Once your organization achieves above 45% compliance required to be STOKE Certified, the Member may schedule an independent evaluation at any time (except for STOKE Events—must be during event) to attempt STOKE certification. Members may choose to set higher certification goals, track their progress in the Roadmapping tool, and submit the certification request whenever the business is satisfied with its projected STOKE score. We encourage Members to schedule on-site evaluations at least one month ahead of time (three months is ideal).
At which point, STOKE will appoint an accredited Independent Evaluator in your region who will connect with your team and discuss potential dates. Once a date(s) is chosen, you will need to assign team members to criteria and prepare a schedule of interviews and tours for the Evaluator’s itinerary.
Two weeks prior to the on-site evaluation, your team will not be able to make any more changes to your answers as indicated by the “Evaluation Locked” indicator in the menu. Your team can still interact with the platform during this time if you need to review compliance notes, evidence uploads, reports, and more. Independent Evaluators will review your performance and evidence and make comments beforehand as needed. At this point on, the evaluation is under the control of the Evaluator and the STOKE Board.
The Evaluator has two to four weeks after the on-site evaluation to complete their assessment. During this time, your organization, the evaluator, and the STOKE Board will follow up on any additional evidence requirements or other points of clarification and due diligence required to finish the assessment. At the end of this grace period, the Evaluation Report is finalized and a final certification score and certification level is awarded if the Member achieves above 45% compliance.
Upon certification, a STOKE certificate, certification logos, custom website profile, and PR and social media templates will be issued to the Member to use for their official STOKE certification announcements (see the “Certification Packet'' from the Downloads menu).
Note: Members have two years after their STOKE Benchmark status is issued to become STOKE Certified. Businesses that do not attempt certification within two years will lose access to the STOKE Benchmarked logo and their custom STOKE web profile will be removed from the live site. Businesses will need to restart the benchmarking process and submit for STOKE review again before restoring access to these materials.