SHAREPOINT AGREEMENTS
Building an AI-Powered agreement lifecycle application
Microsoft’s next-generation solution for seamless agreement lifecycle management. Our team developed a dedicated end-to-end, AI-powered agreement management tool, designed to streamline workflows and fully integrate with Microsoft 365.
Lead Designer
As the design lead, I envisioned the app’s direction, rallied stakeholders and partner teams to champion my proposal, and led end-to-end product design. Starting fall 2023 for 8 months, I was entrusted with bringing this vision to life, focusing on delivering an MVP experience with both internal organizations and enterprise customers. Throughout the process, I collaborated and built strong cross functional partnerships across disciplines and the Office 365 organization. Working with PM, engineers, research and legal experts, we ensured a seamless, high-quality product that met the highest design and engineering standards.
Team
Dieter Jansen (Design Director), Shruti Rajagopalan (Designer), RK Menon (Product Manager), Vijay Sharma (Product Manager) Jeff McDowell (Product Manager) Tim Quinlan (Engineering Manager) Lekshmi Menon (Engineering Manager) Caitlyn Zawideh (Content)
Problem and Challenge
Before this project, Microsoft lacked a dedicated native solution for managing the agreement lifecycle. Organizations and customers created their own and relied on a patchwork of tools like SharePoint, Power Automate, and third-party e-signature platforms, leading to inefficiencies, compliance risks, and a disjointed user experience. We saw an opportunity to envision and create a brand-new solution from the ground up, one that would streamline agreement management, eliminate reliance on external tools, and fully integrate with Microsoft 365.This $1.2 billion market marks a strategic shift as Microsoft is competing with contract lifecycle management (CLM) providers like Ironclad, Icertis, and DocuSign CLM by offering a native Microsoft solution that reduces reliance on third-party software.
Research and Insights
Previously, SharePoint provided a contract management site template that served as a starting point to build a custom solution. This solution was structured more as a template and users could add third-party and custom integrations. User feedback and research on this experience was foundational and helped us launch into more additional studies both internally and with external partners.
“...if I could have a super site where I contain all my documents, but I could make certain documents available to vendors to view and sign, and have some kind of way that I can legally capture signature date, time..all that kind of stuff...give me OneDrive, SharePoint and DocuSign all built in one. That would be fantastic...”
To define the right solution, we conducted:
User interviews with legal teams, procurement managers, and business administrators to understand the whole agreements process
Competitive analysis of existing agreement and CLM tool
Synthesis on various SharePoint offerings and customer created solutions
Key Findings:
Users lacked visibility into agreement progress, often relying on scattered email updates and confusion
Manual approvals led to delays and compliance risks
Workflows were too complex, requiring multiple disconnected tools
Automating processes were difficult
Core Principles
Research insights helped shape our vision and core principles: A unified, AI-driven platform that simplifies agreement tracking, automates workflows, and enhances collaboration
Ensure clarity and transparency.
Design with visibility in mind- users should always know an agreement's status and next steps. Clear progress, status, and history to keep processes transparent and reduce uncertainty.
Prioritize simplicity and intuitiveness.
Keep the interface clean and focused, ensuring key actions are easy to access. Use straightforward language instead of legal jargon and design workflows that guide users through tasks with minimal effort.
Facilitate seamless collaboration.
Enable effortless teamwork by providing role-based access, real-time editing, and streamlined approval processes. Ensure secure, flexible sharing options so users can manage access with confidence.
Alignment and scalability.
Utilize Microsoft Fluent design system as a foundation.
Envisioning a new product
I proposed a North Star for what the agreements app could become, blending the most intuitive and powerful features from various platforms while introducing innovative, user-driven concepts inspired by research and customer needs. Originally crafted for Microsoft’s annual Ignite conference, this North Star set the foundation for a clear vision, paving the way for customer connections, business opportunities and continued iterations.
Utilizing this North Star, we strategically broke down the work into phased milestones, incorporating feedback from both internal and external partners. SharePoint Agreements was never meant to be a static product; it was a continuous evolution. As we listened to our customers and refined the application, our North Star adapted, ensuring we stayed aligned with their needs and the future of agreement management.
A dedicated hub
After months of iterations, back and forth discussions and customer research, we landed on creating an applications within the Microsoft Teams ecosystem.
Centralized to quickly get started and back to your daily workings. Quick start offers a way to jump back into your
last touched agreements, while insights gives you a broad overview of how your agreements are doing.
See all your agreements within your dedicated business unit, or across multiple business units if you have permissions to them. Filter between different categories dependent on what is available.
A continued journey
After eight incredible years at Microsoft, I left in December 2024. One of my proudest milestones was seeing SharePoint Agreements become available to enterprise customers, a major achievement driven by an outstanding team. It was a complex, large scale effort, and I’m excited for the world to experience the value it brings.