How to write an effective minutes of meeting? Basic Template

It is always helpful to have the minutes of a past meeting on hand. Whether to review the list of decisions that have been made or to know who was in charge for a task. It is also a good source of information and reference for the participant, but also for the absent ones. Don’t avoid this task, a detailed minutes could be very useful if you have a disagreement on a subject.

At the end of a meeting, take a few minutes to write a detailed minutes and send it quickly to all participants. This document can also inform the absent what they missed.

Minutes of Meeting Template

1.Basic Information: The date, address, room, and start/end time of the meeting.
2. The names of the participant, the absent persons and the guests.
3. The purpose of the meeting.
4. A summary and purpose of each item on the agenda: Inform / Exchanging / Generating Ideas / Consulting / Deciding.
5. The actions and tasks that have been assigned, to whom it is addressed and the date due.
6. Note the decisions taken
7.  Attach the necessary documents, images or web addresses.
8. Approval of the minutes.
9.  Email the minutes or use a meeting management tool to centralize all your minutes.

How to write a good minutes of meeting? 3 simple steps

1. Take Notes

If you want complete and detailed minutes of meeting, you must take notes during the meeting. Otherwise, it is obvious that you will forget important information. To help you, you can use abbreviations, this greatly facilitates. You could also record the meeting so you don’t forget anything.

2. Have a good structure

Before the meeting, be sure to prepare a detailed agenda. This will help you in writing your minutes using this template. Then you can add your notes directly under each topic, which will allow a quick layout once the meeting is over.

You can even use a meeting management software to help you write the minutes. How? During your meeting, bring your favorite technology tool (laptop, tablet, phone …) and immediately transcribe your notes in the topics discussed. At the end of the meeting, your minutes will be almost finished. You will only have to take a few minutes of your time in post-meeting to correct and voila!

2. Publish the minutes of meeting

If you want using your minutes for something, do not forget to send it to all the participants once the writing is finished! The sooner the better, because memory is a faculty that quickly forgets.

Then what do we do?
Of course, once the minutes have been written and read by everyone, the ongoing project and the accomplishment of the tasks and the follow-up of the actions remain to be done. Go to work!