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Top 10 Meeting Minutes Templates with Samples and Examples

Taking notes is an essential part of meetings, but when done manually, it is akin to cumbersome labor. It is an unavoidable and challenging task that gets even more complicated if you are also expected to be an active participant in the meeting. Not only are you expected to track what every member is saying, but you are also required to record the discussions and decisions in an accurate manner.

Why struggle in such ungainly manner when you can organize your meetings, official records and plans through a smart template that makes you efficient as well as a competent worker?

We are talking about SlideTeam’s PPT Templates that are equipped with necessary features to incorporate information without any hassle.  Using these customizable, 100% editable presentation templates, can save you time in record-taking and let you focus on more productive functions.

Let’s explore the world of Minute-Keeping through amazing, but utilitarian presentation templates.

Template 1: Project Management Schedule Meetings Minutes PPT Template

Be a presentation pro with this meeting minutes PPT Template that is easy to download and use as per your business requirement. This comes in handy when you need to track progress of a specific project and the Key Result Areass of your team mates or subordinates working on achieving a specific goal within a deadline. It entails details like time, day and people involved for tracking and record keeping. It also includes agenda topics, related actions, and deadlines. With this presentation template, you can organize all details in one go. Downloading this presentation is beneficial to your team and you as a project manager as well.

Download this template

Template 2: Sales Team Staff Meeting Minutes

A well-structured Meeting Minutes Template to plan activities is the best solution for building an efficient team.  This presentation contains required details including:

•       Review of the issues, remarks, information
•       Schedule of upcoming meeting and closing remarks
•       Sales meeting agenda
•       Important topics of discussion within the meeting with opening remarks of the team manager or TL

Download this editable slide for providing and filling up information!

Template 3: Meeting Minutes Report of Stakeholders Engagement

Working on cumbersome record-taking with stakeholders’ engagement is now made easy with this PPT Slide. With this resource, you can illustrate minutes of stakeholder meeting in a comprehensive manner. This well-structured layout includes space to mention tasks, due dates of projects, manager responsible and task status. Using this framework, you can also highlight information related to ground rules, agreement on participation and review of new project charter. Download it today!

Template 4: Business Meeting Minutes Strategy PPT Slide

No more hassle of creating tedious official records manually, as now you have a solution that streamlines the process. This PPT Template provides a business meeting process and includes five-elements for effective record-taking. These are:

•       Action item review
•       Overview of theme objectives/measures
•       Review of initiative progress
•       Discussion of key issues
•       Review action items

All of this becomes manageable with SlideTeam Templates. Download now!

Template 5: Meeting Plan with Activities and Time Allocation

When the agenda of a meeting is clear, but you need to be clear and concise to avoid any confusion, then this PPT Template is the ideal solution with meeting plan and time allocation chart.  This document will help you:

•       Incorporate important meeting related points.
•       Give clear visibility into meeting agenda
•       Plan and communicate activities to attendees
•       Name the presenters pitching in ideas.

Template 6: Weekly Group Meeting Agenda Template

If you are asked to create a weekly meeting plan on a frequent basis, this customizable PPT Template is the tool to choose. You can follow this content-ready format that includes elements for organizing your meeting well and for sharing the message to all attendees in a way that there is no room for confusion. This PowerPoint Template lets you fill in all the required information and is sure to give you a consolidated view of meeting agenda and goal progress. Download it now!

Template 7: Business Meeting Agenda PPT Slide

Organizing meetings with attendees, their names, date, location and time in this consent agenda makes it easy for you to expedite the meeting process. Now, planning and arranging a meeting is easier when you download this Business Meeting Agenda PPT Template . It is a simple framework and includes four essential norms that gives a good, organized sound to the minutes. These are date &time, location, consent agenda, and next meeting details. Grab it now!

Template 8: Project kickoff meeting agenda with presenter and duration

Download the set of slides where you can manage, discuss, organize, assess and include the duration of your business meeting. It includes separate rows and columns for agenda, designation, duration, and presenter information. Using This PPT Template can improve your meeting structure and make it more efficient. You can easily work with this editable slide that you can customize to your business needs or meeting requirements. Enter the required details and you are good to kick start a thoughtful discussion with your team.

Template 9: Agenda Infographics Business Meeting Timeline Roadmap Lunch Break Pricing

Professional and well-designed PPTs are what you need when you want to create an impression. This is a 12-slide presentation template that involves the creation of an appealing, yet informative infographic that you must include in your PowerPoint Presentation.

It includes diagrams graphs, charts and much more. Fully-editable infographics PPT You can modify the content and include what your meeting demands. From basic to the most complex and stylish infographic that are editable and disposable to your benefit, choose the ones you need.  Grab it today to ease your workload!

Template 10: The Agenda Business Clock

As the name suggests, through this template, you can easily display meeting agenda of the day and incorporate the discussion points as well. It is a convenient slide to tell attendees the meeting intent and define the major activities performed during the day. Using this PPT Template will create a disciplined meeting pattern that will keep everyone on the same page. Download it now to increase accountability on your part, as the impressed boss looks on!

Shine with Impressive, Designer Meeting Minutes Templates

Impressing your boss, your client or your audience is easy when you have a definitive design to work with. These content-ready PPT slides will help you with the elements, design, color, icons, format and layout, all to your convenience. Downloading these PPT Templates will help you captivate your audience’s attention in your first meeting itself.

PS: If you want conduct 1-on -1 meeting in an effective way, here’s a handy guide with helpful templates.

PPFAQs on Recording Meeting Minutes

What is meant by meeting minutes.

Record keeping of meeting minutes that is held in a day, including details of attendees, agenda, goals achieved, discussion points and concerns raised on issues raised/related to last meeting. It is a critical job when the task at hand is of humungous importance and stakeholders want a clear understanding to be arrived at. The practice of maintaining written minutes and then having it approved adds a layer of professional ethics and management to meetings.     

How do I write a meeting minutes?

It is cumbersome to incorporate each aspect of Minutes of a Meeting manually. Different kinds of meetings will have varying formats depending on the context, the location, the individuals present and the importance of the meeting. A word-by-word audio transcript is also recorded for some meetings, where VVIPs are recorded. For businesses purposes, however, minutes of a meeting needs to be maintained in digital, typed format. If you want to do one better and get the best solution, then SlideTeam PPTs are the answer.  

What are the three types of meeting minutes?

The three types are: Action, discussion, and verbatim, each used for a specific purpose within the meeting agenda. In action, the minutes are typically more detailed and we go into the actual happenings of the event or the way the entire scenario panned out on the day. In discussion meetings, the emphasis is more what people said and its implications for the rest of the meeting. In verbatim minute-keeping, we are to ensure that no meaning is implied or even attached to people’s words. It is a clear, neutral way of writing of the minutes of the meeting. 

Why are meeting minutes Important?

For the process of record taking a retaining progress of the meeting, tracking progress of the company and goals achieved is an absolute meet. Keeping minutes of the meeting ensues people can get their opinions on record, a minor function admittedly. What is even more important is that the minutes signal the direction the company is taking and why?

What are the main parts/elements of meeting minutes?

•       Attendees
•       Agenda
•       Issues from last meeting
•       Venue, date and time

Minutes meeting presentation that you can edit and download easily. It is also important that the meeting minutes be ratified/approved at the earliest and the action taken report, if any was authorized, be placed on record.

What are the steps involved in Recording Meeting Minutes?

The first step is to recognize the attendees who need to be present for the meeting. Next, you will need to send out communication for the venue, date and time of the meeting, including information/ meeting agenda, organizing and preparing presentation for the same.  Remember, the success of any meeting depends upon on the relevant people attending and contributing. Make sure, you document people’s responses on whether they would be present or give the meeting the miss.

