SMM Assessment: Method, Scope and What It Produces

An SMM assessment is a piece of work we carry out, over a defined period, with your people and your data. It examines how meetings and events are actually commissioned, sourced, approved and recorded — the ground an SMM programme has to cover — and produces a written view of where you sit and what the evidence supports doing next.

It is not the free tool on this site. Is SMM right for your business is a ten-question self-assessment scored entirely on your own answers. An assessment is external, evidence-based and takes weeks. If you have not used the tool, start there — it costs nothing and will tell you whether this deeper work is worth commissioning.

What an assessment examines

Scope is agreed before we start, but the standard shape covers six areas. Each is examined against evidence rather than against what the documented process says should happen — the gap between the two is frequently the most useful finding.

Assessment areas and the evidence examined

Demand and commissioning

What we examine: How requirements arise, who raises them and what happens in the first day.
Evidence gathered: Interviews with requesters, a walkthrough of recent live requirements, any request forms or mailboxes in use.

Sourcing and buying

What we examine: How venues and suppliers are found, compared and selected, and where procurement is involved.
Evidence gathered: Recent sourcing exercises, quotations, any RFP documentation, agency arrangements.

Supplier and contract position

What we examine: Which suppliers are used repeatedly, on what terms, and who committed the organisation to them.
Evidence gathered: Supplier lists, signed contracts, cancellation and attrition terms, rate agreements where they exist.

Spend and data

What we examine: What can be seen, at what granularity, and how reliably meetings spend separates from adjacent categories.
Evidence gathered: Accounts payable extracts, card data, cost-centre and event spend reporting, departmental records.

Governance and policy

What we examine: What rules exist, whether they are known, and whether approvals happen before commitment.
Evidence gathered: Policy documents, delegated authority schedules, a sample of recent authorisations.

Risk and duty of care

What we examine: What you could demonstrate about attendee safety, insurance and supplier compliance.
Evidence gathered: Attendee records, supplier due-diligence evidence, insurance positions. See duty of care and risk management.

Area	What we examine	Evidence gathered
Demand and commissioning	How requirements arise, who raises them and what happens in the first day.	Interviews with requesters, a walkthrough of recent live requirements, any request forms or mailboxes in use.
Sourcing and buying	How venues and suppliers are found, compared and selected, and where procurement is involved.	Recent sourcing exercises, quotations, any RFP documentation, agency arrangements.
Supplier and contract position	Which suppliers are used repeatedly, on what terms, and who committed the organisation to them.	Supplier lists, signed contracts, cancellation and attrition terms, rate agreements where they exist.
Spend and data	What can be seen, at what granularity, and how reliably meetings spend separates from adjacent categories.	Accounts payable extracts, card data, cost-centre and event spend reporting, departmental records.
Governance and policy	What rules exist, whether they are known, and whether approvals happen before commitment.	Policy documents, delegated authority schedules, a sample of recent authorisations.
Risk and duty of care	What you could demonstrate about attendee safety, insurance and supplier compliance.	Attendee records, supplier due-diligence evidence, insurance positions. See duty of care and risk management.

The method

01
Scoping
We agree what is in scope — entities, sites, departments and meeting types — and who takes part. This is where the definition of a “meeting” gets settled, which affects the findings more than anything else.
02
Interviews
Structured conversations with the people who commission meetings, buy them and pay for them: procurement, finance, an events or executive support function, and departments generating real volume.
03
Data review
Whatever spend and activity data exists — accounts payable, card data, departmental records — examined for what can be seen and how far it can be trusted.
04
Supplier and contract review
Which venues and suppliers appear repeatedly, what was agreed, who signed, and what the exposure looks like on cancellation and attrition.
05
Process walkthrough
Two or three real requirements followed end to end, from the decision to hold a meeting to the paid invoice. This is where documented process and actual behaviour separate.
06
Analysis and drafting
Findings assembled, placed against the maturity model and drafted, with recommendations sequenced by what is achievable first.
07
Presentation and handover
Findings presented to the sponsor and whoever else needs to hear them, with the document handed over afterwards. Uncomfortable findings are better delivered in person.

