Transforming Contract Management With AI : Insights From Tiffany Hamilton

Made with speech-to-text software, so a few words may be off.

0:00You're listening to the Contract Heroes Podcast, your one-stop shop for all things contract management. And now here are your hosts, Marc and Pepe. Hi, everybody, and welcome to another episode of the Contract Heroes. We're still at CLOC CGI 2024, and this time we got Tiffany Hamilton Winn. Uh, she's our new guest. She's the director of legal innovation, analytics, and technology at DHL Supply Chain. So welcome to the show, Tiffany. Hi, thank you for having me. So there's a lot of things going on here at CLOC. You know, GenAI is, is one of the main topics, but this is... Th- th- this is cool because we were just talking a few, few minutes ago that you're migrating from a legacy, uh, we can call it CLM or contract management software that was built in-house.

0:57Now you're migrating to a new one, and you're building on top of it some AI capabilities. So that's, that's, that's very interesting. So before we start to going deeper about the technical part, like can you tell us a little bit about your background and what are you doing right now on DHL? Yeah. So, um, I've been with DHL for about eight and a half years now in the legal ops space. Before that, I did not have legal ops experience, um, so it's always very interesting when I'm talking to people, they're like, "How'd you land here?" I'm like, "I have no idea." I just had a lot of good opportunities and big projects. Um, but at DHL, we have a lot going on in the GenAI space, but then also just in legal ops space generally. Um, my team handles a lot of things from the contract administration, to knowledge management, to vendor and spend management, um, resource management. Pretty much everything on the CLOC Core 12, we have, um, processes around it in our team. So it's, it's very busy, but exciting space right now. And how you started your team.

1:58So it, it wa- it was only you at, at the beginning? Yeah. So when I first came in, um, I was the only fully dedicated resource. Um, we had a few like partially dedicated resources to various aspects. Um, and then just over the years, we've started to really strategize and put a game plan in place of how we really needed to resource our department, um, for the Americas region. So we started building this out, starting identifying areas where, um, individuals were doing legal ops work, but may not have been considered a legal ops resource. Um, so we did a lot of work there to make sure that we had the right people working on the right things, um, made sure that we were aligning, uh, to the CLOC Core 12 pillars. That was really our guiding light here. Right. Um, and then really just started building out our strategy, um, identifying ways that we could use our existing resources or find where we had gaps, where work that we knew that needed to be done, um, to make, you know, uh, some of these bigger initiatives to really gain traction with them. Um, so we were able to identify areas where we had gaps and argue for resources to help fill those. Right. And you have a lot of different in- initiatives that you just told me. Yeah. But let's focus on the CLM. Sure.

3:10That's very interesting. So you had a legacy system. I'm pretty sure now you know what is lacking- Yeah... and now you want to build something to fix those pain points. Like, can you guide us a little bit there? Yeah. So we've had a legacy system for a very, very long time. It was built in-house. Um, and we've added on a lot of pieces to it over the years. Um, we kind of tried to make it a one-stop shop, um, for good or bad. Um, there was definitely some issues that come up with trying to do that. So after having it in place for so many years, we did start to realize kind of what was broken and what we were gonna be looking to fix when we did decide to migrate to another solution. So now that we're here, we're able to take some of those, uh, historical lessons learned and really build out a solution that works for, um, our legal team, but also for our business partners. And, and how'd that work? Because I, I...

4:03In our experience, so we've been working on the CLM implementation space for years, and one of, uh, the first, well, yeah, interaction with our customers, uh, is of course like the gathering of all of the requirements. Yep. And, uh, and we also help some other customers when they're looking for different kind of vendors. So I'm really interested like how you took that decision, like, and what was in that RFI when you start looking- Mm-hmm... for vendors. Yeah. So some of the first things we did was having initial conversations with the stakeholders that we knew, um, we needed their input, we needed their buy-in. They were the everyday users or they were the recipients of the data that was coming out of these solutions, or they were responsible for the contracts going into the solution. So it really was a, like a feedback approach that we started with to understand what everybody else's pain points were, not just what we thought they were. Um, so I think that was first. Uh, we also took a look at the data that was in the system, really understanding, one, how clean it was, what needed to be cleaned up, um, two, how consistently it was used, and then three, we then took those kind of points and made the determination of, you know, we should move this.