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Templates for keeping meeting minutes

Meeting minutes matter. keeping track of them can be more precise and less tedious when you don't have to worry about your layout. start with a customizable meeting minutes template for an easy-to-tweak layout for all your minutes notes. whether you like to keep your minutes digitally or by hand, there's a meeting minutes template that'll match your flow..

Keep meeting minutes and notes with ease using templates

Spend more time taking effective meeting minutes and less time organizing them—start with a designer-developed, customizable meeting minutes template. Minutes make hours, so don't waste them on tasks that you can do faster with the help of easy-to-use templates. Business meetings beget notes. Keeping precise minutes is important for accurate records. But professional contexts aren't the only places where you can benefit from a minutes template. Serve on a condo board or an HOA? How about a nonprofit or a school-sanctioned club? Find a meeting taking template that works for your meeting's needs and say good-bye to messy notes.

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7 meeting minutes templates for more productive meetings

In college, I wrote for the school newspaper, and my beat was reporting on the Student Government Association (SGA). I often used the minutes from SGA meetings to help me write my article, but I quickly realized that's about all they were being used for—SGA members never read them and usually forgot what they'd discussed in their meetings the next day. And I can't blame them—minutes were kept in a scattered Word Doc and could put a civics professor to sleep.

While minutes are meant to contain the most important records of meetings (that frankly no one would remember otherwise), they can easily become unuseful or outright painful to revisit unless you have a solid framework to work from. That's where a meeting minutes template comes in handy—to ensure you track the most actionable and helpful notes that boards and other teams need to get their work done. 

Check out these seven meeting minutes templates and examples for different types of meetings.

Table of contents:

What are meeting minutes?

Meeting minutes document the topics discussed and decisions made in a meeting. They're a bit more formal than personal meeting notes you jot down in a notebook. In theory, you'd review the previous meeting's minutes before the next meeting to refresh your memory on key points, and you'd keep organized records of all past meeting minutes for future reference. 

But let's pump the breaks for a second. You shouldn't document the meeting literally minute by minute. Meeting minutes are intended to paint the big picture with three goals in mind:

Outline high-level themes

Document decisions

Track progress on projects and goals

What do meeting minutes include?

Meeting minutes may vary based on the type of meeting they record, but they generally include these key components:

Location (online/in person)

Attendees and absentees

Action points

Let's say you're in a project planning meeting to discuss developing a new page layout on your website. The meeting minutes should document why the website is being updated, what the team hopes to accomplish by updating the website, who's responsible for each part of the website update, and when the update should be completed.

Later, if Dave from development (who conveniently missed the meeting) has a question about his action items, he can refer back to the meeting minutes.

Why use meeting minutes?

Here are some situations where meeting minutes have quite literally saved the outcome of projects I've worked on: 

When there's a disagreement about decisions made in a meeting 

When someone is absent from a meeting and needs to catch up on what was discussed

When team members need to be held accountable for their commitments 

When a meeting is being audited or reviewed

When a meeting is used to train new employees

But you don't need to start from scratch every time—meeting minutes templates save time while ensuring you're getting all the benefits out of them.

7 meeting minutes templates and examples

Here are seven meeting minutes template examples for nearly every (high-level) meeting format you can think of. Download and customize them to fit your needs.

1. Standard meeting minutes template

Best for: staff meetings, team updates

This template covers the nuts and bolts for most meetings. It works well for recurring team meetings or if you just need a basic structure with an agenda, decisions, and action items to get you going. Key components in this template include: 

Meeting title

Action items

Next meeting date and time

Wondering where each item in this laundry list of components should go? Take a peek at the meeting minutes example below for inspiration.

2. Detailed meeting minutes template

Best for: project-related meetings, small-to-medium-sized team meetings

A more detailed meeting minutes template can help keep projects on track and hold members of a small team accountable for commitments. In addition to the basic meeting components, a detailed meeting minutes template should also include:

Progress tracking

Project goals and milestones

3. Formal meeting minutes template

Best for: executive meetings, board meetings

Have you ever been in a meeting and thought, "Am I underdressed?" That's the kind of meeting this template is for. These meetings have a more structured order of events, like recapping old and new business or voting on new initiatives. A formal meeting minutes template should include space for:

Old business—follow-ups on previous action items

New business—agenda items or new action items

Discussions

Voting records

4. Informal meeting minutes template

Best for: team huddles, brainstorms

Need to collaborate or strategize in a more casual, creative environment but don't want to forget all the brilliant ideas you spitball? This type of meeting doesn't necessarily have to be informal, but it can lead to creativity and innovation by allowing teammates to work through half-baked ideas.

A more informal meeting minutes template is perfect for this use case. It's less structured—because how are you going to put your out-of-the-box ideas into a box?—but it still keeps your notes organized with spaces for:

Icebreakers

Creative corner—jot down ideas from brainstorms 

Parking lot ideas—ideas that arise during the meeting that aren't relevant to the current discussion but could be considered in the future 

5. Annual meeting minutes template

Best for: annual general meetings

You won't use this template often, but it does help keep a consistent, historical record of your organization's trajectory. To capture key highlights and outcomes of a company's yearly gatherings, use an annual meeting minutes template to keep notes on things like:

State of the organization

Financial review

Strategic initiatives

Recognition and awards

Announcements

Employee questions

6. Client meeting minutes template

Best for: client meetings

Whether you're in consulting, project management, or any other client-facing role, this template ensures both parties are aligned, expectations are well documented, and progress is effectively tracked. Here's what should be included in a client meeting minutes template:

Action items for both sides

Report findings

Client feedback

7. Training meeting minutes template

Best for: training sessions

A training meeting minutes template is an invaluable tool for training sessions, workshops, and learning events. It guarantees that key insights and training content are documented for trainees to refer back to, and helps the ongoing improvement of training programs. This type of template should have room for:

Training objectives

Resource links and materials

Key takeaways

Participant feedback

Who to reach out to with additional questions

Meeting minutes tips

Using the right template is only the first step in taking effective meeting minutes. Consider these tips when learning how to take meeting minutes (or don't—your supervisors may want you to take the meeting notes forever if you do too good a job):

Avoid transcribing every word. Instead, aim to summarize discussions into key points and action items.

Stay objective. Present discussions and decisions impartially. You may agree with Barbara's eye rolls that this new project is totally useless, but don't let that personal opinion show in your notes.

Consider sharing your screen. For ultimate alignment, you could share your screen while you take notes during the meeting. This way, attendees can verify your notes in real time or chime in with any suggested additions. 

Automate meeting minutes

If you want to go a step further, you can use software to do the heavy lifting for you:

Related reading:

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Cecilia Gillen

Cecilia is a content marketer with a degree in Media and Journalism from the University of South Dakota. After graduating, Cecilia moved to Omaha, Nebraska where she enjoys reading (almost as much as book buying), decor hunting at garage sales, and spending time with her two cats.

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Meeting Minutes Template

What do you think of this template.

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Every day, important meetings take place in your office. Decisions made in these meetings may involve a lot of time, money and can even change people’s careers. With important things at stake in meetings, it’s no wonder meeting minutes are considered of great value. Meeting minutes serve as a record of what was discussed and decided in a meeting, what actions must be taken, who must take them and when. So, being of such great importance, what are meeting minutes? What exactly is included in meeting minutes? And why are these things important?

Minutes that capture the purpose of the meeting and its agreed outcomes are a record that can be referred back to and can be used for follow-up purposes. Effective meeting minutes are clear and to the point, but at the same time, they do not leave out important information.

When you are writing meeting minutes you need to include different kinds of information. Here’s a list of what needs to be included in effective meeting minutes:

– Date, time and location of the meeting.

– The purpose of the meeting.

– Names of attendees and those who were unable to attend.

– Agenda items.

– Decisions that were made.

