Managing contracts is fundamental to the smooth operation of any business.
However, many organizations cling to outdated contract management practices, leading to miscommunication, compliance risks, and wasted revenue.
With the rise of advanced Contract Lifecycle Management (CLM) systems, streamlining contract workflows has never been easier. A crucial part of this transformation is the migration of your legacy contracts.
In this blog post, we’ll guide you through the legacy contract migration process. We’ll also discuss a list of legacy contract migration best practices to ensure a successful transition to a digital platform.
The Challenges of Legacy Contract Data
Businesses using manual contract management systems or storing them in disorganized file systems face many problems such as:
- Accessibility: Finding contracts when needed is time-consuming and inefficient, scattered as they are in file cabinets, dusty storage rooms, or unorganized shared drives.
- Visibility: Without centralized management, gaining insights into contractual obligations and key dates becomes extremely difficult.
- Security: Sensitive contract data is prone to accidental deletions, unauthorized access, or even physical damage.
- Compliance: Keeping up with ever-changing regulations without a comprehensive tracking system becomes a compliance minefield.
To address these hurdles and enhance contract management, companies are migrating legacy contract data into intelligent CLM platforms.
The Contract Data Migration Process
1. Preparation and Planning
- Inventory existing contracts: Get a complete overview of all contracts, both active and inactive. Assess their location (digital, physical) and file formats.
- Define migration goals: Determine what you want to achieve – enhanced visibility? Compliance readiness? Better data insights? Aligning your migration plan with business objectives ensures a smooth process.
- Choose the right software: Research carefully and select a CLM solution that aligns with current and future business needs, offering scalability and flexibility.
- Form a migration team: Assemble a cross-functional team, including legal, IT, procurement, and stakeholders responsible for data integrity and security.
2. Data Collection and Extraction
- Collect all contracts: Gather legacy contracts from various locations and convert physical documents into digital formats (OCR scanning).
- Extract metadata: Identify key information like contract type, parties involved, key dates, clauses, financial figures, and other relevant data points.
- Data cleansing: Eliminate inconsistencies and inaccuracies found in your contract data. Pay close attention to formatting and correct obvious errors to improve the integrity of the information you’re migrating.
3. Transformation and Mapping
- Data standardization: Ensure consistency for easy searching and analysis. Define standard naming conventions, date formats, and other parameters.
- Map to the new system: Determine how the extracted metadata aligns with the CLM’s data model. This might involve creating new fields or adjusting existing structures in your target system.
4. Import and Validation
- Bulk upload: If the CLM allows, use bulk import tools, ensuring data mapping and transformation rules are correctly applied.
- Quality checks: Rigorously check a representative sample of imported contracts in the new platform for completeness, correctness, searchability, and accessibility to relevant parties.
5. Ongoing Maintenance
- User training: Educate your teams on the new platform to ensure a smooth transition. Training should focus on searching, contract creation, approval workflows, and reporting.
- Data governance policies: Develop procedures for adding new contracts, managing changes, and handling access/archiving to maintain data quality.
Legacy Contract Migration Best Practices
- Start small: Begin with a pilot project. Migrate a subset of legacy contracts to test processes, address issues, and build confidence before a full-scale migration.
- Automate wherever possible: Use OCR technology, AI-powered metadata extraction tools, and pre-built data mapping templates to streamline and reduce manual processes.
- Prioritize active contracts: First focus on contracts that have ongoing relevance to your business or involve compliance obligations.
- Involve legal counsel early: Legal expertise helps identify potential risks and ensures contract data integrity throughout the migration.
- Seek external support (if needed): Consider experienced consultants to guide you, ensuring a smooth and efficient migration process, especially for complex data sets or large contract volumes.
If your organization is still struggling with legacy contracts, it’s time for change. Vyapi helps you streamline your legacy contract migration, ensuring data integrity, process efficiency, and improved contract visibility.
Migrating legacy contract data is an important first step. The true benefits of CLM emerge through ongoing refinement of your contract processes.
Regularly review data governance policies, user training, and leverage emerging technologies to keep your contract management practices cutting-edge.
