Optimising procurement processes with contract automation

As a procurement professional you're tasked with managing the financial health of the company by justifying every penny that leaves the business. Of course, for each euro spent, there’s an expectation it will lead to more than a euro in value for your business. Else, why spend it? 

Because each euro can only be spent once, all fund allocations carry  the expectation of outperforming other possible investments. Your mission is to maximise the value gap — whether it means bringing in extra revenue, avoiding costs, or delivering efficiency gains. Docfield was designed with this in mind: to deliver a solution that takes the guess work out of maximising procurement teams' value, and making it easy to subsequently report on.

Why contract automation is essential

In many companies, procurement teams are seen as the cost-cutting department. As a result, procurement teams often minimise their own departmental spend and opt for scrappy solutions, like manually tracking contract data in spreadsheets. Besides being highly inefficient and error-prone, it is only a marginal improvement on outdated pen-and-paper processes. The Docfield platform is a 360 console to review critical contract data and execute changes immediately. Below we’ll explore why we’re the perfect fit for procurement teams!

1. Eliminating manual handoffs and errors

Procurement professionals not only manage multiple projects at once, they also manage multiple stakeholders. Both internal and external. The reality is that contracts rarely move from creation to execution linearly. There are often back-and-forths that involve legal & compliance, security, budget-holders, and ultimately a director of the company for sign off. Passing contracts back-and-forth through e-mail and Slack leads to poor version control and inefficiencies in the purchasing process.

• Real-time negotiation & approval: Stakeholders can redline or comment directly in the platform, eliminating endless email threads.
• Easy external access: Inviting suppliers into a contract negotiation should feel as simple as sharing a Google Doc—no cumbersome sign-ups or confusing platforms.
• Automated role-based approvals: When you need a final “green light,” the system routes the contract to the right person at the right time, compressing cycle times.

On the collaboration front, internal teams (finance, operations, legal) can jump in to review or approve clauses within a single platform. Externally, inviting suppliers to negotiate terms can be as easy as sending a secure link—no lengthy onboarding or complicated account setups required. This agility not only saves time but also strengthens relationships by reducing friction.

2. Providing dashboards & analytics for better spend visibility

Procurement is a finance function — its purpose is mostly defined by evaluating vendor performance through a financial lens. Its own success is thereby measured in the same way. This includes tracking total spend under the team’s management, the savings negotiated, and the overall value gained through cost avoidance, reductions, or additional revenue. To deliver these results, procurement teams need clear, real-time visibility into spend, supplier performance, and contract statuses.

Automated contract solutions like Docfield offer dashboards that pull data from contracts, providing:

• Unified spend visibility: A single source of truth on contracted supplier spend. 
• Renewal reminders: Ability to identify renewal terms and notify the team (more on this below). 
• Compliance: Ensure all contracts are compliant with company policy, like blocking a contract from being signed if it has auto-renewal switched on. 

A data-driven procurement function is better positioned to cut unnecessary costs. The right CLM—especially one integrated with your ERP—provides centralized spend data. For example, Docfield’s analytics feature helps procurement teams identify patterns, highlight areas for negotiation, and track contract performance against KPIs.

3. Proactive renewal & obligations management

While legal teams might be more focused on risk and compliance, procurement teams want to optimise costs and ensure timely renewals. Contract automation tools can send alerts well before an agreement is due to renew, giving you time to renegotiate terms or reassess supplier performance. This proactive approach helps you avoid auto-renewals that lock you into suboptimal pricing—or worse, let contracts renew unexpectedly.

4. Centralizing supplier data (SxM)

Modern procurement teams need more than just the contract text; they need to understand a supplier’s risk profile, compliance status, and performance metrics over time. By centralizing supplier data within the contract platform, you gain:

• 360° Supplier View: quality metrics and compliance data in one place.
• Better Relationship Management: Scorecards and performance dashboards.

5. Contract Lifecycle Management

CLM is the engine that drives procurement contract automation. With Docfield, you get:

• Template & clause libraries: Ensure consistent language and risk policies across all supplier agreements.
• Automated workflows: Accelerate the authoring, negotiation, and sign-off processes without missing compliance checks.
• E-Signatures & repository: Make it easy for all parties to sign securely, then store final contracts in a centralized, searchable database.
• Obligation & renewal alerts: Never miss another renewal date or compliance deadline.

Conclusion & Next Steps

Procurement teams are expected to make every euro work harder than the last. Yet many still rely on spreadsheets or other manual methods that waste time and lead to errors. Docfield addresses these pain points by automating the entire contract lifecycle—offering real-time collaboration, centralized dashboards, proactive renewal alerts, and integrated supplier data. With these tools, procurement moves beyond simply cutting costs and becomes a strategic force, maximizing value for the business through smarter spend management and streamlined operations.