– Actions that need to be done. Include the deadline and who it was assigned to.

– Follow up meeting.

Prepare your meeting minutes by writing down the things you know beforehand, like date, time, location, purpose and agenda items. This way you will only have to add the things that you discussed, like the outcome of the meeting.

Make the most of your company’s meetings and help your company be right on track. Whether it’s a board meeting, corporate meeting or just a simple meeting, recording meeting minutes helps massively with planning and time management.

The meeting minute template is a professional PowerPoint template pre-designed with stunning visuals and editable text placeholders so as to save time and efforts during preparation.  It contains a pack of 4 well-presented slides.

The first slide contains a table with meeting notes and discussion columns for writing all that transpired in the meeting. The user can use the table in the second slide to present minute details according to the days of the week. Subsequent slides allow the presenter to display timed minute details from meetings, and to enter meeting minutes into a journal.

This slide will be useful for leaders in preparation for meeting with other department leaders. This template can also be used by executive assistants when preparing a meeting plan for their boss. Sales managers can use this template when preparing for a meeting with a key customer. You can write down the client’s wishes in detail and submit your comments to the commercial director for approval.

Also, this template will be useful for public relations specialists when preparing information about the meeting with the public and preparing the main theses of the meeting for further discussion with the company management. Also, this template will be useful for business trainers when preparing materials for the course.

Each slide is 100% editable and customizable to meet user requirements. You can change color, text and scale icons. Suitable for business presentations. Ideal for use by secretaries and minute takers, etc. The use of the meeting minutes template in business presentation cuts across all industries. Use this meeting minutes template for a concise presentation of meeting minutes and engage your audiences from start to finish.

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What to Include In Your Meeting Minutes [+ 10 Templates]

Written by: Chloe West

Whether you’re having an in-person or virtual meeting , it’s important to put policies in place that ensure it’s an effective and productive gathering. And one great way to do that is to keep up with meeting minutes.

Meeting minutes are notes taken throughout a meeting so that participants can easily refer back to them for a refresher on what was discussed and what needs to be done next. However, it can be difficult to make the most out of your notes without an impactful meeting minutes template.

Throughout this article, we’ll talk more about the importance of meeting minutes and what you should include . We'll also share 10 fully customizable templates and meeting minutes examples you can use during your next meeting.

Let’s dig in.

Here’s a short selection of 8 easy-to-edit meeting minutes templates you can edit, share and download with Visme. View more templates below:

Table of Contents

What are meeting minutes and why use them, what to include in your meeting minutes, 10 meeting minutes templates for your next meeting.

• Meeting minutes are notes taken throughout a meeting to keep track of what was discussed.
• A meeting minute document should include; the time and date, participants, objectives, agenda, notes and action items.
• To make your meeting minutes impactful, use these actionable tips: use a branded template, assign the meeting minutes to the best note-taking person in the team and review action items from previous meetings.
• Take advantage of Visme's meeting minutes template to make your meeting productive.

Meeting minutes are notes of discussions, decisions and action items within a meeting.

Now the big question is: why are meeting minutes important?

They help those who were not in the meeting to know what was discussed and are also useful for meeting participants to look back on so they know their next steps.

Meeting minutes get their name not from the measure of time but from the term "minute," (“my-newt”), which means small. This possibly stems from the Latin term “minuta scriptura,” which means “small notes.”

Although they are quite minute, meeting minutes still have great importance and should be utilized throughout each of your most important meetings. A few benefits include the following:

• Having a clear-cut agenda before you even start the meeting.
• Establishing a record of what was discussed and who is the stakeholder for various tasks.
• Getting notes and discussion points for those who were not present.
• Understanding the next steps so your team can stay on track.
• Ensuring you hold a productive meeting every time and discovering the ineffective meetings you can remove from your calendar.

According to research by Zippia , Organizations spend roughly 15% of their time on meetings, with surveys showing that 71% of those meetings are considered unproductive. Use effective meeting minutes to help your team stay productive and focused on the agenda in subsequent meetings,

Transform technical, complex information into easy-to-understand reports

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• Get more visual with your communication to ensure intricate information is resonating and sinking in

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Now how can you make sure you get these benefits out of your meeting minutes? There’s no best format for meeting minutes, but there are best practices.

Here are six main line items you’ll want to include to get the most out of your meetings—and your meeting minutes.

Meeting Date and Time

First, let’s start with the basics. When and where is the meeting? Create a section towards the top that includes the date and time of the meeting. You may also want to include the location, especially if this is a live document and you’re having a virtual meeting or presentation . Participants can then click on the meeting minutes document to access the meeting.

Meeting Participants

Next, add a table with all meeting participants. List them in order of importance or talking time, starting with the team leader and going down the list from there.

For example, you might put your department head at the top, then go in order from who has the most agenda items to discuss to who has the least. This helps you keep the meeting organized and have enough time to review each person’s agenda items.

Meeting Objective(s)

What is the meeting for? Not only is this good to include in your meeting minutes so you can find meetings of a similar purpose with an easy search, but it’s also good to have in general. After all, a meeting with no objective should not be held as it’s a waste of each person’s time.

Your objective might be something like:

• To assign tasks and kick off our next project
• To brainstorm ideas for our next marketing campaign
• To improve processes within a certain team or department
• To plan an upcoming event or team building activity

Meeting Agenda

Create a table or itemized list of all meeting agenda items. You may want to reach out to attendees to see if anyone has specific items they plan to bring to the meeting to discuss. Write down the name of the person who plans to talk about each agenda item on your document.

Meeting Notes

This is going to be the meat of your meeting minutes. The above items keep you organized and ensure you have a productive meeting, but you need a large section (or additional page) to house all meeting notes.

When taking minutes for a meeting, you may want to place notes under each specific agenda item. Or you may want to create a new page for this; it’s entirely up to you.

However, you need to dedicate one team member to take notes throughout the meeting to input into this section. It’s a good idea to choose one of the fastest typers on your team or consider having a secretary or assistant help out here.

Notes may at first be jumbled and filled with typos, so make sure to revisit this section at the end of the meeting to clean it up. That way, the notes can easily be referenced in the future by meeting attendees and those who were not present.

When creating meeting minutes, use Visme shortcuts to add things quickly; after all, you don’t have time to spare. Click on the slash icon on your keyboard and find what you need, faster. Easily update information throughout your meeting minutes from a single source with Visme Dynamic Fields .

Watch this video to learn more about Visme keyboard shortcuts and hotkeys.

Action Items

At the bottom of your meeting minutes document, include a small section for action items. This is where you’ll put actionable tasks that meeting participants (even some who may not have been in the meeting) need to complete. Include the deadline as well.

This is how you know you’re having a productive meeting—you’re ending it with the next steps for the team to complete before the next meeting or before the launch of your project.

Once you’ve filled this out, send the meeting minutes document to everyone involved or with action items to complete. This will help keep the team on track and everyone knows what they need to do without their manager keeping tabs.

Share the final meeting minutes with your team so you’re all on the same page. Use the Visme analytics tool in your dashboard to review who has seen the document.

Beyond using Visme templates for meeting minutes, you can make quick infographics to show quick stats like Paul, a sustainable travel services coordinator. Here's what he had to say:

“Creating and sharing visually appealing content is quick and easy with Visme. I often find myself jumping into Visme during a meeting and finding an infographic or two to share stats and data. The response I receive about the data and presentation stylings are always positive, and people want to learn more about Visme - which I'm glad to do.”

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5 Tips for Taking Meeting Minutes

Are you new to meeting minutes? Don’t worry; we’ve compiled a selection of actionable tips for taking meeting minutes efficiently every time.

1. Use a Template

Nothing saves more time than an easy meeting minutes template.

