's execution and final annulment. A contract lays out legal-enforceable duties between the parties. Having lawyers for business contracts can structure contracts to negotiate business agreements and simplify the process of generating and evaluating contracts.