Posts

Companies do not exist in isolation but are constantly interacting with external parties including vendors, partners, regulatory bodies, customers, employees or competitors. Considering the complications of such relations, there emerges the need of a mechanism to govern relations and operations that companies are involved in.

As a result, most businesses use contracts to specify the terms, expectations or commitments to stakeholders and vice versa. Contracts form a central part of an organization’s functioning – ensuring that businesses and their stakeholders are adhering to the best practices and standards hence creating strategic relationships.

Given the importance of contracts for effective business performance, it is pivotal to have in place a process that will guide the entire lifecycle of contracts – from creation, negotiation, managing changes, approval, execution, monitoring adherence and obligations, analysis & review and renewal or termination of contract data. Contract management involves the process of methodically administering contracts to ensure financial and operational risks are minimized while maximizing stakeholder’s performance.

Logically, effective contract management drives business performance in organizations. At the same time, unstructured contract management processes lead to costly operational and financial risks.

What Constitutes Effective Contract Lifecycle Management?

Contract Management involves various phases and cycles which can guide the framework of a contract management approach.

The stages include; Initiating requests for a contract, Contract Authoring, Negotiating the Contact, Approving the Contract, Contract Execution, Obligation Management, Revisions and amendments, Auditing and reporting and Renewal/termination.

Much of contract management revolves around lifecycle management. Having a good grasp of the contract management process minimizes the amount of time spent in the administrative tasks while also mitigating risks in a business relationship.

Additionally, for your contract management approach to be more useful, businesses need to implement certain best practices that ease the process of administering contracts.

• Centralized Storage for all Contracts

Have all your contracts in a centralized repository where you can access all your contracts instantly and that is accessible to all stakeholders. This ensures accurate arrangement & storage of contracts as well as tracking of different contracts, while also providing instant access& retrieval of contract information including terms and conditions, parties involved, approval status, renewals etc.

• Real-time Collaboration throughout the Contract Lifecycle

The drafting or approval of contracts is often a tedious and time consuming task. One goal of a contract is to ensure each side represented obtains what they’re obligated to in the contract. Through collaboration and communication between different parties involved, a contract can produce terms that are representative of all stakeholders.

• Facilitate Compliance throughout the Contract Lifecycle

Putting in place an effective contract management process helps in providing the ability to manage or avoid risks and compliance issues through ensuring adherence to regulatory/legal and corporate requirements.

Our Contract Lifecycle Management System enables you to Practise Effective Contract Lifecycle Management

Contracts are essential to your business requirements and thus need to be allocated resources accordingly. With so much at stake, an effective contract management system is equally vital to your business operations. By investing in contract management software, you can turn contract management into a strategic process by eliminating risks while also reducing the manual effort that goes into process management. Our Contract Lifecycle Management platform, eHorizon Mkataba is a secure cloud-based platform that completely automates your processes by allowing you effectively manage contract timelines, to collaborate on all your contracts in real time,  record your contracts’ experience, and ultimately bring uniformity to all your organization’s contracts.

In the process, we not only help your organization to reduce cost and minimize risks but also save a lot of time spent in manual contract administration. Sign up for a free demo today and see how it helps in organizing and managing your contracts.

Amidst the current global COVID-19 (Coronavirus) pandemic that is still unravelling, governments across the world are making decisions which impact the way we do business. For instance, earlier this week, the social distancing control measure was put into effect and we expect governments around the world, the private sector and individuals to similarly adopt measures that decrease risks and exposures to the COVID-19 virus.

We recognize the seriousness of this situation and the potential impacts it may have on your business as our customer. However, we want to assure you that we are fully operational to support
you during these unprecedented times. Our ability to support you is predicated on our core values- as an organization that puts customers first, and our resilience- having been in the business for the past 30 years.

We are currently set up to successfully manage all systems. processes, compliance and communications in order to continue providing uninterrupted services to you. We have taken urgent measures to minimize the risk for all our employees while ensuring 100% business continuity.

Specifically, we have taken some critical actions, including;
• Educating our staff on COVID-19 and the measures they need to take to stay safe and to continue to provide services
• Contingent measures to work away from the office should the situation escalate such that it is no longer feasible for staff to report to work
• Support capabilities are geographically dispersed so we can draw on resources in other countries should the need arise
• A ramped up overall system capacity for the online approvals and video conferencing modules in anticipation of the increased number of virtual meetings
• Closely monitored system performance on a 24/7 basis to ensure quality services

Our mission to remain your true partner in solutions that address the management of people, processes and governance. We are here to continue supporting you and your organization during this crisis and well after.

Please let us know if there is anything we can do to help you.

From its humble beginnings 16 years ago, Cellulant has grown to become a leading Pan-African financial technology company providing a one-stop digital marketplace platform with offices in 18 countries that service 34 markets in Africa.

Cellulant was founded in 2004 by Ken Njoroge & Bolaji Akinboro with $3,000. The founders, currently Cellulant’s Co-CEOs saw an opportunity to build a world class business in Africa & to transform customers’ lives through mobile technology. Today, Cellulant runs a technology platform for marketplaces that matter to Africans. They also provide the underlying digital payment infrastructure that solves pertinent problems in Africa faced by businesses, retailers & consumers.

