Reflections from IACCM 2016

We’d like to take a moment to share the “takeaways” we learned as an exhibitor at the 2016 International Association for Contract and Commercial Management (IACCM) Conference in San Diego this past month.

We thought it was time to share our industry learnings and insights with our visitors because we believe in the power of continuous learning and development. We also figured that you, our current and future customers, may find value in knowing what we learned and how it can help your business as you seek our next generation contract management system (CMS).

The following themes emerged throughout the conference:

People are Ready for Next Generation Software

Earlier this fall, the 2016 Nobel Prize in Economics was awarded to two economists for their contributions in the field of “Contract Theory.” Oliver Hart and Bengt Holmstrom were recognized for creating frameworks to write contracts—improving both the design of contracts and shedding light on how contracts help us deal with conflicting interests.

We believe this recent spotlight on contract management was a large motivator for guests at this year’s IACCM Conference—who transitioned from just talking about contract management to actively seeking out solutions. Attendees were optimistic about the future of contract management after hearing many presenters, including our own client Kunal Dharia of Blue Shield of California (BSCA), who spoke about their company’s transition to our product Contraxx.

More Than Ever, Businesses are Collaborative and Transparent

Thought leaders in the industry were very open to talking about their contract management challenges and hearing from presenters about how they were able to solve them. Attendees saw the possibilities of a more intuitive and efficient contract management system and learned about the benefits of transitioning to a sophisticated system.

From Ecteon’s perspective this year’s attendees were ready to talk about the next step in contract management. Previously, people in the industry would generally talk only about the concepts of workflow and knowledge management—it seems now that people are taking action to change their current CMS processes.

Template Harmonization is a Trending Buzzword

“Template harmonization” was a big buzzword at the IACCM conference. Template harmonization happens when one change is made in one document and causes all similar documents to update with the new edits—thus creating “harmony” amongst various contracts. With more advanced technologies and systems available, managers don’t have to manually update hundreds of documents anymore—changes can be made simultaneously and quickly.

Senior Level Support is Catching Fire

The Nobel Prize news caught the attention of many senior-level decision makers in Fortune 500 and 1000 companies. By bringing a very internal process into the spotlight, C-Suite professionals realized just how critical contracts are to the entire company from a cost, efficiency and operations perspective. No longer are contracts thought of as paper records kept in the file cabinet—they are an integral part of a company’s overall operations. That realization and support from higher up management is helping contract managers take the steps to invest in next generation software.

We are excited to continue our involvement with IACCM, recently co-facilitating a webinar on November 15. The webinar “Transforming the way we think about contracting” shared BSCA’s experience achieving 100 percent automation in the creation of member facing documents.

Click here to download the webinar recording: https://www.sendspace.com/file/vtx2hr