Reuse a review grid on the next deal

A new deal comes in, and the due diligence review needs the same questions as the last one: change of control, assignment, termination, governing law, liability caps. The firm has a standard question list, kept as an earlier review or in a spreadsheet. Start the new insight from that list rather than typing the columns again, so every review asks the questions the same way.

The question that decides where you start is where does the standard list live today? In an insight the firm keeps as a template, import it. In Excel, import the spreadsheet. As questions you have written before, pick them from your column library.

Start from a template

1. Open the matter's new insight and click Templates in the toolbar above the table. The button is there in an insight that belongs to a matter.

2. Under Template, pick the review to start from. The list holds the insights kept in the client's group and in the Firm-wide Library, under the folder names they are filed in. Hover over the information icon next to a template to read its description.

3. Click Import. The template's columns are added after any columns the insight already has, with their questions, types and any decided columns.

   

Import brings the template's rows with it as well. Keep a template insight without documents, so only its questions come across.

Import the question list from Excel

1. Prepare the spreadsheet with one row for each column you want, and a heading on each of its columns: a label, the question, and if you like the type. For Project Alpha that might be a row with "Change of control", "Does the contract allow the counterparty to terminate or change its terms on a change of control of Beta Holding A/S?" and bool. Only the first sheet is read.

2. In the insight, click Import columns from Excel in the toolbar above the table, then click Upload files and choose the spreadsheet. The diagram in the window is a reminder that each row of the spreadsheet becomes a column in the insight. No rows or answers are imported, only the questions.

3. Tell Juristic which column of the spreadsheet is which: Label, Prompt and Type (optional). The first rows of the sheet are shown under the choices so you can check. Click Continue.

   

4. Check the list of columns. You can correct a label or a question, change the Column type, or delete a row you do not need on this deal.

5. Click Import 12 columns; the button counts the columns you are importing. If the insight already has documents, the new columns are analysed straight away.

A type in the spreadsheet is read when it is written as the type's short name: shorttext, longtext, bool, date, number, currency, percentage, list or verbatim. Anything else, or no type column at all, gives a Short answer column, which you can change in step 4.

Keep your best questions in your column library

1. When you write a new column, leave Save this question to my column library ticked on the last step before Add column. The question is saved as it stands on that step, after any clarification, not as you first typed it.

2. On the next deal, click Column Centre in the toolbar above the table. Your saved questions are under Your own columns, and Juristic's standard ones under Juristic. Search the list at the top.

   

3. Click a question to add it to the insight as a column.

4. To share a question with the rest of the firm, click the pencil on a question you wrote in Column Centre, leave Share on and click Save. The switch is on each time the window opens, so turn it off before you click Save if the question should stay in your own library.

Copy an earlier review

In the matter's list of insights, click More on a row and choose Duplicate for a copy in the same matter (its title ends in "(copy)"), or Copy and move to and a matter under Matters to copy it into another matter. A copy brings the documents' rows and answers with it. For a new client's deal, start from a template or a spreadsheet instead, so nothing from the earlier matter comes along.

Tips from practice

• One maintained template. Keep the firm's standard due diligence review as a single insight without documents, in the Firm-wide Library or the client's group, and let one person keep it up to date. A template copied from deal to deal drifts. See set up a group's templates and standard content.
• Spreadsheet for the knowledge lawyer, template for the team. A question list maintained in Excel is easy to review and comment on. Import it once into the template insight, and the team imports the template.
• Standard questions stay standard. Add the deal-specific questions as extra columns after the import, and leave the standard ones as they are, so reviews stay comparable across deals.

With the columns in place, add the documents and run the review: review a set of contracts in a table. For judgement questions, see decide a review question from the facts.