The state of CLM in Europe: 4 key questions

Wine and cheese: a classic combination, just like Agiloft and CLM.

Recently, Agiloft’s Jim Leason hosted a wine and cheese tasting webinar with Deloitte UK’s Craig Conte where the two discussed the state of Europe’s current CLM market and industry trends. Below are four key questions attendees had about CLM in Europe.

1. Who is looking for CLM in Europe CLM?

First, there are the companies turning to contract lifecycle management, seeking solutions that add structure and methodology to the way they are handling their current contract processes.

Second, there are returning companies that have previously acquired a system and now, having experience with CLM, possess a better understanding of their specific organization’s requirements and goals.

Third, there are companies that, when purchasing their first CLM, didn’t take every departments’ needs into consideration. For instance, a company’s procurement team was in charge of buying the CLM. However, due to a lack of communication with sales and legal, the purchase was not collaborative and only met the needs of one department. CLM implementation should be a truly enterprise-wide effort.

2. What are the primary needs of CLM in Europe?

They need a better process around managing contracts, no matter what the department, that addresses all of the regulatory concerns in the market.

Another need is consolidation and standardization. This is a result of corporate IT departments starting to take note of and analyze the amount of tools a company possesses. They’re discovering that legal teams bought one system with matter management in mind, yet handle contract management on another system. For example, sales may have one type of CLM, but procurement has a different solution.

Companies’ needs evolve: Six years ago, IT professionals were buying technology with no insight on what other departments needed in terms of managing contracts. Many companies now realize their mistake. Law, contracting, sales, and procurement have since become more empowered through a collaborative buying process.

3. What can European businesses do to better prepare for implementing a new CLM?

A scenario we’ve often witnessed is when a company plans to buy their first CLM, they did their homework, collaborated with their colleagues, and even had the sign offs necessary to make the purchase, but at the last moment, upper management insists they hold off a little longer. A few ways a company can make the most of the delay is to:

• Further prepare for purchasing the CLM.
• Invest more time into the due diligence within the organization.
• Start surveying the existing internal stakeholders that work with contracts in order to fully understand pain points and the challenges you’re trying to solve.

4. Are European enterprises successfully using AI as part of their CLM solution?

Customers plan their full CLM implementation and integration in phases. The proper use of AI usually is not truly successful until later in the planning strategy. Implementation and integration phases often include:

• Phase 1: Carrying out a legacy migration. Getting the new system running. Creating and introducing more efficient workflows. Getting templates set up and running correctly.
• Phase 2: Integrate the CLM with other important company systems ensuring that master data management is clean. Also, integrate with system of record for suppliers, customers, or any other important group in order to avoid data silos and similar situations.
• Phase 3: Usually, a company expects AI to act as an immediate remedy for all that is flawed in their current processes. The reality is that once the CLM solution is implemented, integrated, and in use, the first thing that happens is the team members start to familiarize themselves with the system and identify room for improvement. The more confident the business becomes through using the new CLM solution, the more effective the AI becomes in detecting extremely specific, high risk-areas that need better management.

Around the world, Agiloft’s no-code, scalable, and flexible system is perfect for today’s constantly changing business environment. There will always be new milestones for companies as they grow and evolve. Agiloft’s ability to flex, extend, and integrate allows for that transformation and pivots as a company grows.

Join us for our next webinar and learn more about why Agiloft is the global leader in agile CLM.

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