What are meeting minutes?
Meeting minutes, also known as minutes of meeting (MoM) or meeting notes are written record of a meeting. When implemented correctly, effective meeting minutes can be a powerful mechanism to track action items, keep stakeholders aligned and drive accountability within team.
How to write meeting minutes?
In general, meeting minutes should capture the following six elements:
- Date and Time
- Attendees
- Agenda
- Notes
- Key Decisions
- Action Items
Meeting minutes can be modified to fit the need and nature of your meeting. Some meeting minutes can be very long and formal, whereas others can be short and informal. In the article we have shared four meeting minute samples for different kinds of meetings:
1. Leadership/Business Review Meetings
2. Team Meetings/Sprint Planning Meetings
Let’s get to the templates!
1. Leadership/Business Review Meetings
These meetings provide leadership an overview of the health of their business and is a forum for different teams to interact. These are usually conducted in a large group where attendees belong to different teams (like product team, marketing team, finance etc.) or functional groups (like engineering, product, analytics etc.). These are often recurring in nature.
Use the below template to start capturing meeting minutes for leadership or business review meetings.
2. Team Meetings/Sprint Planning Meetings
These meetings promote collaboration and visibility within a team. These meetings are attended by the team members along with the team leader/manager. These are recurring meetings with biweekly being the most common cadence. For these meetings, the attendee list and the agenda are usually fixed and hence, the note taker can skip the two sections when capturing meeting minutes.
Use the below template to start capturing meeting minutes for team meeting or sprint planning meetings.
3. 1:1 Meetings
These meetings are an opportunity for two people to collaborate closely and stay connected. These meetings serve many purposes depending upon the participants - like manager - direct reports 1:1, mentor - mentee 1:1, peer 1:1, informal 1:1s/coffee chats. Due to the nature of the meeting, the meeting notes can be often informal. These meetings can be a one-time occurrence or recurring. The cadence for recuring meetings can range from weekly to quarterly.
Use the below template to start capturing meeting minutes for 1:1 meeting, right away.
4. Project Kick-off Meetings
All new projects start with a project kick-off meeting. These meetings introduce all project members, set the context by going over project objectives and goals, drive ownership amongst the members and align on project roadmap/milestones/timelines. Since this meeting discusses critical information for the project success, the meetings notes should be detailed as they would be referred to very often during the project lifecycle.
Use the below template to start capturing meeting minutes for project kick-off meetings.