Learning how to take minutes for a meeting template will help you in more ways than you can imagine. Use it every time you’re in charge of taking meeting minutes at in-person or virtual meetings.

Template options include; pre-filled documents you can download, professionally designed templates you can customize at will or a template specially designed for your brand.

2. Review Actions

Always start a new meeting minute document with a review of the actions from the previous meeting. Keep track of what still needs doing and who’s in charge.

Have this section in your template every time, so you don’t skip or forget about it. The best location is close to the top so that the reader can get the lay of the land before reading the rest of the minutes.

3. Use Tables

In our collection of templates for meeting minutes, you’ll find a few with tables as part of the layout. You can use tables for the entirety of your note-taking or only for specific sections.

Separating the content into different visual styles helps readers skim the final document and retain attention. Use your brand colors in the tables to complete the visual composition of your meeting minutes.

4. Collaborate

Keep track of meeting minutes and collaborate with your team members using the Visme whiteboard feature. Assign sections for attendees to fill in while the meeting is happening. Go a step further and use one of our whiteboard meeting summary templates . Collect the information together, and don’t miss a single thing.

5. Capture Visuals

Take screenshots or photograph important information shared during the meeting. For example, any information shared on a board or analysis with post-its on the wall.

Virtual meetings with presentations might include critical information like roadmaps and data visualizations. If they are highly important for productivity, include them in the minutes.

Ready to start running impactful, effective and productive meetings? You need a meeting minutes template . We’ve got 10 professionally created templates for various types of meetings.

The best meeting minutes template is the one that helps you take notes faster and doesn't hinder productivity. Choose the template that works best for you, match it to your brand colors and start taking notes.

1. Executive Committee Meeting Minutes Template

This meeting minutes template is a more corporate design, perfect for executive meetings with the C-suite in your organization. Input all attendees, write out your agenda topics, then take brief notes on decisions made or action items for the next meeting.

2. Minimalist Meeting Minutes Template

With an easy meeting minutes template like this, you can easily assign various agenda items to the meeting participants. This helps to keep the meeting organized and ensures that everyone has a speaking opportunity.

3. Board Meeting Minutes Template

This straightforward template will allow you to create a professional look for your board meeting minutes agenda. This specific template showcases what an end-of-year meeting might look like, but you can use it for quarterly updates, major board changes and more.

4. Team Meeting Minutes Template

This creative team meeting minutes template gives you a bit more flexibility in your design. Meeting minutes don’t always have to be corporate, straightforward designs. Have some fun with the look and feel of your team meetings so they're visually appealing to look back on.

5. Creative Agency Meeting Minutes Template

With Visme, you get access to a number of fun design elements to take your visual content to the next level. With a template like this, you can take advantage of our icons to visualize things like date, participants, location and more within your meeting minutes.

6. Simple Meeting Minutes Template

Incorporate tables into your meeting minutes to easily organize participants and agenda items. With Visme, you can create tables of any size within seconds, making it easy to adjust and create new and existing tables for your meeting minutes.

7. Marketing Team Meeting Minutes Template

Incorporating contact information into your meeting minutes is a great way to make sure that all meeting participants are able to reach each other if there are any additional questions or clarification needed on action items. You can easily add those as additional columns in your table.

8. Corporate Meeting Minutes Template

Get creative with your meeting minutes design with this simple corporate minutes template. Incorporating additional design details, especially if it matches your branding patterns, is a great way to make your meeting minutes more visually appealing.

9. Project Kick-Off Meeting Minutes Template

Don’t put your “meeting minutes” title right at the top—take a page out of this simple minutes template’s book and use a big, bold font to place your heading vertically along the side of your page. This is a creative way to help your meeting minutes stand out.

10. Annual Meeting Minutes Template

Use color strategically to make certain pieces of your meeting minutes pop. In the above template, we see color backgrounds added to certain table cells to bring attention to those as headers.

Use a Meeting Minutes Template Today

In this guide, we discussed what to include in meeting minutes and shared ten ready-to-use minutes for meetings templates.

Now you can hold more productive and efficient meetings by utilizing meeting minutes templates to take notes, bring attention to action items, and ensure all participants have a voice within the meeting. Use Visme’s online whiteboard or document creator to get started today.

Not sure if Visme is the right tool for your team? Take a look at all of the new tool and features we added for you.

Write effective meeting minutes using Visme

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About the Author

Chloe West is the content marketing manager at Visme. Her experience in digital marketing includes everything from social media, blogging, email marketing to graphic design, strategy creation and implementation, and more. During her spare time, she enjoys exploring her home city of Charleston with her son.

Meeting Minutes PowerPoint Template

The Meeting Minutes PowerPoint Template is a data table presentation. There are two slides of white and blue PowerPoint backgrounds. The PowerPoint templates of meeting minutes are professional, multi-purpose slides. These layout designs will help demonstrate decisions made over each agenda item in tabular format. Meeting minutes may also include protocols, notes, and instant records of brainstorming sessions. Such written record of meeting sessions are important to keep track of important agreements. People who could not attend the meeting can gather necessary information from these meeting minutes.

The PowerPoint template of meeting minutes divides slide into multiple editable segments. The users can take advantage of this pre-design template in PowerPoint by simply editing text placeholders. It could be used during business meeting sessions to go through agenda and actions of previous meetings. For instance, users can insert this layout before presentation agenda and highlight actions that are decided upon.

The top section of Meeting Minutes PowerPoint Template has a date, time, and location text boxes. There are two text placeholders in Agenda segment. However, users can add more agenda components by duplicating text boxes in the Meeting Minutes slides. The two additional data tables will help record discussion points and allocation of work. This business presentation template could be used in Google Slides Themes for employees to collaborate online.

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Note Taking

10 meeting minutes templates and examples for word and clickup.

Haillie Parker

August 21, 2023

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We’ve all been there. When you’ve reached your limit and can’t seem to remember those next steps Barb asked for in your last  virtual meeting .

This feeling hits you like a ton of bricks, always at the worst times—like halfway through a presentation or right after you sign off in a “what just happened” kind of way. Luckily, there’s no reason to panic because the solution is simple: check the meeting minutes!

Meetings are a critical component of the workplace and make up about 15% of an  organization’s total time spent . That’s almost a full day’s work!

Without reliable software to track meeting minutes , teams may lose track of critical conversations for solving major problems plaguing the company. And by accurately capturing what happens in those meetings, you’re investing in the future health, functionality, and effectiveness of your team.

Still, the big question remains:  how do you write meeting minutes correctly?  That’s where we come in! 💪🏼

By the end of this post, you’ll have a solid grasp of how to write meeting minutes and 10 customizable meeting minutes templates for ClickUp, Excel, and Word to keep your team informed.

Pop on your blue-light glasses, open your digital notepad, and follow along!

What Are Meeting Minutes?

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Meeting minutes (also referred to as minutes of meeting or MOM ) provide written documentation of what occurs during a meeting so there’s a clear record for everyone involved—whether they attended or not.

They are great tools for organizations that meet regularly for events like a project kickoff meeting or a status update. Done correctly, they serve as a window into past discussions, helping you revisit ideas and facilitate problem-solving.

The information also provides a quick way for higher-ups to stay updated on big changes. Or if a member missed the invite, they can reference the minutes and follow up with the appropriate person for further questions or comments.

But our personal favorite way to use meeting minutes is for team recognition. If a client compliments your performance on a project—that goes in the minutes! Who doesn’t love healthy team morale? 👏

The final copy is then proofread for any mistakes or typos and sent to all team members, including anyone who missed the meeting or who would benefit from knowing what happened. This guarantees everyone has access to vital information in a timely manner and prevents PTO-induced FOMO at work. 💞

Bonus: Meeting Cadence for Remote Teams

Meeting minutes vary depending on your team’s needs, industry, or product, but all minutes should include a few key bits of information:

• Meeting title and subject
• Date and time
• Record of attendees (name, title, and organization)
• A meeting agenda/cadence
• A brief summary of each discussion item
• Major decisions and action items
• The date of the next meeting

Some sections will be longer than others. The title, date, and time should take up no more than a line, while the agenda summary may take a few paragraphs. The attendees and action items should be succinct, bullet-point lists.

