Squirrels go nuts over contract management solutions

Did you know the attention span of a squirrel is only one second? But, the attention span of a squirrel focusing on an acorn is as long as four minutes. That’s a big difference! Working in sales, I identify a lot with the squirrel; my clients are my acorns and anything else gets the least attention possible.

In fact, my aspiration is to spend 85% of my time with customers versus 15% on tedious administrative work. The minute I meet a new potential client, I want to give all my time possible to delivering the best value for the client and my company.

Sadly, this time management goal is quite often hacked during the most drawn-out part of every sales deal – the contract process.

Contracting is time-consuming

In order to negotiate and approve a contract it has to be circulated around the organisation. It begins with our legal people, who love to read and have the long attention span of a thousand squirrels in a forest of oaks. They need to generate the right template and draft and approve the legal terminology. The contract should also go to finance to review the numbers; to management for approval and comments; as well as back-and-forth to the customer before the final signing. Parts of the contracts change along the way and it’s easy to lose track of who has done what and when.

But we need to keep control

We sales squirrels don’t have time to read and re-read long documents. We have harder nuts to crack back in the field. But we can’t afford to lose control either. Taking our eye of the contract process can lead to deadlines missed, mistakes made, and value lost.

So how do we get around this? The answer, in a nutshell, is contract management software. We need to simplify and speed up the contracting process by digitalising it. This shortens the sales cycle, weeds out errors, and helps boost the bottom line. Here’s how:

Keep track of contract versions and finalize the contract quickly

Now, we no longer wait for comments and approvals, or lost attachments, or wonder which comments are from whom, or which are non-negotiable according to policy and which are open for possible further modification?

Keeping track of contract versions is simple. We also reduce the risk of actually sending the wrong version to a client – it’s happened to me. With the software, we can guarantee which version is the final one thanks to a transparent trail in the approval process of what actions have been taken. With software you can also forget the printers that never work when you most need them and quickly close the deal with electronic signatures.

Luckily those days are gone when sales had to chase up colleagues, who were lost under the sun umbrella with a coconut and a straw.

Keep future control

Even after the signing you can keep control, because the contract stays in the tool and can’t fall into the wrong hands or get lost because someone storing it leaves the company. Sales people will also never miss a renewal deadline or the chance to activate a contract option, particularly if a contract is coming up for price renegotiation.

Ok, time to stop now. I know the sales guys have already stopped reading. If you’re from legal or another department with a longer attention span, please take a look at Cloudia Contract.

Squirrels go nuts over contract management solutions

 

Sini Paananen
former Solution Sales Manager
Cloudia

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

P.S. Interested in digitalizing your contract management? Take a look at our eContracting Guide!

P.P.S. Learn why honesty is the best policy when it comes to your data

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