What is a Contract Repository?

According to the global nonprofit World Commerce and Contracting the modern Fortune 1000 company maintains 20,000 to 40,000 contracts at any given time. 

Yet Docusign and Deloitte research on the end-to-end agreement process found that almost half of companies believe they spend too much time searching for agreements. Over 54% lack the tools to automate the tracking and analysis of their completed agreements.

Organizations of all sizes need to be able to access their agreements and the data within them immediately and with absolute confidence that their records are accurate. To keep this information accurate and accessible, they’ll need a contract repository.

What is a contract repository?

In simple terms, a contract repository is any place where an organization stores and organizes its contracts for future reference. Today, however, the term has expanded to refer to a centralized system for storing, managing and analyzing contract information.

Thankfully, today a contract repository can be digitized, with electronic copies of contracts stored in cloud-based storage systems. Even in the age of digital storage, however, maintaining contract information can quickly become unwieldy—making contract repositories more important than ever. 

Why is it important to have a contract repository?

Organizations that work with contracts need to have an accurate record of the most recent version of all agreements, ready to reference at a moment’s notice. Maintaining a single, reliable contract repository for all their contracts is the best way to make this possible.

Without a reliable contract repository, organizations will spend an outsized amount of time attempting to find and organize contracts for various needs. Not only will it have a huge impact on their productivity, but - even worse - it can hamper the organization’s ability to realize value from their current agreements and negotiate future deals.

Contract management is a lengthy and often complex process. Many contracts undergo changes in the form of addendums and amendments. If an organization can’t keep a record of these changes as they happen in a single, reliable location, they run the risk of making decisions using outdated information or even having multiple, contradictory versions of a contract in different places.

What does a contract repository need to be effective?

Not all contract repositories are created equally. Without the proper systems, even a robust digital filing system won’t efficiently keep agreements organized and up to date.

For a contract repository to be manageable and useful, it needs to have the following qualities at a minimum:

• Centralized: Your contract repository must store all contract information in a centralized location, including old versions and completed deals.

• Standardized: Your contract repository should file and organize all of your agreements according to a single, clearly defined, and consistent system. This should make it straightforward to quickly find any contract you need.

• Secure: Contracts are highly sensitive information. Your contract repository should incorporate robust security protocols to ensure only the right users have access to the right agreements.

• Searchable: Your digital contract repository should include an effective search feature that helps teams analyze agreements uncover insights and potential cost-saving opportunities.

How to build a contract repository

If you’re looking for a way to build a contract repository, Docusign Navigator, part of Docusign Intelligent Agreement Management, is designed to be easy to adopt and integrate into your current systems.

Learn more about Docusign IAM.