It happens all the time: A senior exec wants to hold a small meeting and asks an administrative assistant to book it at a local hotel. The admin calls the hotel to inquire about available space, chooses the menus, arranges for audiovisual equipment, maybe even books a few sleeping rooms for out-of-towners. He or she then signs the contract, and they’re good to go.

Except that no one outside that group even knows the meeting is happening. The expense is never included as part of the company’s overall meeting spend, and inevitably the cost gets buried somewhere in the business unit’s operating budget. The hotel rate may be far more than what people in other parts of the company are paying with the same chain. And if the meeting gets canceled, there’s nothing in the contract to protect the company from liability and no one advocating to waive the penalty in lieu of future business.

All Too Familiar

It’s a common scenario, says Kevin Iwamoto, GLP, vice president of enterprise strategy at StarCite, who is based in San Jose, Calif. He uses the example of one admin who organized a couple of small meetings a month for her boss and paid for them on her personal credit card so she could build up the airline miles on her account. “Eventually, other people at the company started noticing that she was taking her whole family on these far away, exotic vacations,” he says—using miles earned from the company’s spending. Meanwhile, the company was missing out on an opportunity to track that meeting spend, leverage buying power, and mitigate risk.

Chances are, even if your company has a strategic meetings management program in place, there are meetings being planned by admins or ad hoc planners that you don’t know about. But getting a handle on small meetings does not necessarily mean bringing them under the meetings department’s jurisdiction. In fact, many companies are finding that it is more effective to allow ad hoc meeting planners to plan them—as long as they are armed with the right tools.

The concept—often referred to as “meetings in a box”—involves developing prenegotiated packages with preferred suppliers that typically include set menus, meeting space, basic audiovisual, and standardized contracts for events that fall into the company’s definition a “small meeting.” Admins can then choose a package that meets their needs and book the program without having to negotiate costs or review contract terms and conditions.

It’s the right approach at the right time, as companies look for new efficiencies and ways to do more with less in the current economy, says Susan Fenner, manager of education and professional development for the International Association of Administrative Professionals, Kansas City, Mo. Fewer internal resources often leave admins picking up the slack, she says. “Any job that needs to be done goes to the admin. Many times, they are being asked to pull together a meeting almost overnight. They don’t usually have any [professional] meeting planning skills and don’t get any training in things like hotel negotiations. If they are not doing this on a regular basis they may not know what to ask for or what savings can be had.”

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