read time: 4 min
As an Executive Assistant, your role covers a wide range of responsibilities, but one that takes up considerable time and often goes unseen is meeting planning. So much of that work happens behind the scenes — organizing travel, coordinating attendee needs, and managing the budget — and therefore, it’s not always recognized by your colleagues or your executive.
By tracking meeting planning outcomes, you make that effort visible. Key performance indicators (KPIs) give you proof points that show how your work saves money, keeps logistics on track, and ensures meetings achieve their goals in a way your executive can clearly see and measure.
Why meeting KPIs matter
Meeting KPIs aren’t another mark on your checklist, they’re about influence, impact, and visibility. By choosing the right metrics, you can connect your daily responsibilities directly to executive priorities and larger company goals.
Meeting KPIs give you clarity. They highlight what’s working, where to streamline, how to compare different approaches, and track progress. KPIs give you a clear roadmap for continuous improvement, and a way to showcase the difference you’re making along the way.
How to build your own KPIs
Before you begin developing your meeting KPIs, there are few things you should consider to ensure you’re set for success.
Balance metric and project-based KPIs
Some KPIs for Executive Assistants are purely numeric like budget accuracy or survey response rates. Others are project-based, tracking whether critical steps were completed, like delivering a meeting brief or securing a venue within a set timeline. Both types matter: numbers show precision and are more definitive, while milestones show reliability.
Align with company and executive priorities
Always align your meeting KPIs to the broader company goals and your executive’s expectations. For example, if leadership prioritizes more efficient offsites, track budget accuracy, travel efficiency, and attendee satisfaction.
Make them specific and measurable
Use the S.M.A.R.T. (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-bound) goals method and tie meeting KPIs to percentages, numbers, and deadlines. You should also revisit the KPIs you set quarterly to reflect changing goals and responsibilities.
Engage your EA community
Connect with other Executive Assistants who are facing the same challenges. Ask how they’re tracking meeting planning outcomes and what they’ve found helpful. Tapping into this community gives you benchmarks, new ideas, and validation that you’re on the right track.
Examples of meeting planning KPIs for Executive Assistants
Below we share four key examples of meeting KPIs that you can start tracking today to help excel in your role and deliver impactful outcomes.
1. Organize pre-meeting work
Focus on what happens before the meeting starts: prepare the agenda, share a meeting brief with all the necessary details, and deliver pre-meeting communications to build engagement. This meeting KPI shows your foresight and organization by ensuring attendees arrive informed and ready to engage in sessions.
KPI examples: Percentage of meetings where the meeting brief was sent 48 hours in advance to all attendees.
2. Select smart meeting destinations
Put on your research hat and identify meeting destinations that balance cost, accessibility, and convenience. Choosing the right location shows intention — that you’re mindful of budgets, aligned with executive priorities, and tuned in to company goals.
KPI examples: Track cost per attendee and/or average travel time. A secondary meeting KPI could be the percentage of attendees who can reach the meeting location within a reasonable time (e.g., under four hours).
3. Deliver budgets with accuracy and savings
Cost is a language every executive understands. Tracking budget performance shows you make informed choices, capture savings, and use technology to plan more efficiently. With TROOP, you can track costs across flights, hotels, meeting spaces, and agendas for a full picture.
KPI examples: Keep actual spend within 10% of estimated budget, and track cost per attendee.
4. Measure experiences and outcomes
A successful meeting is more than logistics, it’s impact as well. Capture attendee feedback through surveys or quick debriefs, and consider how activities, like team dinners or offsite experiences, support culture and collaboration. At the same time, track whether meeting objectives were achieved and how they connect back to your executive’s priorities and broader company goals.
KPI examples: Target at least 80% positive feedback with post-meeting surveys, and track the percentage of meeting objectives successfully achieved.
Tracking meeting planning KPIs is how you excel
By tracking KPIs, you bring the impact of meeting planning to the surface — showing how your planning saves time, keeps budgets on track, improves the attendee experience, and ensures meetings achieve their goals.
The right KPIs don’t just highlight the value you bring to meetings; they also clearly showcase the strategic contributions you make every day.
Plan better, more engaging in-person meetings