Each section should align with the meeting agenda . This helps the reader understand the order of events and easily hop around to locate a specific point! Think of your meeting minutes as the Spark Notes of the meeting—they’re easy to digest but will still give you the whole story!

If additional topics are covered that weren’t planned on the agenda, you can create a new section or designate another as “open discussion” or “other items” to indicate an issue arose that wasn’t initially planned.

Capturing all of this information is critical to ensuring the notes are comprehensive and thorough. That’s why you should always start with a meeting minutes template to make sure nothing is missed. 🤓

A meeting minutes template is a pre-formatted document that outlines everything you need to take meaningful minutes from a meeting. The right template will allow you to add key information like who was in attendance, the beginning and end of the meeting, key points, and more.

Plus, meeting minutes templates work with different document collaboration software to help you edit, customize, and reuse them for future meetings.

An effective meeting minutes template will give you all the necessary tools to sufficiently document the events of a meeting. Using this template, you should be able to organize all meeting details in a presentable, accessible format that everyone can understand.

But before you start building your own template from scratch or investing in the first one that pops up on your search, there are a few significant features to look for in an efficient meeting minutes template:

• Collaboration features to edit, comment, and delegate work amongst the team
• Flexible sharing and permissions options to make sure the right people have access to your minutes
• Intuitive and rich styling options to properly format your meeting minutes
• The ability to embed other files, media, links, and images into your document

The best meeting minutes templates will be compatible with or built into your preferred document editing tool. This makes it possible to integrate your template with your other work meeting tools , or even your virtual meeting platform! In this case, making sure your meeting minutes template aligns with your tech stack is another major asset.

These elements will ensure that every meeting is worthwhile and that everyone walks away with the information they need. Combined with other meeting materials and recordings, your meeting minutes template will be an invaluable asset in maximizing the productivity of every meeting.

10 Meeting Minutes Templates & Examples

To help you find the template you need in time for your next brainstorming session, use this list of our top 10 meeting minutes templates for your favorite document editors. Find detailed template descriptions and feature breakdowns, plus, access each template directly from this article!

The Meeting Minutes Template by ClickUp makes it easier than ever to include all the crucial details of a meeting using a one-page ClickUp Doc that can be edited, shared, and copied for future meetings.

This template comes pre-formatted with separate sections for general information, your meeting agenda, updates, announcements, and more. It’s also highly visual, with customizable styling features to add checklists, tables, media, data, and more to help members quickly digest the minutes.

Especially for routine meetings with the team, this beginner-friendly template covers all of your bases and is a great starting point for those who are new to writing meeting minutes in general! If you’re looking for a simple but thorough structure that makes organization efficient—no matter the type of meeting —this Doc template should be your go-to.

Not only is the Meeting Minutes Framework Template by ClickUp beginner-friendly, easy to customize, and thorough—it also exists within ClickUp’s powerful and collaborative Docs feature that allows you to work alongside your team with real-time editing.

Summarize the important details of your meetings, including attendees, action items, and links to additional resources, all of which you can conveniently organize as separate subpages within your meeting minutes document.

You can also use this framework template to track key items learned, outcomes for stakeholders, and tasks for designated teammates to complete based on the listed action items. The depth of this template makes it the perfect resource for keeping everyone informed, engaged, and on the same page, literally.

Add emojis, images, formatting, and styling options to  instantly structure your notes  and make your writing stand out. Plus, share your Doc instantly via URL, or attach it to your task for easy access at any time. And did we mention ClickUp Docs are connected directly to your workflows?

Taking a slightly different organizational approach to your minutes, the Minutes of Meeting (MoM) Template by ClickUp applies a pre-built task to your workspace. This simplifies and standardizes the traditional note-taking process by structuring your recurring details and action items in an interactive List .

In this task, you’ll find a Getting Started Guide in the task description with step-by-step breakdowns of how to use the template in the most productive way possible. You’ll also have access to multiple Help Docs to make the most of ClickUp’s other key features including subtasks , Custom Fields , Checklists , and more.

Beyond the task description, this template automatically populates four subtasks to track attendance, the next meeting’s items, address current issues, and view this week’s meeting agenda. And to double-check that all items were covered, your minutes writer can use the post-meeting assessment checklist to determine whether the meeting was a success based on its goals.

The requirements of your meeting minutes may differ when it comes to teams across different industries and use cases. Luckily, ClickUp offers tons of templates to remedy this very challenge! Starting with the Board of Directors Meeting Minutes Template by ClickUp .

Like the other templates in this guide, this meeting minutes Doc template allows you to record and tag all attendees, along with the agenda and action items. But your board of directors may have specific expectations that vary from your typical meeting, and this template gets that—so you also have the ability to record voting results for each action item and provide high-level meeting notes.

You can also quickly share the document with all other key players using the “Share Doc” button in ClickUp!

The Project Management Meeting Minutes Template by ClickUp will help you get the most out of your project management meetings with a complete list of items in a customizable ClickUp task.

You can start using this template ahead of your project kick-off meeting with designated sections for helpful links, meeting details, agenda, and project team members—all from the comprehensive task description.

Another section details the project schedule review, which will indicate work completed, the work planned for the future, and other miscellaneous notes. Plus, you can list the different risks and issues that might negatively impact each project using one of the six Custom Fields found in this template.

From there, you can oversee your project’s progress after the meeting with five pre-made subtasks to:

• Make sure all members have access to the proper tools
• Cost breakdowns are allocated for the quality management team
• KPI dashboards are in place

And more! If you need a comprehensive meeting minutes template for project management, you’ll be hard-pressed to find a better template than this one.

Not quite ready to take on the meeting minutes? Start by taking detailed notes! The Meeting Notes Template by ClickUp is the perfect bare-bones meeting notes template to organize the details of your meeting and keep team members aligned.

Sections in this template include:

• Meeting Date, Time, Agenda
• Meeting Recording Link
• Key Takeaways and Summary
• Action Items.

Together, this one-pager template will help you take basic notes that could supplement other meeting materials—including the meeting minutes!

Another template that can assist with note-taking during meetings is Recurring Meeting Notes by ClickUp . This template is ideal if you conduct regular meetings and want to track progress with each recurring meeting.

You can use this document to manage all agenda items, list to-dos, refresh your memory from previous meetings with a high-level overview, and assign different action items to team members. Of course, you can also include details such as the date of past, current, and future meetings, the specific meeting purpose, attendees, and absentees. Additionally, indicate whether the number of attendees meets the quorum for each meeting.

Want a solution to help track meetings from start to finish? Add the Meeting Tracker Template by ClickUp to your workspace! This detailed template includes all information in a comprehensive and actionable List to plan, prepare, and manage action items as you go.

You can use the template to track all types of meetings and projects, from one-on-ones and quarterly business reviews to birthday celebrations and other events that venture outside of traditional business meetings.

The template includes many components to assist with every aspect of meeting tracking, including three statuses, eight Custom Fields, and four view types.

While ClickUp is a great solution for keeping all meeting documents in a single location with optimal shareability and other features, you may want to use a meeting minutes template for Excel if your organization already invests in Microsoft products. This Meeting Minutes Executive Tracking List is a basic spreadsheet template for keeping track of details in executive meetings.

This XLS-formatted meeting minutes template uses a simple sheet layout with multiple columns to track all meeting details. Include information such as descriptions of tasks, assignees, due dates, required resources, and executive status records.

