Corporate meeting planners who push for strategic meetings management elevate their role from tactician to strategist and gain visibility as the company expert in sourcing best practices.

Organizations that view meetings management as a logistics function overlook the opportunity to optimize program quality and service while reducing costs, say the four corporate meetings experts interviewed in our white paper. They are one of a number of meeting managers who have initiated strategic meetings management programs (SMMP) to ease their workloads, control costs, and align their planning functions with organizational goals and strategies.

In FutureWatch 2006, an annual study by Meeting Professionals International and American Express, 71 percent of planners who work for corporations, associations, government, or nonprofits say meetings are recognized as a strategic function important to the growth and success of their organizations. Yet only 39 percent of these client-side planners have fully implemented or plan to implement consolidated purchasing practices. Another 34 percent have either not considered or considered but dismissed meetings management consolidation.

There are some people who don’t know what SMMP or meetings management consolidation is. The National Business Travel Association defines an SMMP as “an inclusive approach that maximizes quality and service at an affordable price by consolidating best-practice processes.” Such a program is aligned with the organization’s mission and vision. It differentiates a strategic meeting manager from a logistics-oriented meeting planner.

This white paper reviews how SMMPs can achieve cost reductions and process efficiencies. We present three case studies of planning professionals who are benefiting from SMMP. Learn how you, too, can pull off double-digit savings, raise awareness of the strategic value of meetings, and elevate your status within your organization.

Download the full white paper Be a Meetings Champion