One Page After the Meeting Ends
The smallest meeting-note format that turns discussion into a record you can re-read.
- meetings
- records
- work
After a meeting, the phrase "I'll organize it and send it" comes up often. But trying to organize it perfectly takes a day, and people who were not there hear the same explanation again. A meeting note is not about making sentences pretty; it is about not losing the next action.
Five boxes on one page
After a meeting I fill in only five boxes:
- Basic information — date, place, attendees, purpose
- Confirmed facts — what was seen together, such as numbers and current status
- Decisions — what was agreed in this meeting
- Open questions — what is still not decided
- Next actions — owner, task, deadline
It is especially important not to mix decisions with open questions. When a question is delivered as a decision, the site moves on a wrong premise. Conversely, leaving a record of why something was not decided saves the next meeting from repeating the same discussion from the beginning.
A short record sent the same day
It is better to send meeting notes on the day. Rather than delaying to polish a draft, write "draft for confirmation" at the top and ask people to point out anything that differs from the facts. Having the people who were there correct it is more accurate than reconstructing from a week's guesses.
What the reader needs is not every sentence of the meeting. So rather than copying who said what, leave the reasoning that affected the decision and the next action. When you need to quote someone, keep it short without changing the meaning.
The end of a record is sharing
A good meeting note does not end in a folder. Put it where the person who will start the next action can find it immediately, and append the result to the same document when it is done. When one-pages pile up, they become the team's memory, and the context of the work carries on even when people change.