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Contract analysis: Difference between revisions
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Amwelladmin (talk | contribs) (Created page with "{{a|devil|}}Luminaries, thought leaders and digital prophets will tell you that machines can now read and annotate contracts, such that yon poor legal eagles are n...") |
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:''Besides manipulating the physical world, machines are also increasingly encroaching on tasks that, until now, have required a human ability to think and reason. In the legal sphere for example [[J. P. Morgan]] has developed a system that reviews commercial loan agreements, it does in a few seconds it does what would have required, they estimate, about 360,000 hours of human lawyer time.'' | :''Besides manipulating the physical world, machines are also increasingly encroaching on tasks that, until now, have required a human ability to think and reason. In the legal sphere for example [[J. P. Morgan]] has developed a system that reviews commercial loan agreements, it does in a few seconds it does what would have required, they estimate, about 360,000 hours of human lawyer time.'' | ||
: — Daniel Susskind, {{br|A | : — {{author|Daniel Susskind}}, {{br|A World Without Work}} | ||
Sounds fantastic, doesn't it? Preternaturally intelligent silicon minds scanning and processing gigabytes of diverse text in an instant and analysing it for all material quirks and issues, like Zen from ''Blake’s Seven''. | Sounds fantastic, doesn't it? Preternaturally intelligent silicon minds scanning and processing gigabytes of diverse text in an instant and analysing it for all material quirks and issues, like Zen from ''Blake’s Seven''. | ||
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But even here the technology disappoints and, in predictable ways, makes an existing problem even worse. It is worth investigating why. | But even here the technology disappoints and, in predictable ways, makes an existing problem even worse. It is worth investigating why. | ||
====The problem statement==== | |||
Start with the problem the contract review tool is designed to solve: [[Confidentiality agreement]]s are seen as generally low-importance, low-risk agreements — assuming they are properly negotiated — that one must get through as quickly as possible in order to get on with more fruitful commercial negotiations. They tend to be “I’ll show you mind if you show me yours” kind of an affair. But — especially in this data obsessed world — they are buried risks if you don’t watch them carefully. The [[JC]] has a whole [[Confi Anatomy|confi anatomy]] you can peruse if you would like to know more. | |||
So you need your legal eagles to be en guard to stop the stupid getting in. | |||
Now: [[confidentiality agreement]]s come in all different shapes and sizes. They needn’t be longer than a few paragraphs, but our American friends are given to presenting 15-page bunker busters, which in the main amount to much the same thing as a concise one, ''but you never know and you must watch them like a hawk''. There are a few points you need to check: the definition of confidential information, exclusions from the general definition, rights to disclose information that is confidential, the term, scope of remedies for breach. It is all, in concept, standard stuff. But it is a faff — depending on how excruciating is the writing style of the author, it might take up to an hour to review, correct mark up and send back. And it isn’t exactly glamorous. | |||
So the problem: it’s slow, it takes a bit of time, the review parameters are fairly [[complicated]] (but not [[complex]]) — there is a limited risk of missing something — and ones inhouse [[legal eagle]] has invariably got better things she could be doing. This is, in person hours, effectively costing the firm money. | |||
====The contract review tool as a solution.==== | |||
The [[contract review tool]] promises to perform this first basic check by reference to a pre-defined playbook of confidentiality policies, rather like a triage unit at a military hospital. You give it a once over and it goes out the door. Brilliant. | |||
{{sa}} | |||
*[[Why is reg tech so disappointing?]] | |||
*{{br|A World Without Work}} | |||