How can AI help you manage your contracts?

Know who owns the contract

Every important contract should have someone responsible for it. If nobody owns it, nobody is likely to spot issues before they become problems.

AI can help track obligations, but it cannot replace accountability. Make sure every contract has a named owner within the business.

Keep signed copies somewhere sensible

You should be able to find the latest signed version of any key contract within minutes.

If contracts are spread across inboxes, laptops and shared drives, important information can easily be missed. Having a central online location and contracts tracker can help with this.

Modern contract management platforms and AI-powered document repositories make it easier to search contracts, locate key clauses and identify important terms without trawling through inboxes and shared drives.

Diarise key dates

Renewal dates, notice periods and review meetings can all have significant commercial consequences. Missing a notice deadline could lock you into another year of a contract you no longer want.

Use your contracts tracker to record key dates centrally. Many legal tech solutions can now automatically identify and track these dates, providing reminders before action is required.

Review supplier performance regularly

A contract should not sit in a drawer gathering dust. Ensure the contract owner is actively managing a supplier’s delivery against what they contractually promised and whether service levels are being met.

Use regular meetings with your supplier’s account manager to keep on top of performance – this can help deliver better outcomes and commercial terms on renewal.

Don’t let scope creep become the norm

Extra work often starts with a simple request. If responsibilities, deliverables or pricing change, make sure the contract changes too. Use short form contract addendums to record changes and link these to the primary contract in your contracts tracker or online repository.

Keep a record of issues and an audit trail

When problems arise, document them with any agreed contractual changes.

Good records can help resolve disagreements quickly and provide valuable evidence if a dispute develops later.

Use data to spot risk in your contracts or identify improvements to your standard templates

One of the most valuable uses of AI is identifying patterns across multiple contracts.

It can highlight contracts with unusual liability provisions or non-standard terms that may require attention or it can highlight standard deviations from your starting position.

These insights can help drive visibility of contractual risk that can be reported against or help suggest improvements to your templates to speed up contracting.

Review contracts before renewal

Whilst AI can tell you when a contract is due for renewal, only people can decide whether the relationship is still commercially worthwhile or the existing terms match what you need.

Business needs change and contracts should evolve with them.

Ask for help before there is a problem

Contract management is much easier when issues are identified early.

A quick conversation before a situation escalates is often far less costly than dealing with a dispute later.