Benefits of Version Control in Contract Management

What is contract versioning?

Contract versioning is tracking and managing multiple revisions of a contract throughout its lifecycle. This practice is important for effective contract management to ensure smooth operations and develop strong connections with partners and clients. Businesses might manage hundreds and thousands of contracts each requiring numerous modifications and updates, making it impossible to keep track of different contract document versions. With version control, a new version is created when a contract is modified, allowing all changes to be tracked.

Why is contract version control important?

Take a look at how your company’s contracts are organized and how your team communicates when working on those contracts.

• Are your document labeled with extensions such as, “/FILENAME-DATE-v14-r02.doc”?
• Have you ever had an email discussion with your team about updating a document, made revisions directly to it and then accidentally saved over the previous version?
• Have you ever had to dig through files trying to determine which version of a contract to update because you can’t tell the difference between the most recent iteration, the last final and approved contract, and draft copies?

If you’ve ever answered “yes” to any of the questions above, you recognize the importance of version control and the frustration of not having an established process.

Without version control, changes become permanent; but with contract version control, you always know and work from the latest version, while still being able to reference previous versions.

Versioning “enables you to store, track and restore items in a list and files in a library as they are changed,” according to the Microsoft Office website.

Contract version control is extremely helpful and in fact, a crucial step in creating a “productive, collaborative ‘office’ for your always-connected staff,” according to a Fast Company article. Without it, workflows within your contract management system become moot and coordinating who should review and revise what and when becomes challenging.

What are the benefits of version control in contract management software?

• Easy Tracking of Changes
• Never lose the previous version
• Improved collaboration
• Compare versions and identify changes
• Improve Compliance and Auditing
• Save Time with Organized Contract Revisions
• Reduce the risk of errors and miscommunication

Let’s take a closer look at these benefits in detail.

Easy Tracking of Changes:

Contracts often go through numerous variations, with multiple stakeholders requesting changes and modifications. Version control makes sure that every change is documented, providing a clear history of modifications. This allows you to track who made changes and when maintaining complete transparency throughout the contract's lifecycle.

Never lose the previous version:

“Have you ever saved an important document, since you required an earlier version?”

This is no longer an issue with version control for contract management. Version control maintains each revision automatically, allowing you to access previous versions and go back to an older draft if necessary. It provides you peace of mind, knowing that no version is lost.

Also read: Using AI to Summarize and Review Contracts Quickly

Improved collaboration:

Contract negotiations often involve multiple stakeholders, each bringing their revisions. Version control improves collaboration by ensuring that all changes are documented and accessible to the entire team. It additionally improves transparency, but it also avoids the chaos of having multiple versions floating in emails or documents shared by others.

Also read: Advanced AI-Enabled Contract Negotiations with AddIn AI redlining

Compare versions and identify changes:

When contracts are frequently updated, it is easy to miss an important change in the fine print. With version control, you can compare different drafts side by side to figure out exactly what has been altered. This feature ensures that no important information slips through the cracks, allowing you to review and accept changes securely.

Improve Compliance and Auditing:

Compliance with legal and regulatory regulations plays an important role in contract management. Version control allows you to keep a full record of all contract changes, which is required for auditing. If problems arise, you'll have a clear record of who made the changes and why, maintaining your business stays compliant and audit ready.

Save Time with Organized Contract Revisions:

Manually searching through emails or files to find the right version of a contract can be time-consuming and difficult. Version control reduces the confusion of storing all contract revisions in one central location. No more sorting through innumerable versions—everything is right where you need it.

Reduce the risk of errors and miscommunication:

One of the major risks in managing contracts involves dealing with outdated or incorrect versions of a contract agreement. Version control significantly minimizes this risk. Everyone is involved with the most recent version, reducing the possibility of errors or miscommunication. This reduces the risk of costly errors, making the contract management processes easier and more efficient.

Also read: AI-Powered Contract Management - Contract Review and Analysis with AI

Why is ConvergePoint's Contract Management Software the best choice for contract version control?

• Keep your existing documents, which were most likely created in Microsoft word in the same file formats — meaning you’ll already know how to work in the documents and it will be easy to migrate them to a SharePoint-based Contract Management Software
• Easily search for contracts and related documents by creating consistent file naming conventions and saving contracts into organized directory structures
• Maintain records of all revisions, comments and discussions surrounding a contract for audit purposes
• Compare documents to see what changes have been made between versions
• Confidently make edits without worrying about accidentally saving over a previous version
• Know who made what changes and when
• See the evolution of a contract, with version history stored in one central repository

Conclusion:

Want to discover the importance of version control and how contract version control works? why it’s crucial for collaboration and how it can streamline workflows within your contract management system? No one does version control like Microsoft, on its platform “SharePoint”.

As SharePoint experts, ConvergePoint will show you how version history works within our Contract Management Software and how it eliminates extra emails and confusion within your legal department. Incorporate Office 365 & SharePoint contract version control to streamline contract management and experience a secure and efficient approach to maintaining contract integrity within the dynamic Office 365 environment.

See how effective version control a critical piece of the entire contract workflow, and how it fits into the process. Request a demo with ConvergePoint!