While nailing down the specific goals of GCC, I quickly concluded that I needed to unionize institutions together into a collective, building an influential voice backed by their large combined contract values. I also recognized the need to get some real horsepower behind us from a credible firm that knows the IT game at the highest and global levels.
I needed a firm that could look any Core and IT supplier in the eye and cite text-and-verse from the authoritative sources on just about any term, best practice or legal covenant imagined. When I met with Pillsbury LLP, I knew I had found just the team.
Understandably, bringing in lawyers can be an alarming notion. However, to get the fairest contracts, it’s vital to bring in the experts. By combining forces with Pillsbury, GCC is unstoppable.
Introducing: Bob Zahler and Elizabeth Zimmer
Zahler, a partner with Pillsbury is known as the founder of outsource IT contract law, while Zimmer routinely negotiates the largest IT deals in the world. The combined intellectual property and experience of Paladin and Pillsbury makes it possible to author and then negotiate the first and ultimate “win-win” master contract in the history of the industry – the Golden Contract.
The fact is, we’re not out for blood. We are fighting for fairness and equity. We’re out for a just master contract that will work as the basis for an institution of any size. Then, we’ll go for right-sized pricing, optimized based on the institution’s transaction volumes and product usage. We’ll expect contracts with a service level that actually explains what the product will do functionally and then provides a real enforcement mechanism a small institution can execute.
We are simply demanding commercial terms that match what is found outside the industry based on examples set by some of the world’s best suppliers. It’s time to check the vendors and reset the standards.
Whether the oligopoly knows it or not, the industry is not happy with the quality of the products, services and value they are receiving. There is a deep-seeded suspicion that bankers are being taken advantage of economically and an absolute certainty they are being held hostage by hidden terms buried deep in the bowels of their contracts. It’s time to change the game – once and for all.
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