5:15We should continue looking at this piece of information, or maybe we should let this go because either it's not relevant for our business now, or maybe we are tracking it somewhere else. And, you know, how, how was that, you know, when you were looking at the data that was, um, you had access to, you know, how did that cleanup process go? Yeah. Um, data cleanup is always a little messy. Um- Especially for lawyers. Yes, yes. It's one of my favorite topics. But, um, yeah, so it, it was a little messy at first, but once we really got our hands around what was out there and what we decided, um, to move forward with and what to let go of, it helped with some of the, some of the conversations, pulling in the right people to making sure that we're confirming the different pieces of the data. Um, we also have leaned pretty heavily on, um, the vendor that we're working with to help us cleanse some of this data, um, and really get it in a good point that we can then migrate it into the solution.

6:15Yeah, that, that, that's always a good place to start with. Well, es- especially when the vendor, they know what they're... Well, what they need in order to implement it. Because, like, a lot of people think that AI is just, like, a plug-and-play thing. No. Right? Like, just, just, like, create your Spotify account, and then you can play music. It doesn't work like that. You gotta have e- everything clean- It needs time... and then you can start to build the models over those, that, that ty- type of data. And so, and can you tell us a little bit, like, how you mix both? Or how are you envisioning working together? Yeah. Um, so we'll have a, essentially, a repository with an AI component on top of it. Um, in addition, we also have an intake solution, which is the front end. Yeah. So it's really the initial intake of the requests coming in.

7:06There are workflows in place that will feed it over into the AI solution, which will actually help us draft some of these agreements, um, help us pull out, uh, the data points from the fully executed agreements, that is then sending over those documents and the information into the repository. Um, there's definitely a human in the loop at every step to confirm that what's been, um, put in place or what's been extracted is accurate, but it's a lot less manual than our existing process. Right. And I would like to... I mean, we, we can talk about this for hours, but, uh, right now we're trying to get, like, really straight to the point. And if now that you're in the middle of the implementation, you've been working with both of the systems. In our experience, there's a lot of people trying to do the, the same. Trying, because they still don't know how to do it. Yeah. What will be, like, your key takeaway? Like, how- Yeah... what would you like to learn before you started this? Um, for me personally, um, I'm a, I'm a data nerd, so this is where this is coming from. Okay. I think, um, understanding your data and information governance are very important.

8:16We- And, and, and what do you mean, like, for that? The in- information governance? So I try to think about information governance in relation to any system, anything that's producing data. So, um, how is the data getting in there? Okay. Who's touching it? How often? What are they doing with it once it's in there? What are they doing with it after? Um, it's really, like, a whole life cycle, and we could probably talk a completely separate session on- ... on this whole topic. But I think- Gotta be a second interview... I think really understanding your data, and not just from your own perspective, but from all the stakeholders that are touching it and relying on it, is crucial. Because if you decide to cut something out or change something in the process, change what you're capturing, there may be a, um, a, a side effect down the road that you may not have anticipated, but had you just spoken to another stakeholder, they could have probably told you. Yeah, and especially adoption, because at the end, if the main users are not going to use the, the, the system, even if you spend a lot of money there, it's just gonna be just directly to the trash can. Yes. Yes. Right?

9:17Well, Tiffany, so if, if people would like to know a little bit more about your experience, what is, like, the best place to find you? Um, you can always find me on LinkedIn, or I love to go to the conferences. So I'm at Clock every year. I'm always happy to, uh, have any type of conversation on legal ops, not just contract related. Awesome. Well, thank you so much, Tiffany. We real- we really appreciate you joining us. And thanks everybody for listening to another episode of Contract Heroes. This episode of the Contract Heroes is sponsored by Koho Consulting. Koho helps organizations of all shapes and sizes find, implement, and manage their chosen CLM tool. Whether your project is buy or sell side led, Koho can help you navigate the waters of the CLM space to make sure that you're getting a product that's going to fit like a glove for years to come. If you'd like to learn more about Koho, visit their website at C-O-H-O consulting dot com.