Document automation: how to get started

Are you keen to get your precedents automated but wondering how to scope your projects? This is often the area where we find hesitation and uncertainty around what’s needed, with projects getting stuck.

In fact, the automation process essentially mirrors the drafting process that you go through in your mind every day as a lawyer: the logic flows are the same.

As a starting point, think about the questions you would need to ask yourself if manually drafting a document from scratch (to get rid of all those square brackets!) AND what the available answer type/options would be – single or multiple sellers? English or Scots law? Type of purchase price structure? Buyer’s name?

Then ask yourself when each question will be relevant ie whether the question (and the content it relates to) would only appear if any of the other question(s) are answered in a certain way – for example, a question about how the sellers will share liability will only ever be relevant where you answer first that there are multiple sellers.

You can then map out these questions/answer options logically (and equally importantly, sign-post how each answer combination will affect the wording of your output document) in a variety of ways, depending on the complexity of the document and proposed automation.

Soon you will have the makings of your end user questionnaire, and a logic framework that your automation team can use to start building your automated template.