If you use Microsoft Word regularly, you may benefit from a Meeting Minutes Template for Word, with Microsoft offering a number of meeting minutes templates. You’ll find plenty of customizable document templates for all types of meetings, including admin meetings, PTA meetings, and this classic meeting minutes template for general team meetings.

Can’t find a suitable template for Word? Microsoft also allows you to create documents from scratch.

The way you record meeting minutes will depend on your writing style and your ability to capture notes quickly. No need to worry about speed right off the bat though, with a little time and experience, you’ll develop a rhythm for capturing the right information.

That said, here are a few reminders to help you create the best meeting minutes of all time:

Your notetaker is not your minutes writer

Notes and minutes are different—and they need to be treated that way! While meeting notes can be formal or informal, meeting minutes have a standard set of practices and information included.

Sometimes meeting planners assign facilitators to take notes on a meeting and later ask the same person to create meeting minutes from those notes. Other times, the meeting planner may even use these terms synonymously! You’ll likely sacrifice the consistency and quality of your minutes by doing this.

Putting too much responsibility on the notetaker can lead to less comprehensive notes or gaps in sections of the meeting minutes. By overloading one person with both jobs, you may compromise their ability to do either task successfully.

So if you’re responsible for the minutes, give them 100% of your focus.

Tell the story as efficiently as possible

Stick to the important points.

Instead of harping on every little detail, focus on the big ticket items and leave it to the reader to ask questions. Your minutes will point them in the direction of the right person to follow up with. 🙂

If an issue is raised in the meeting, be sure to document:

• The problem or challenge being addressed
• The ideas being considered as solutions
• The agreed-upon path forward
• When you can expect the problem to be resolved

Including extra information can get in the reader’s way, making the minutes harder to follow. A better idea is to only include the most salient points.

Clean it up

Trust me, you’re not going to want to share your raw meeting minutes without a heavy edit. Instead, use your first pass as the foundation to structure your final draft. During the editing process, you’ll craft the notes into a coherent narrative that follows your team’s consistent minutes structure.

During the meeting, focus on the information. Don’t worry about the organization of your notes until you’re ready to edit—that’s when the minutes take shape!

Re-reading and re-writing the notes will help you better remember the discussion and give you a fresh perspective on each topic.

Pro tip: Rather than trusting your good old-fashioned pen and paper for this job, try taking structured notes in a digital notepad!

Tools like ClickUp’s Notepad and Chrome Extension provide a quick and intuitive solution for fast note-taking. Instantly add formatting and style with rich text editing to make your notes more thorough, even mid-meeting.

Always, always, always ask questions

Don’t leave anything to chance! If any notes or comments seem unclear, reach out to that person for clarification if you can. What’s most important is that you get the facts correct for those who couldn’t attend or need a refresher. Accuracy over speed!

Accountability starts with the action items

Your action items will be one of the shortest components of your meeting minutes but possibly the most important!

This is the section where you record the next steps for solving problems addressed during the meeting. That’s why every action item should include a few hard and fast details:

• The decision or action that needs to be taken
• Who is responsible for completing the task
• When it should be complete

This is how meeting minutes promote accountability and help participants track tasks more effectively. Our suggestion? Craft your meeting minutes in a dynamic document tool that allows you to add and assign comments to your writing.

(AP) Style matters

It’s always a good idea to follow the AP Stylebook when finalizing your summary. The meeting minutes should be edited, proofread, and free of errors. Typos pull the reader’s attention away from the matters at hand and honestly, they’re just not professional.

Check, double-check, and have someone else check your work. Eliminate mistakes and let the reader stay focused on the content.

Get your facts straight

The primary purpose of meeting minutes is to convey what happened.

Consult your notes or the meeting recording to ensure you’re sharing the correct information. And instead of guessing, talk to your peers! Do everything you can to verify that the minutes are reliable.

Prepare Your Meetings With the Right Meeting Minutes Template

While templates can save you a ton of time, they become even more valuable when you can edit, access, and manage them alongside your other work. Free project management software like ClickUp is designed to fix the very problem and so much more.

Even chose from ClickUp’s growing Template Library or create your own to fit your team’s unique needs. 🦄

And did we mention that ClickUp integrates with over 1,000 other work tools ? Even Zoom ! All to make your meeting minutes process that much easier. 😇

And the best part: these features are completely free .

ClickUp’s collection of meeting minutes templates, collaborative Docs, and powerful meeting management features are accessible to anyone for free, forever. Want to get in the driver’s seat? Get started with ClickUp now !

Questions? Comments? Visit our Help Center for support.

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6 Examples of Meeting Minutes (+Free Templates)

Use these meeting minutes examples to see how to write meeting minutes for your own meetings.

Fellow offers the most integrated AI Meeting Notes, summaries and action items so nothing gets missed.

Taking meeting minutes is a common practice in many organizations. It's how the organization keeps track of what happened during the meeting and how decisions were made.

But what exactly should be written in meeting minutes can be confusing if you don't have an example.

In this article, we'll give you examples of meeting minutes so that you can see how to write meeting minutes for your own organization's meetings.

Meeting Minutes Examples In This Article:

• Meeting Minutes with No Formatting
• Simple Meeting Template
• Board Meeting Template
• Executive Monthly Meeting
• Sprint Planning
• One-On-One Meetings

Quick Tips on Writing Meeting Minutes

Before we jump into the examples of meeting minutes , here are some of the best practices to look out for:

• ‍ Keep the meeting minutes short and sweet . A full hour of discussion should result in around half a page or even less, depending on how much information you need to include. ‍
• Include who was present at the meeting as well as their role (if relevant).
• ‍ Note decisions that were made . If something is decided upon, always state what decision was made so that future actions can be assigned and held accountable. ‍
• Keep track of votes . If there was a disagreement or debate, make sure to note how the final decision came about (i.e., who voted for which option). ‍
• Reiterate any action items that need to get done at the end of the meeting so people know what they're responsible for.
• Use an AI meeting management platform like Fellow to automatically record, transcribe, and summarize meeting minutes

As you can see, meeting minutes are pretty straightforward to write. As long as you get all of the necessary information down in a clear and concise way it should be fine.

Here are some examples of how to write meeting minutes for your own meetings. At the bottom of each meeting minutes sample is a link to download the meeting minutes template for free or to use it in Fellow (free meeting management software).

Learn what *not* to include in your meeting minutes

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1. Meeting Minutes Example: No Agenda or Formatting

For example, unstructured meeting minutes with no formatting might end up something like this:

The meeting started at 11:00 am and was attended by John Smith, Jane Doe, and Robert Brown. The meeting minutes were kept by James Taylor.

After an overview of how the project is going so far and what we hope to accomplish in the next week, we discussed how best to divide up our tasks for this upcoming week. For the first day, we decided to work on task A and B.

We also reached a consensus that we would finish up our discussion about how best to handle issue C at next week's meeting instead of trying to solve it now.

Advantages of no-agenda style of meeting minutes

Taking meeting minutes without any agenda or formatting is not ideal, but it does have advantages over not taking meeting minutes at all. So if that’s the way you’ve done it until now, it’s a good start. You’ve been keeping notes that can serve, somewhat, as a record. And they can serve to jog someone’s memory. 

Advantages include: 

• At least you’re taking meeting minutes
• You can do it instantly, without any prep
• You have some kind of record, even if it’s not ideal
• You can easily copy, paste, and share the information
• It can work for very small teams, which don’t have a lot of meetings (Say, a tiny local sailing club’s quarterly meetings.) 

The good news is it’s easy to take this style of meeting minutes to the next level, to give yourself more power, better reputation, and to help your team accomplish even more. 

It's easy to switch styles to more formatted notes

Taking your meeting minutes to the next level is easier than not. In fact, switching to a style of meeting minutes which depends on an agenda and some basic formatting is easier and less stressful than a no-agenda, no-formatting style.

