The sales department and legal department typically mix like oil and vinegar, and it’s generally true for businesses both large and small. Stereotypically, the sales department consists of larger-than-life personalities wanting to move a million miles an hour to get that deal closed. In stark contrast, legal departments are generally known as the “no” department and to sales, any creative idea or an idea with great potential can meet its end when pitched to legal. Oftentimes these departments struggle to get along because their perspectives are so different. Thankfully, there are many ways to address this relationship because both are pivotal to a business’ long-term success. Here are a few tips to make sure both departments not only work well together but understand each other’s perspectives.
Attend each other’s meetings
As crazy as it might seem, attending each other’s meetings every now and then can be a good thing. Generally, department meetings are limited to those in that respective department. However, inviting the sales team to the legal team’s meeting (and vice versa) may be more helpful that you think. Trainings are a great opportunity to have the other department attend so they get the benefits of learning and understanding the company’s business goals, product, and any upcoming changes.
While sales may begrudgingly attend a legal team meeting, it is imperative for sales to get a glimpse into how the legal team works. Like a fly on the wall, a sales team member can sit in on a legal team meeting to understand what their workload looks like and how that affects their communication. This is especially so when the legal team discusses risk and ongoing legal issues. This will help the sales team member understand the “why” behind a legal decision that may seem off-putting to an outside department. Similarly, someone from the legal team that joins a sales meeting may be able to understand the kind of pressure that the team is under to meet certain quotas. The sales team is the face that the customer sees. They deal with the customers head-on and therefore must navigate personalities, demands, competition, and the pressure of closing a deal. Moreover, sales may know that getting business A to sign on will give the company a reasonable chance to get businesses B, C, and D to sign on, which explains why the sales team member is hard selling the legal team to complete the contract review for business A. This insight is helpful for the legal team to understand why some contracts or transactions are positioned higher than others.
Education
A legal team should be aware that throwing legal jargon back and forth is confusing and alienating for anyone other than lawyers. The sales team needs to understand certain legal concepts in order to get a general idea of how lawyers evaluate risk for the company. The sales team should feel comfortable at the legal meeting to ask questions and seek clarification. The sales team can also educate the legal team on its own jargon, from acronyms to marketing strategies and business methodologies - breaking these concepts down can help legal understand the sales’ team perspective when requesting help from legal.
Manage expectations for contract review
When the sales team submits a contract for legal to review, the sales department needs to make sure that they are communicating all the facts to the legal department. It is imperative to steer clear of assumptions. When requesting legal to review a contract, providing the company name, due date, and general subject of the contract is not going to cut it. That is merely the basics. The legal team needs to know more to the story since oftentimes, the type of deal will affect certain language in the contract itself. Communicating more upfront will reduce the back-and forth e-mails between teams and will ultimately speed up the contract review process.
For legal, when sales submit a contract for review, it is important for legal to communicate their follow up questions in a timely manner. Even more so, explaining the reasoning behind the questions will help sales understand why legal is requesting that information. Legal needs to manage the sales team’s expectations when it comes to contract completion. The legal team must report the status of the contract step by step (in most cases) instead of going radio silent. When something is urgent, an email may work, but many times, picking up the phone is a quick and simple solution.
Have a contract playbook
Like the US Constitution, a contract playbook is a living, breathing document. A contract playbook helps guide any department when submitting a contract for review. The contract playbook can be as tailored as you want. In this case, a contract playbook for a sales team can be as specific as the company requires it.
A contract playbook consists of information geared toward streamlining, managing, and reviewing contracts. The information in the playbook helps the contract submitter complete the necessary work upfront and provide the legal team with information it needs to complete the contract review process efficiently.
For legal, a contract playbook explains what provisions to back down from and what the non-negotiables are. It can include what is necessary to protect when it comes to IP and what the company is willing to negotiate. It can even go so far as specifying what the company’s “musts” are for Mutual Non-Disclosure Agreements for a short-term contract versus a company’s “musts” for a long-term contract.
Indeed, a contract playbook can also explain what the next step should be if a contract encounters certain roadblocks and provides the names of those in the company who might have the correct information to move the contract review process forward.
If a company wants assistance with a contract playbook, they can hire an attorney with contract management experience to not only create a contract playbook, but train the company’s departments on how to manage the contract playbook. If a company does not have a legal team, it is even more imperative to hire an attorney with contracts management experience to make sure that all departments dealing with the company’s day to day legal issues are well-versed on the company’s interests and what the company must protect.
If you have questions about this article, or about contracts management in general, contact Steve Setliff (ssetliff@setlifflaw.com) at (804) 377-1261.
© 2024 Setliff Law, P.C.| View Our Disclaimer | Privacy Policy