The Client
This midstream services company enables the energy industry to move products from the wellhead to the wholesale market. It provides diversified services – from purchasing, selling, and processing to transporting, and storing energy – for end users and consumers of crude oil, natural gas, natural gas liquids, refined products and asphalt. The Oklahoma-based company serves customers in North America, Europe, and Asia.
The Problem
The company’s outmoded method for managing its legal documents was creating significant inefficiencies – a situation further compounded by the generation of new contract-related paperwork on a daily basis. Corporate records were organized by entity, placed in binders with tabbed sections indicating various document types, and stored on shelves in a file room. Legal papers related to acquisition / divestiture of assets was similarly organized by transaction and placed in binders with tabbed sections. From a process perspective, as new and/or related documents were created, legal staff was required to physically place them in their respective binders. The labor-intensive and error-prone environment put increasing burdens on the legal department’s time and workload. Meeting requests for specific documents – during company audits, for instance – required staff to search through binders and retrieve documents literally by hand.
The Solution
The root problem was not a matter of how the company classified and organized documents; rather, it was its inability to search, retrieve, and store documents in a timely and consistent fashion due to outdated information management practices and tools. Although the legal group was in the midst of scanning documents into electronic format, designing and implementing an electronic document management system was outside the skills range of its IT group.
The company engaged Stonebridge to define a technical approach for its document management solution. The goal was to organize the legal department’s information in a digital folder structure that meticulously replicated the structure and organization of its existing physical filing system. To minimize project risk, Stonebridge first developed a Proof of Concept (PoC) showing that the technical approach would meet user needs. With the success of the PoC, the client engaged Stonebridge to fully implement the solution. Built on the Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 platform, the document repository organizes digital copies of documents using embedded metadata that allows legal staff to easily search, retrieve, and produce specific documents needed for audits and other routine company matters.
The Benefits
The company’s legal department can focus on working with the corporate records and transaction documents – supporting audit and other routine company matters – instead of managing a physical file room. Additionally, the legal department can provide auditors or other department staff secure access to specific areas of the system, enabling effective self-serve access to vital records.