Which version is the right one?
The complexity of legal workflows means a single document will get edited several times. The best way to marry up all versions and spare the confusion of finding the right one, is to use a DMS, says Kaden Smith, director at NetDocuments.
By their nature, legal matters require complex workflows, with many documents going back and forth between opposing counsel, clients, and others for negotiation and revisions. Sometimes, those rounds of edits can even occur within the firm. Almost always, those versions need to be maintained in case changes need to be reverted or comparisons run. Do you have the proper tools to help reign in the chaos that can ensue as you begin working with versions upon versions of documents?
This is where a document management system (DMS) can really pull its weight in time-savings, reduced frustration and efficiency gains for your team. For example, instead of emailing copies of documents and then having to manually incorporate changes from multiple parties, you can simply share a single document via a collaboration space and use the co-authoring function to allow multiple people to make edits in a single document, greatly reducing the complexity and risk of errors in your review cycles. This also provides the ability to accept or reject changes and build onto the amendments others have made. Not only is the editing easier, but the security and confidentiality is maintained, because the document remains safely stored in the DMS versus copies existing in numerous places. The added bonus is that your email inbox is less chaotic.
In-house review cycles can sometimes be cumbersome to manage as well. With the availability of sub‑versions, your clients never have to see that you’ve had four different people weigh in on one version of the document and ended up with version numbers running into the triple digits over time. When you’re ready to present the changes to the other parties, you can choose when the proper time to “version up” occurs, so your in-house versions would be 4.1, 4.2, 4.3, etc. and then you would version up to version 5.0 when in-house changes are complete.
Say goodbye to instances of documents named “final, final, final”! A modern DMS like NetDocuments can help your firm avoid confusion no matter how many versions are needed to finalise a document, improve collaboration internally and with external parties and elevate client services while minimising risk.