The reason is that a bit of organization makes anything easier, and that includes especially a task such as taking meeting minutes. 

Disadvantages of no-agenda style of meeting minutes

Before we look at an easy way to better organize meeting minutes, let’s take a clear look at the disadvantages of taking meeting minutes without any agenda or formatting. Sometimes if a method has seemed to work fine, and to satisfy stakeholders, it’s helpful to look directly at the disadvantages. 

Looking at the opportunities you’re missing with a super simple approach to note taking can be highly motivating. You’ll find a lot of low-hanging fruit that can improve your standing and your team’s performance.

Disadvantages include:

• They look unprofessional . ‍ A plain text form of meeting minutes is very informal – and not necessarily in a good way, because a basic agenda and simple formatting is so easy these days, with so many free apps available, and so many excellent free templates available. 
• They’re hard to read. Formatting, fonts, design and templates exist for a very good business reason. They make information easier to read and absorb. When meeting minutes are left unformatted, they’re harder to read. Everything is one big mass of text, even if it’s broken up into short paragraphs and sentences.  
• They might be hard to access. Unformatted meeting minutes without an agenda are usually lacking in other best practices for meeting minutes. For example, easy cloud access. Can the right people access meeting minutes at any time, securely, from any device? 
• They might be too easy to access for the wrong people. Again, unformatted meeting minutes often get short shrift in access management, resulting in blunt-instrument access controls. Are they in simple Google Docs set to “Anyone with the Link Can Access”? It happens far too often. And it’s not professional or secure. 
• The notes are unfocused. The chain of causation is clear. Meetings without agendas are unfocused. That means the person trying to take notes doesn’t know what to focus on, and the conversation veers into multiple directions anyway. So the notes are going to be unfocused. They’ll reflect the ongoing lack of focus in meetings. And they are a link in the chain – they are part of the cause of that lack of focus.

Which means they are also the cure to the lack of focus. Formatted meeting minutes, based on a professionally formatted agenda template, can introduce a high degree of order into a business meeting, and especially over a series of meetings.  You can bring a significant amount of focus into regular meetings just by regularly creating a formatted agenda. 

When taking notes without an agenda, you don’t know what to focus on

You or whoever is running the meeting can’t stick to time schedules (because there aren’t any)

It’s easier to format than to keep using unformatted meeting notes

The good news is that it’s so easy to take these first two “best practice” steps: 

• Start with an agenda
• Format the notes

But how? Right? 

The next section spells out exactly how you can get started. It’ll make your note taking better, your meetings more productive, and your standing rise. 

How to take the next step 

To take the next step up, you need just one thing. 

You need a professionally formatted agenda template. (You can take notes right inside your agenda template.) 

Scroll down to see some examples of professionally formatted, free meeting agendas, which you can download and use right now.

Get the exact agenda meeting template you need right now – for free

While you’re moving up from a no-format agenda, you may as well choose an agenda template designed specifically for the kind of meeting you’ll be taking notes for. 

It’s easy. 

Just scroll down in this article to find the most commonly needed templates. 

Not finding one that fits your needs? Try our 80+ collection of professional agenda meeting templates .  

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2. Meeting Minutes Example: Simple Meeting Template

If you’re in a hurry, or have a minimalistic need, this Simple Meeting Minutes template is for you. It frontlines the Goal of the meeting, segues into the Agenda Items, and closes with a Next Steps section. 

This meeting minutes template is perfect for true Simple Meetings because it focuses everyone on the Goal of the meeting, which is what simple meetings are for, after all. In a simple meeting, no one is concerned with Roberts’ Rules of Order, a quorum, recording votes according to accepted parliamentary procedure. 

The Simple Meeting participants are there to quickly discuss a specific issue, solve a specific problem, answer a specific question, and reach a specific business goal. 

That means this Simple Meeting Template is great for what it’s good for, but could be limited when it comes to other kinds of meetings. 

When you see that your needs are better served by a more detailed design, keep scrolling to see other popular examples of meeting minutes, each with a free template – or use the search or filter functions at our directory of Free Meeting Agenda Templates .

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3. Meeting Minutes Example: Board Meeting Template

This board meeting template includes all the basic components of a board meeting, so that the person or persons taking notes can have a clear focus. 

It starts with a Call to Order, includes Attendance of voting members and others, Approval of the previous meeting minutes, Reports, Motions, Announcements, and Adjournment. 

Prepare to take minutes for a board meeting

Board meetings are among the highest level of meetings at which you could be responsible for taking notes. It’s important to do your homework in order to prepare. 

• Talk with someone who has done it well before at your company, or with your board chair. Ensure you understand what the expectations are of the meeting minutes taker, and how it’s been done before. 
• Review Robert’s Rules of Order , where you’ll learn about having a quorum, making motions, conducting and recording voting, and more under the most respected methodology for running  meetings on parliamentary procedure.
• Make sure you’re aware of your company’s specific policies regarding the board meeting agenda and minutes. your board’s specific policies.
• If it’s your first time to take minutes for a board meeting, it’s a good idea to practice in private with example board meetings you can find on YouTube, or previous board meetings from your company, if they’re available to you on audio or video in a company repository.

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4. Meeting Minutes Example: Executive Monthly Meeting

Because weekly (or even monthly) Executive Team Meetings relentlessly come around on the calendar, taking meeting minutes for them can quickly overwhelm a person who doesn’t yet have a good system in place.. 

A good system for an Executive Weekly Meeting includes built-in ways of: 

• Collaborating on the agenda items
• Sharing the agenda easily
• Taking notes 
• Handing off responsibility for taking notes on the fly
• Secure, easy ways of sharing the meeting minutes afterward
• Secure, easy ways of storing and searching the entire series of meeting minutes

Fellow offers an end-to-end easy system for managing all these functions. 

But any such system starts with an agenda template professionally designed for an Executive Weekly Meeting. Check out the free, instantly-available template below. It doubles as the template for taking meeting minutes. 

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5. Meeting Minutes Example: Sprint Planning

Sprints that reach goals require effective sprint planning, which requires effective sprint meetings. Done well, a sprint planning meeting not only kicks off a new sprint, but also provides: 

• Clear next steps
• Clear criteria by which success is judged 

A Sprint Planning Meeting Agenda will help to avoid unanticipated obstacles and make sure everyone knows who’s accountable for what and who is authorized to make decisions on any given issue that may arise. 

Sprint Goal

The professional agenda / meeting minutes example for a sprint planning meeting below starts with the Goal , so that everyone knows what the purpose of the meeting is. Collaborate with other stakeholders to determine the Goal. 

Sprint Backlog

Then refine your Backlog as you create the agenda.  The Backlog is a complete list of what the product requires and in what chronological order. Presenting the Backlog is part of mapping the progress in the project so far. 

Epics to be Delivered

This template has you moving naturally then from where the project is to what Epic Deliverables are next. 

Scope of Work

From there the meeting will move to refining the Scope of the Work , to make sure everyone is on the same page about what “done” means in this sprint. 

Key Risks and Concerns 

The Key Risks and Concerns section anticipates possible roadblocks that may arise, and how to deal with them, and who might help deal with them. 

Notes and Takeaways and Actions

The Notes and Takeaways section, and the Actions section, confirm what has been decided, and who is responsible for owning any given part of the process.

Followup specifies exactly how task owners will be held accountable, and how stakeholders can help and be kept up to speed.

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6. Meeting Minutes Example: One-On-One Meetings

One-on-One Meetings can take many forms, from General One-on-Ones, to a Monthly Coaching Call, to Mentoring Meetings, One-on-One Manager Weekly Meetings, and many more. 

