The single most useful thing you can do before a SAM call is to know your own position better than the person calling you. A SAM engagement is voluntary and sales led, which means the conversation is shaped by whoever brings the clearest picture of your estate. If that is the vendor, the call runs on the vendor's numbers. If it is you, the call runs on yours. Building your internal position first is how you make sure it is you.
This is a working guide to assembling that position: what to measure, how to read it the way Microsoft will, and how to walk into the call with a number you can defend. For the wider method, read the SAM engagement playbook.
Why your own number has to come first
In any review, the first credible number on the table anchors the discussion. A recognized defensive move is to decline the initial SAM review and run your own internal assessment with independent help first, then respond from a controlled position. The logic is simple. If you arrive with a measured, reconciled view of your estate, every later claim is tested against your number. If you arrive empty handed, your estate is defined by whoever measured it first, and that will be the sales side.
Whoever brings the first defensible number sets the frame. Make sure it is yours.
Reconcile deployment against entitlement
Your internal position is the reconciliation of two things: what you have deployed, and what you are entitled to. Deployment is the count of what is actually running. Entitlement is the licenses you hold and the rights attached to them. The gap between the two, in either direction, is your real position. Build both halves carefully, because the quality of the reconciliation is the quality of your defense.
- Deployment, measured across the products and environments the engagement is likely to reach
- Entitlement, including agreements, purchases, and prior true up credits
- Rights that reduce count, such as downgrade, reassignment, and second use
- Environments that should be excluded, such as dev and test where rights allow
Count it the way Microsoft will
A position that uses your own counting logic is only half ready, because Microsoft uses its own counting methodology and its own data drawn from Azure, Microsoft 365, and management tooling, and Microsoft's calculation governs. A SAM tool output is not audit defense, and a clean internal count can still differ from the vendor's calculation. So build your position twice: once the way you would count it, and once the way Microsoft is likely to. The difference between the two is where the argument will happen, and knowing it in advance is how you prepare for it.
| Area | Your reading | Likely vendor reading |
|---|---|---|
| Ambiguous use | Excluded where rights support it | Counted toward the gap |
| Dev and test | Covered by use rights | Counted unless evidenced |
| Reassignment | Applied to reduce the count | Often not credited by default |
| Cloud telemetry | Contextualized to actual entitlement | Read at face value from the data |
Find your over licensing, not just your gaps
An internal position built only to check for shortfalls misses half its value. Look just as hard for over licensing, the entitlement you hold and do not use. A sales led review has little reason to surface it, but it is real money, and it is an argument you can bring to the table. Knowing where you are overpaying turns the call from a one way request for more spend into a two way conversation about right sizing.
The vendor will look for what you owe. You should also look for what you are owed.
Decide your lines before the call
A position is not just a number. It is also a set of decisions about how you will handle the conversation. Before the call, settle what you are prepared to share, what you will hold back, what scope you will agree to, and what your walk away point is. The engagement is voluntary, so all of these are yours to set. Deciding them in advance, in calm, is far better than deciding them live, under the gentle pressure of a friendly call that is moving faster than you are.
- The scope you will agree to, by product, entity, and period
- The data you will provide, and the data you will not
- The outcome you want, whether that is resolution, right sizing, or simply declining
- The point at which you stop the engagement and assess on your own
Walk in ready
When you have reconciled your estate, counted it the way Microsoft will, found your over licensing, and set your lines, you are no longer reacting to the call. You are running your side of it. The contract clause that adds licenses at 125 percent of price when unlicensed use reaches 5 percent or more is a real risk, but it only bites on use that is genuinely unlicensed and genuinely counted. A strong internal position is what keeps the count honest and keeps that clause from reaching use you can actually defend.
A buyer side advisor builds this position with you and stands behind it. We reconcile the estate, model both counts, surface your over licensing, and set the lines before the call. Our guarantee applies: we reduce your exposure or we reimburse our service fee, and with gainshare you pay only from verified savings. If a SAM call is on the calendar, get a quote and we will have your position ready before it begins.
When the numbers start to look serious, our Microsoft audit defense team manages every exchange with the auditor on your behalf.