The Challenge

Cellulant has grown from a team of two to more than 450 staff seated across 18 countries. Cellulant recognized that to make this growth of people sustainable, a dynamic payment management system was essential for this.

“We are committed to growing our people, and investing in their growth. One of the fundamental, and possibly basic ways, is to make sure that at the end of the month, they can count on their pay reaching their bank account as we have promised,” Says Sam Kariuki, Chief People Officer at Cellulant. “As we grow in numbers we have increasingly needed to integrate our payroll systems and assure that all staff have a great experience in this particular area.”

Getting started on the Integration journey
Payroll processing was a manually driven part of the business, relying on monster-sized spreadsheets and largely reactive to anything HR related. Simple tasks were burning unnecessary hours each week due to the manual nature of the admin work involved.

Results that matter to the business
Chrispinus Odhiambo, Talent and Culture Operations at Cellulant states that with the integration of eHorizon HRMS in 8 countries, “this has contributed to the effectiveness of how we process payroll. This in turn has increased our productivity. The HRMS has brought simplicity, accuracy, and efficiency to the business.”

With the seamless integration of the payroll management system, processing has become much easier, faster and efficient. Instead of day-to-day admin tasks, the People Growth Team is concentrating on more strategic initiatives – and placing employee experiences at the heart of what they do.  It hasn’t stopped there. Chrispinus is now exploring more features through eHorizon HRMS, meaning he can look outwards strategically, rather than inwards. He is tackling forward talent planning, managing resources more effectively and reducing time spent on simple tasks such as leave management and employee self-service.

“The reports tabulated provide insight and enable us to effectively and strategically plan for our company.” says Chrispinus.

Kenyans are extraordinary marathon & long-distance runners, earning us world recognition as exemplary athletes. This March 2020, Zamara presented the 7th Annual Retirement Conference with their theme being “Running The Retirement Marathon”enlightening delegates on how one can run your retirement race successfully.

The Zamara Retirement Conference 2020 offered an array of seasoned experts in the pension & finance sector like Miriam Musaali, COO of Zamara Uganda who touched on issues of effective trusteeship coupled with practical tools & guides.

Software Technologies was proud to sponsor the event with Chets Mukherjee, our Operations Director, speaking about digitizing pension governance with eHorizon eBoard.

eHorizon eBoard is a Governance Solution that helps to manage a Board’s affairs at an efficient and effective level, and by extension the Board Committees and Management Meetings.

The development and functionality is based on good Corporate Governance and International Best Practices and manages several aspects of the Board. The features at a glance can be summarized as below:

• Board Minutes & Agendas
• Containerizing all relevant documents needed for the board members from time to time
• Director Evaluation
• Directors information, communication & skill matrix
• Corporate Compliance dashboard
• Organizational Plans dashboard
• On-line approvals
• Discussion forums
• Video Conferencing.

“eHorizon eBoard has added value to our organization in terms of our board meeting management processes. It is a great system that has greatly helped our organization in making our board directors proactive.”

Ms. Leah Mumbi- Head of ICT, Industrial & Community Development Corporation

Established in 1954, ICDC has over 60 years of experience and stability in promoting projects that create wealth and jobs for Kenyans in diverse sectors of the economy. We enjoy a heritage of expertise and stability as we promote businesses with the potential to become tomorrow’s blue chip companies. These include Manufacturing, Agro-processing, Energy, ICT, Infrastructure, Financial services and Education sectors.

THE CHALLENGE

WHY SOFTWARE TECHNOLOGIES LIMITED

Leah Mumbi, ICT Manager, states “I like that you are always upgrading the system. The system is constantly adding value to our organization. I feel like we are heard when we see the new updates put on the system. Once I saw the demo, I didn’t think twice about Software Technologies. She also highlighted the impeccable support Software Technologies provides.

RESULTS

Continuity and overall board management: With eBoard, there is continuity in managing the board’s processes. “With the Resources tab we don’t have to worry about where previous documents were stored, print previous bulky board packs as they are easily available” Leah mentions.

Easy updating and sharing of board papers: By providing the board with a central document repository, ICDC has seen an ease in the sharing of board papers. Leah is now able to share corrected documents from any board pack at any time. “I don’t have to worry when I have to send a corrected document, because I am sure everyone will be notified and it will be displayed on the homepage and stored in the briefcase.”

Ensured 24/7 secure access to data from anywhere in the world: Board members have all time access to the meeting pack. “Board members are prepared for the meetings and the CEO mentioned he had observed a sense of proactiveness among the directors.” Leah states.

Savings on time, money and resources: Previously, the organization’s time, printers and paper reams were all excessively used in preparation for board and committee meetings. With eBoard, ICDC has saved close to 50,000 USD in printing and distribution costs. They also continue to make an environmental impact by using less paper and saving more trees.

Data Security and Confidentiality: “eHorizon eBoard is a secure platform and when we use it, we are sure our documents are secure.” Leah states. Software Technologies is ISO 27001 certified and the management systems put in place maintain world class standards of information security.