This is a simple explanation and template anyone can use to create, organize, and standardize effective meeting minutes. The sections are as follows: attendees, agenda, announcements, attachments, action items, and assembly.

The order of the sections is interchangeable, and some may be left out depending on how your organization is managed, how detailed you wish to be, and the security protocol in place.

Attendees

The Attendees section of your minutes is straightforward. In this section, simply list the people who came to the meeting alphabetically by last name. If you wish to get fancy, you can list if people were absent and further list if their absence was excused or unexcused.

Agenda

Assuming an agenda was provided prior to the meeting (even just as people logged onto the webinar platform or as they shuffled into the room), this section lists select expanded agenda items. The keyword here is expanded. The bulk of the meeting’s minutes belong in this section. Minutes can be recorded in any way that feels customary to the group’s scribe, to the organization, or to the project. As long as the minutes are consistent, concise, complete, and predictable, the agenda they follow can have any reasonable appearance.

Action Items

How is your track record with people completing what they say they will during meetings? I typically had more success with people actually following through on completing their action items when the action items appeared in their own separate section of the minutes. For that reason, I make a special note each time someone cues an action, such as “I will send,” “I will research,” “I will contact,” or “I will gather.” Be sure to write your action items using complete sentences, identifying the subjects by name, and using an action verb to trigger who will complete each task (or if the task is generic to the group).

Announcements

This section is pretty simple. Any oddball or miscellaneous items go here.

Attachments

If you made any visual references during the meeting, such as a previous email, an invoice, a presentation, etc, it is often useful to incorporate them with your meeting minutes. Having an Attachments section allows you to annotate these enhancements. Every effort should be made to use attachments minimally but tastefully and to describe each attachment in only one line.

Assembly

When known, the Assembly section of your meeting minutes tells readers when they can expect to meet again. This is particularly useful for people who were unable to attend this meeting but wish to attend future meetings. Your team and your company’s culture will dictate how specific and how far in advance you release the information for your next assembly. Many times, minutes do not address the next assembly or use some form of “to be determined.” Other firms give the exact day, minute, and webinar access code.

This was written by our contributing writer, Joshua Nussbaum.