Southern Management Association Annual Meeting (SMA)

Southern Management Association · in person · Official site ↗

Trust

Established · 9/10

Major society or long-running conference. Indexing and committee verified.

Quality: High 4/5

Strong international conference with solid review and a reputable host.

✕Committee international — Program chair, all track chairs (2026 call) and officers/board all at US institutions
?Indexing verified — Nothing to verify
✓Archive history — Program PDFs 2002-2025 online
✓Committee listed — Program chair and track chairs named in call
✓Domain age — smgmt.org registered 2012-10-30; legacy southernmanagement.org since 2000 (Wayback 2006)
✓Double blind — Papers enter SMA's blind review process, no identifying information
✓Indexing specific — No indexing claimed
✓Known mill — Single annual society meeting
✓Organizer reputable — Owns Journal of Management (SAGE)
✓Past editions — Programs archived back to 2002; meetings listed 2022-2029

✕Failed !Warning ?Not verified ✓Passed

Promotion (NN 42/2026)

no category

0.0 points per paper (≤ 4 authors)

— Abstracts only: no full paper in proceedings, so it doesn't count as a scientific paper.
— Proceedings papers can supply at most 1/3 of the required minimum points.
— Max 1 paper per author per proceedings volume.

Deadlines & fees

Abstract: TBA
Full paper: TBA
Notification: TBA
Registration: TBA

Indexing

What is trust?

Trust is ANA's verdict on whether a conference is a real scientific event rather than a fee-collecting mill. It says nothing about prestige or promotion points; those are shown separately.

Established	9–10	Major society or long-running conference. Indexing and committee verified.
Trusted	7–8	Legitimate. Long history and real committee; small gaps, e.g. next year's fees not out yet.
Plausible	5–6	Probably legitimate, but key claims (indexing, review, committee) are only partly verified.
Doubtful	3–4	Several checks failed or couldn't be verified. Check it yourself before submitting.
Avoid	1–2	Matches a known conference mill or has serious red flags.

How it's scored: every conference starts at 3. Points are added for a listed committee, an international committee, 3+ past editions, a domain and archive several years old, and a university or society organiser. Points are taken off for vague indexing ("major databases"), an indexing claim that turns out false, review faster than 7 days, a brand-new domain, missing committees, or many unrelated conferences on one site. A known conference mill is capped at 2.

Quality is a separate 1–5 score for whether it's worth presenting there: the conference's tier (flagship, mid, regional), verified WoS/Scopus indexing, double-blind review, a reputable organiser and an international committee. A small regional conference can be fully trusted and still Modest.

Top	5/5	Flagship conference: verified indexing or a major society, rigorous review.
High	4/5	Strong international conference with solid review and a reputable host.
Mid	3/5	Good conference, but indexing or review rigour only partly verified.
Modest	2/5	Real but small or regional, little verified indexing. Fine for networking and a2/a3 points.
Low	1/5	Real, but little evidence of selectivity or reach.

Future meetings listed by SMA: 2027 Louisville KY (2-6 Nov), 2028 Oklahoma City (24-28 Oct), 2029 St. Pete Beach (23-27 Oct). 2026 call (St. Pete Beach, 27-31 Oct 2026): submission deadline 27 Apr 2026; 8 tracks incl. Track 3 HR, Careers & Development and Track 4 Organizational Behavior; 'Rule of 3 + 2' (max 3 papers in tracks 1-7 plus 2 PDI sessions); papers screened, then blind reviewed; outstanding paper and doctoral paper awards per track. Expect a late-April 2027 deadline. Only active SMA members can register (membership USD 50/yr). Fees not public without login.