What the output document contains

Current-state description — how meetings are actually commissioned, bought and approved, written plainly enough to circulate.
Baseline position — what the data shows about volume, spend and supplier concentration, with its limitations stated.
Maturity placement — where you sit against our five-level model, and why.
Findings — what is working, what is not and what is exposed, kept separate from recommendations so you can disagree with one without rejecting the other.
Recommendations — sequenced, with dependencies named, and options described where there is a genuine choice, including doing nothing.

It is written to be read by a Finance Director and used by whoever ends up owning the category. If it needs translating before circulation, we have written it badly. It feeds directly into the business case if one is needed.

An assessment is not an audit

The two words get used interchangeably and should not be. An audit tests compliance against a defined standard and produces a pass, a fail or a list of exceptions. It is usually independent, often mandated, and its authority comes from the standard.

An assessment describes a current state and forms a view about it. No standard is being tested, there is no pass mark and no certification — what it offers is a structured, evidenced opinion about where you are and what would improve it.

We are also not independent in the way an auditor is: we are a supplier who could later be involved in the work. If genuine independence is required — because a board or audit committee needs it — commission it from someone with no downstream interest. See meetings compliance for where formal obligations sit.

Who takes part

An assessment needs three perspectives: the commercial, the operational and the paying. In practice that means procurement or category management, whoever handles events or executive support, and finance.

It also needs departments that actually generate meetings — the busy ones rather than the co-operative ones, because those most likely to have found their own way of working are the ones a programme must accommodate.

Time commitment from any individual is usually an hour or two. The effort goes into assembling data, and where it does not exist, that is a finding rather than a delay.

Honest limitations

An assessment tells you where you are. It does not do the work, and commissioning one is not progress in itself. Organisations complete a thorough assessment, agree with every finding and change nothing — because the recommendation that mattered was to name an owner, and that is a decision no external party can make for you.

It reflects a point in time. A reorganisation three months later invalidates parts of it.
It is only as good as the data available. Where records do not exist, that absence is a finding, not a baseline.
It cannot quantify a saving. We will not put a number in a document that we cannot evidence.
It does not create authority. If the organisation will not agree who owns the category, an external document will not settle it.

How this relates to an SMM Review

An SMM Review is the introductory conversation: around an hour, no preparation, no fieldwork, no document. It covers how requirements arrive, what happens to them and where the obvious gaps are. For most organisations that is enough to decide what to do next, and it is where almost everybody should start.

An assessment is the deeper structured work that follows when the answer is not obvious, when nobody has the full picture, or when a decision needs evidence rather than an informed opinion.

You do not need a review before an assessment, but it is the cheaper way to find out whether you need one.

Frequently asked questions

01How is this different from the free assessment tool on your site?

The readiness tool is a ten-question self-assessment based entirely on your own answers, completed in a couple of minutes, with an indicative result. Nothing is verified and nothing is submitted.

An assessment is carried out by us, with interviews, data and contract review, over a defined period, and produces a written document. The tool tells you roughly where you think you are; the assessment establishes what the evidence shows.

02What does an assessment cost?

It depends on scope — the number of sites, entities and departments in scope, and how much data review is involved. We scope it before quoting, which usually starts with a review conversation.

What we will not do is publish a figure that assumes an organisation we have not met.

03Do we need to prepare data before you start?

It helps, but it is not a prerequisite. We will ask for whatever spend and activity data exists in whatever state it exists in.

If assembling it turns out to be difficult, that difficulty is itself part of the finding. Organisations frequently discover more from trying to produce the data than from the report that follows.

04Will you tell us we do not need a programme?

If that is what the evidence shows, yes. Low volume, a single site or a genuinely well-coordinated existing arrangement are all legitimate reasons not to build anything, and the assessment will say so.

An assessment that always concludes with a recommendation to buy something is not an assessment.

05Does an assessment commit us to using you afterwards?

No. It is a discrete piece of work with a defined output, and the document is yours to use however you choose, including as the basis for a tender that we do not win.

You should also weigh the fact that we are a potential supplier when you read our recommendations. We would rather you did that consciously.

06Can you assess part of the organisation rather than all of it?

Yes, and in larger or multi-office organisations it is often the better approach. A single division or region assessed properly is more useful than an organisation-wide exercise spread too thinly.

Where divisions operate very differently, assessing them separately also avoids an averaged picture that describes none of them.