What Should Be In Your Meeting Minutes

meeting minutes

Why are Meeting Minutes important?

Meeting minutes remind attendees of important highlights, action items and key decisions made during a meeting. They also serve as a great way to update those that cannot attend and help increase accountability within an organization.

What should be included?

Meeting minute formats vary from company to company, but most include a few basic items:

Pre-Meeting items:

  • Meeting time/date/location
  • Meeting attendee’s + those unable to attend names
  • Meeting attendee’s + those unable to attend email addresses
  • The accepted meeting agenda
  • The meeting objective

In-Meeting items:

  • Action items assigned
  • Key decision outcomes
  • KPI’s
  • Next Steps
  • Next meeting time/date

Post-Meeting

  • Make sure action items and decisions are clearly notated
  • Decide as a team how quickly meeting minutes should be sent (recommended ASAP)
  • Decide how meeting minutes should be sent:
    • Email
    • Hard copy
    • Less Meeting
    • Dropbox / Box
    • Google Docs / Evernote
    • Sharepoint

The Writing Process

The best meeting minutes are meeting minutes that get read. While you can’t guarantee that, you can take steps to help increase the odds:

  • Keep them brief
  • Make them legible
  • Be objective
  • Include only the most important highlights
  • Avoid fluff (usually equates to reducing adjectives)

 If you’d like to see how easy it is to take/share meeting minutes in Less Meeting, try it out completely free for 14 days!

Related Posts