Minutes of a meeting are written by someone who was present at the meeting. They summarize the main points that were discussed and provide information on decisions made during the meeting.
Before writing any minutes, start with the purpose of the meeting. This will help guide what you should cover in the minutes. If you're writing minutes for a board meeting, you might want to focus on the agenda items and decisions made. If you're writing them for a staff meeting, you might want more detail on the discussion topics.
Once you've determined the purpose of the meeting, set up the agenda. You can use a template or just make one up yourself. It's helpful to think about who needs to attend the meeting and why. Then, list the main points of the meeting. Finally, add any other relevant details.
After the meeting, summarize the action items. This will help everyone involved understand what was discussed and agreed upon. If there were no action items, then simply state that at the end of the meeting.
Make sure to include key takeaways in your minutes. These should be things that people need to do after the meeting. They might include actions needed by different groups within the organization, such as sales, customer service, and IT.
If you're writing minutes from a meeting, make sure to add notes. This will help others understand what was discussed at the meeting. It's also helpful when distributing the minutes to other members of the team.
