No one can deny the importance of taking great meeting notes. Good meeting notes record important data, information and decisions and help everyone clarify action items, track follow-ups and progress. For some professions, such as consultants, venture capitalists, lawyers and sales personnel, meeting notes are even more important.
However, many of us also dislike taking meeting notes, not only because it is time consuming but also because it is frustrating to take meeting notes while focusing on the meeting.
Good news is that in the era of artificial intelligence, things will be quite different. In this article, we will share what steps you should take before, during and after a meeting and how Laxis - our AI meeting assistant will help to make each step much easier so that you can truly appreciate the value of meeting notes and not be bothered by the abundant work.
Step 1. Set a Clear Agenda and Create a Standard Template
Agendas give structure to meetings and help everyone focus on what matters. When the meetings have a clear direction, you don't need to spend time on irrelevant information and waste too much energy. To set a right agenda, it is suggested to set a reasonable amount of time, clearly define the scope of discussions and even decide the amount of time to spend on every topic. Based on the agenda, you can create a template beforehand so you can organize notes during meetings and share with people after meetings with less efforts. Below are items that are suggested to include in the template:
- Schedule
- Items to be discussed
- Meeting Partipants
- Need and Ask of the Client
- Decisions and conclusions
- Action items, people to take charge, and due dates
Hack with Laxis - A Variety of Note Templates
Laxis will provide you different types of well-designed note templates and you can choose to use all the templates freely. You just need to add information in the right columns and everything is very self-evident. Once the agenda is done, you can easily share with all the attendees so everyone can be on the same page. You can also edit the format according to your needs. When you plan ahead, your meetings will be done with more efficiency. Below is a sample template for your reference:
Topic
Introductory Meeting for collaboration with [company name]
Date and Time
December 19, 2020
Items to be discussed
1. Organization Size
2. Your solutions
3. Timeline of the action plan
Participants
Regional Manager, HR personnel, Legal Advisor
Absentees
*If any*
Summary of main points
1. Client requirement
2. Legal processes will take 3 weeks to collaborate
3. Need additional discounts
Decisions
1. Social media collaboration
2. Weekly communication to respective user base
3. Discuss with manager on additional discounts
Action Items(Action, People in Charge, Deadline)
1. Share with [manager name]
2. Delegate Sales team to the job & give deadline
3. Share deliverables with creative team for Social Media
Agenda for Next Meeting
1. Progress on Legal work
2. Share social media content for approval
3. Commit to the deal
Meeting Record
Recording of the meeting (online/ offline)
Step 2. Use a Recorder
Recording the meeting is always helpful when you are not sure whether you will be able to get all the important information in your notes or whether you want to listen to some conversations one more/ multiple times. Sometimes, when you play a recording, you will be surprised by how much information you missed.
Hack with Laxis - Laxis can capture conversation anywhere anytime
Whether your conversation happens through online conference, phone or in person, Laxis can record the conversations and provide a platform to manage all of your important information about clients, their requirements, points of discussion and further steps in one place on any device of your choice.
Step 3. Concentrate and Take All Important Information
The most important thing about notes taking is to be focused. Not getting distracted by a new message or an email is a task these days. Once you lose track of the conversation, there is no returning back. Also, when you are 100% focused, you will understand you will be able to leverage or negotiate for the best possible outcome for everyone involved.
The biggest challenge is not to write too little and too much. Below are things you don’t want to miss:
- Reasoning
- Important numbers
- Perspectives of different stakeholders
- Decisions
- Action items
It is worth mentioning that you can always ask for a pause to ask your attendees to explain some point, clarify some idea or do a recap when you have problems comprehending them. It is very possible that other people are having the same problems with you.
Hack with Laxis - Real time Transcripts
Laxis can generate real time transcripts, so you can focus on your meeting without worrying to miss important information.
Step 4. Summarize and Edit
You don’t want to wait one or two days and even longer to organize your meeting notes because the longer you wait, the less memory you have. It is crucial to get work done after the meeting as soon as possible while everything is fresh in your mind and you are still excited about it.
Review your template to ensure all decisions, actions and motions are clearly noted. Polish your wording to ensure brevity and clarity. Check with speakers to add missing points or points you are not very clear of.
In terms of rules, here are a few things to keep in mind:
- Be objective and fact-based
- Write in the same tense throughout
- Don’t over summarize (when you are not sure, more is better less)
- Have clear logics and flows to organize the information
Hack with Laxis - Auto Memo Generation
Laxis can also automatically extract conversational highlights which include main points, action items and so on by leveraging its advanced AI technologies. You just need to edit as per your requirement to quickly create meeting memos.
Step 5. Save and Share
After you finish the first version, you can send it over to all the attendees to ask for their feedback and approval. Once everyone approves, you need to save meeting notes with reference materials in your cloud services or otherwise and share with all the relevant people.
Hack with Laxis - Store in One Place, Share Across Channels
Laxis will generate your notes in formats including .text, .doc, .pdf, etc. You can easily share your notes to channels such as Slack and so on to work with your teams. You can store all conversations in Laxis and search any conversation easily and quickly find important information including keywords, speakers and time stamps from any of your conversations.
In a nutshell, with the help of Laxis, you will not miss any important information while focusing totally on comprehending ideas and having effective conversations. You can reclaim your time by having AI to do most of the work for you.
To know more about the product and the team, visit us at https://laxis.tech/
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