Define the pilot scope and check its inputs
The client's initial instruction is to review a supplier's proposed agreement against its confirmed contracting positions, identify the issues and provide proposed amendments. The firm wants to test whether it can offer this as a recurring service with a defined scope. Its pilot includes one agreement, a written issues list and one marked-up draft. Negotiations and specialist assessments require a separate partner decision about scope. These are fictional service-design choices. They establish something the partner can test before describing a dependable service to clients.
The familiar label 'supplier-contract review' leaves important operating questions unanswered. Which version is being reviewed? Have the schedules and referenced terms been supplied? Are the client's commercial objectives and contracting positions confirmed? The associate checks these inputs and records specific questions where something is missing. The partner can then see the basis on which work proceeds and what remains unresolved. A useful pilot tests whether these input requirements are clear enough for colleagues to apply consistently, including when the client sends an incomplete instruction.
Review the agreement, hand over reasoning and flag the new schedule
In the ordinary assignment, the associate compares payment, termination and liability provisions with the client's confirmed positions. For each relevant departure, the issues list identifies the provision, the difference from the client's position, its significance for the stated commercial objective and the proposed response. The marked-up draft implements that response. This gives the reviewing partner a concrete criterion: can each recommendation be traced to the agreement and the instruction? A general warning about risk does not answer that question if the proposed amendment lacks an explanation.
The ordinary handover contains the reviewed agreement, the client positions used, the issues list, the marked-up draft and unresolved questions. The partner checks whether the recommendations are supported and whether the two deliverables agree. The pilot should record when the partner has to repeat analysis simply to understand the associate's reasoning. That distinguishes necessary senior review from avoidable reconstruction. It also tests the service boundary in practice: producing a draft is only part of the promised work if the accompanying issues list cannot support an efficient, substantive review.
The second assignment changes the instruction in a specific way. The client sends a new supplier schedule and asks the firm to include it in the review. The schedule introduces supplier access to employee personal data and incorporates separate online processing terms. The associate flags both documents to the partner rather than assuming that their specialist assessment falls within the original service. The issue is now whether the proposed scope covers the additional analysis and what further work the firm should propose to the client.
Verify retained work and assign the exception through Wisanna
Some completed work remains usable after verification. The client's identity, commercial objectives and confirmed contracting positions can be retained if they remain current. Analysis of unaffected provisions can also be retained after checking its dependencies on the new documents. Liability or termination conclusions must reopen where the schedule or incorporated terms affect their premises. The distinction is between verified work that still answers the instruction and analysis whose basis has changed. A provision's appearance in an earlier draft is insufficient evidence that its previous treatment remains appropriate.
For the exception handover, the partner receives the original scope, the new schedule and incorporated terms, completed work, potentially affected provisions and unresolved questions. In this fictional pilot, the partner selects a lawyer with data-protection experience to receive that package and assess the new documents and their implications for affected provisions. The receiving lawyer needs the existing analysis to understand what can be relied on and what needs revisiting. The partner records the additional work to propose to the client. Selecting a colleague does not itself settle the client's expanded instruction.
On Practice, Wisanna allows a firm to define its own matter work plans, roles and step owners. Built-in work plans are available from Pro. A human handover of a step creates an Inbox item; the colleague is selected by people. The firm designs the service boundaries, review criteria and client commitments. A matter can retain documents, confirmed or corrected facts, decisions, sources and related work for later use. Lawyers determine what is retained and verify AI-assisted outputs. These capabilities can express the firm's operating choices without determining the service's scope.
Compare pilot effort and quality before offering the service
Use a manual pilot log to compare a baseline set of similar reviews with pilot matters. Separate ordinary assignments from exceptions, recording differences in document completeness, complexity and staffing. Capture lawyer work time, partner review time, handover waiting, repeated analysis, exception frequency and effort outside the proposed scope. Include the time spent designing and maintaining the plan when assessing whether avoidable effort has fallen overall. Shorter waiting is useful information, but it does not establish cash savings, additional revenue or available billable capacity.
Pair those observations with partner checks of material issue coverage, support for recommendations, consistency with confirmed client positions and corrections or reopened analysis after review. Evidence for offering the service would show that the tested boundary is workable and effort is manageable while quality holds. Repeated costly exceptions may support a narrower offer. Limited or inconsistent evidence calls for further testing. A small comparison supports internal learning rather than a general performance claim. For a working session with Wisanna, bring an anonymized ordinary assignment and an awkward exception to examine the proposed plan and the evidence needed before making client commitments.
Examine your proposed service plan with Wisanna
Bring an anonymized ordinary assignment and an awkward exception to a working session on the proposed plan and the evidence needed before making client commitments.
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