Most in-house authorized groups speak about contracts when it comes to danger. They deal with fallbacks, approval workflows, and redlines. Not often do they speak about contracts when it comes to knowledge. And that’s the place the true alternative is hiding.
In a current episode of Notes to My (Legal) Self, authorized tech chief Colin Levy supplied a perspective that ought to make each in-house lawyer cease and assume. “Contracts actually are how companies run,” he mentioned. “They’re the lifeblood of a enterprise — and so they include a number of helpful knowledge that always goes unnoticed or not tracked or not acted upon.”
It’s the type of remark that sounds apparent when you hear it. In fact, contracts are stuffed with helpful data. But when we’re trustworthy, most authorized departments nonetheless deal with them like static paperwork — PDFs to be negotiated, signed, and filed away. We don’t deal with them like knowledge sources. We must always.
Watch the complete dialog right here:
We’re Sitting On Gold And Calling It Admin Work
Contract knowledge isn’t restricted to celebration names and cost dates. It contains danger positions, clause tendencies, cycle instances, fallback utilization, and time period variations. It’s business-critical data hiding in plain sight. Nevertheless, we regularly deal with this knowledge as a authorized admin — one thing to “deal with” moderately than one thing to study from.
Whether or not or not you employ a CLM system, contract knowledge stays one of the underused property authorized groups have.
That hole results in acquainted issues. Gross sales wonders why contract approvals stall. Finance can’t reconcile income forecasts with actuality. Procurement groups miss auto-renewals that value the corporate. Authorized scrambles to elucidate, however with out clear, structured knowledge, we fall again on narrative. That’s when authorized turns into the black field everybody struggles to navigate.
You Can’t Leverage What You Can’t See
Colin emphasised that authorized tech isn’t nearly automation. It’s about visibility. “To be a valued member of the workforce, it’s a must to perceive how the enterprise operates,” he mentioned. “Authorized tech helps you turn out to be extra data-driven and visual.”
Visibility is the distinction between authorized being seen as a blocker and being trusted as a strategic companion. When authorized exhibits up with metrics, actual insights about what slows offers, the place danger accumulates, and the way phrases evolve, all the things modifications. You’re now not asking for belief. You’re incomes it.
The First Step Isn’t AI. It’s Consideration.
Authorized departments are desperate to discover generative AI, however Colin supplied a warning: it’s not the instrument that issues; it’s the information you feed it. Earlier than exploring automation, begin by understanding what’s already in your contracts.
Colin recommended specializing in foundational insights: renewal dates, cost schedules, efficiency obligations, negotiation tendencies, and clause alternate options. “The extra you possibly can observe these knowledge factors and use them to drive your choice making,” he mentioned, “the extra management will worth what you’re doing — and perceive why you’re doing it.”
Contracts Ought to Converse The Language Of Enterprise
Colin made a robust case that authorized groups want to talk in knowledge to be heard by the enterprise. It’s now not sufficient to say “belief us.” Enterprise leaders need to see affect — measured, quantified, and aligned to goals. “Knowledge can actually show you how to get there,” he mentioned. “And in a manner that management and different features of the enterprise can perceive and act upon.”
When authorized speaks in contract knowledge, it turns into a drive multiplier. It helps higher selections. It builds belief. It clarifies how authorized helps each income and danger mitigation. And it transforms contracts from paperwork into strategic intelligence.
Remaining Thought: Don’t Wait To Get Loud
Colin’s message is obvious. Authorized doesn’t have to boil the ocean or launch a metamorphosis challenge to make progress. It simply must pay nearer consideration to the indicators already embedded in contracts.
Begin by asking one good query. Monitor one helpful knowledge level. Flip one perception right into a dialog with a enterprise companion. That’s how change begins.
Authorized groups have all the time been nice at defending the enterprise. However now we’ve got the instruments, and the information, to light up it.
Olga V. Mack is the CEO of TermScout, an AI-powered contract certification platform that accelerates income and eliminates friction by certifying contracts as honest, balanced, and market-ready. A serial CEO and authorized tech govt, she beforehand led an organization by means of a profitable acquisition by LexisNexis. Olga can also be a Fellow at CodeX, The Stanford Center for Legal Informatics, and the Generative AI Editor at legislation.MIT. She is a visionary govt reshaping how we legislation—how authorized programs are constructed, skilled, and trusted. Olga teaches at Berkeley Law, lectures broadly, and advises firms of all sizes, in addition to boards and establishments. An award-winning common counsel turned builder, she additionally leads early-stage ventures together with Virtual Gabby (Better Parenting Plan), Product Law Hub, ESI Flow, and Notes to My (Legal) Self, every rethinking the follow and enterprise of legislation by means of expertise, knowledge, and human-centered design. She has authored The Rise of Product Lawyers, Legal Operations in the Age of AI and Data, Blockchain Value, and Get on Board, with Visible IQ for Attorneys (ABA) forthcoming. Olga is a 6x TEDx speaker and has been acknowledged as a Silicon Valley Girl of Affect and an ABA Girl in Authorized Tech. Her work reimagines folks’s relationship with legislation—making it extra accessible, inclusive, data-driven, and aligned with how the world truly works. She can also be the host of the Notes to My (Authorized) Self podcast (streaming on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and YouTube), and her insights recurrently seem in Forbes, Bloomberg Legislation, Newsweek, VentureBeat, ACC Docket, and Above the Legislation. She earned her B.A. and J.D. from UC Berkeley. Observe her on LinkedIn and X @olgavmack.