(To see a full slate of professional One-on-One Meeting templates, select the the “One-on-One” filter at Hugo’s repository of 80+ Free, Professional Meeting Templates .)

But the one thing that One-on-One meetings require, and is often overlooked, is an agenda. The need for a One-on-One Meeting Agenda can be overlooked because a one-on-one meeting may seem simple, because it’s just between two people. 

Why One-on-One Meetings Need Agendas and Meeting Minutes, Too

But the reality is, a meeting between two people, or among 2,000 people in an all-hands-on-deck meeting, requires direction. 

A One-on-One meeting requires an agenda. And it requires meeting minutes, so that each participant can know the focus of the meeting, what was decided, and directions going forward. 

The worst thing about meetings – any meetings, even one-on-one meetings – is their poor management. Poor management of a meeting wastes people’s time and saps their energy. And people naturally dislike that. 

On the other hand, well-managed meetings multiply an individual’s accomplishments as part of a team, and thus are the opposite of wasting time. Individuals naturally thrive based on such meetings. 

One-on-One meetings are no exception. When you attend a One-on-One Meeting, you have the more opportunity than in any other meeting to affect the outcome. It can be goal-oriented, directed, documented, and energizing. 

All you need is the right, professionally designed template. 

For General One-on-One Meetings, this agenda is useful. (For several more specific kinds of One-on-One meeting agenda templates, click the filter “One-on-One” at our repository of 80+ and growing meeting templates .)

{{one-on-one-manager-weekly="/blog-inserts-4"}}

Get 80+ Meeting Minutes Templates (Free to Download)

These examples of meeting minutes all come from our free agenda template library—only they've been filled in with more information.

In fact, all of the meeting agenda templates in our library can be used for meeting minutes. After all, meeting minutes are essentially the agenda of a meeting, just filled in with summaries of what happened in that part of the meeting.

Find these templates and many more in our large gallery of templates, including executive meetings, board meetings, sales meetings, customer calls, team meetings, and staff meetings.

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How To Write Effective Meeting Minutes (with Templates and Samples)

New to writing meeting minutes.

Whether you’ve been tasked with taking notes for a committee or you’ve been appointed Secretary to the Board of your organization, preparing meeting minutes doesn’t have to be an arduous task. Here are some tips and ideas that will help you get started with writing and preparing effective meeting minutes, as well as a meeting minutes sample and a meeting minutes template that you can follow.

This guide on how to write meeting minutes was prepared by WildApricot to help the volunteers and/or staff of small non-profits and membership organizations who may be new to the task of taking and preparing minutes of meeting for committees or Boards of Directors.

What Are Meeting Minutes?

Meeting minutes are the written record of what was discussed and decided during a meeting. They typically include the date and time of the meeting, a list of attendees, a summary of the topics discussed, decisions made, action items assigned, and the time of adjournment.

Minutes are essential for providing an official account of the meeting, ensuring accountability, and helping attendees recall important details. They are usually prepared by a designated person, such as a secretary or administrative assistant, and are approved at the subsequent meeting.

What Should You Include When Writing Meeting Minutes?

The five steps that you must include are:

• Pre-Planning
• Record taking – at the meeting
• Minutes writing or transcribing
• Distributing or sharing of meeting minutes
• Filing or storage of minutes for future reference

For more detail on each step, read on!

Read more: 13 Meeting Minutes Templates for More Productive Nonprofit Board Meetings

Who Should Write the Meeting Minutes?

Meeting minutes are typically written by the designated secretary or administrative assistant of the group or organization. In some cases, a specific member of the group may be assigned to take minutes for a particular meeting.

The person responsible for writing the minutes should be someone who is attentive, detail-oriented, and capable of accurately capturing the discussions and decisions made during the meeting.

Meeting Minutes Template:

Here’s a simple template you can refer to next time you need to take meeting minutes:

Organization Name

Meeting Minutes

Opening: The meeting was called to order at [Time] by [Name] at [Location].

Present: [List of all present members]

Absent: [List of any members who were not present]

Approval of Agenda: The agenda was reviewed and approved.

Approval of Minutes: The minutes from the previous meeting were reviewed and approved.

Business From the Previous Meeting:

• [Summary of any motions or topics from the previous meeting, including decisions made]

New Business:

• [Summary of any new motions or topics raised, including decisions made]

Additions to the Agenda:

• [Summary of any additional items raised during the meeting]

Adjournment: The meeting was adjourned at [Time] by [Name]. The next meeting will be held on [Date] at [Location].

Minutes submitted by: [Name]

Minutes approved by: [Name]

How to Create Your Meeting Minute Process

As mentioned above, there are essentially five steps involved with meeting minutes:

Pre-Plan Your Meeting Minutes

A well-planned meeting helps ensure effective meeting minutes.  If the Chair and the Secretary or minutes-taker work together to ensure the agenda and meeting are well thought out, it makes minute taking much easier.

For example, depending on the meeting structure and the tools you use, the minutes-taker could work with the Chair to create a document format that works as an agenda and minutes outline as well.

Set the Agenda of a Meeting

At the very least, it’s important to get a copy of the meeting agenda and use it as a guide or outline for taking notes, setting up your mom format, and preparing the minutes – with the order and numbering of items on the minutes of meeting matching those of the agenda.

In addition, the agenda and/or meeting notice also provides information that will need to be included in the minutes, such as:

• the names of all the meeting attendees, including guests or speakers
• documents that are sent out with the agenda or handed out in the meeting – copies (digital or hard copy) of handouts should be stored with the meeting minutes for future reference and for sharing with those who were unable to attend the meeting (and others as determined by the meeting’s Chair).

Clarify Expectations

When you take on a new role as minutes-taker or Secretary, be sure to ask the Chair of the committee or Board what their expectations are of your role during the meeting, as well as the type of detail he/she expects in the minutes.

For example, if your Board or committee will be dealing with motions, or voting on items/issues, be clear on whether you need to offer names of those making motions, seconding, etc. If you will be dealing with this type of procedures, you (and your Chair) may want to refer to Robert’s Rules of Order .

What Should Be Included in Meeting Minutes?

Before you start taking notes, it’s important to understand the type of information you need to record at the meeting. As noted earlier, your organization may have required content and a specific meeting minute format that you’ll need to follow, but generally, meeting minutes usually include the following:

• Date and time of the meeting
• Names of the meeting participants and those unable to attend (e.g., “regrets”)
• Acceptance or corrections/amendments to previous meeting minutes
• Actions taken or agreed to be taken
• Voting outcomes – e.g., (if necessary, details regarding who made motions; who seconded and approved or via show of hands, etc.)
• Motions taken or rejected
• Items to be held over
• New business
• Next meeting date and time

You can find more templates and details on formatting meeting minutes here.

The Minutes Writing Process

Once the meeting is over, it’s time to pull together your notes and write the minutes. Here are some tips that might help:

• Try to write the minutes as soon after the meeting as possible while everything is fresh in your mind.
• Review your outline and if necessary, add additional notes or clarify points raised. Also check to ensure all decisions, actions and motions are clearly noted.
• For Board of Director’s minutes in particular, we recommend including a short description of each action taken, as well as the rationale behind the decision
• If there was a lot of discussion before passing a motion, write down the major arguments for and against
• Edit to ensure brevity and clarity, so the minutes are easy to read
• Be objective
• Write in the same tense throughout
• Avoid using names other than to record motions and seconds.
• Avoid personal observations — the minutes should be solely fact-based
• If you need to refer to other documents, don’t try to summarize them. Rather, simply indicate where they can be found or attach them as an appendix

Meeting Minute Best Practices:

Create an outline.

As discussed earlier, having an outline (or template) based on the agenda makes it easy for you to simply jot down notes, decisions, etc. under each item as you go along. If you are taking notes by hand, consider including space below each item on your outline for your hand-written notes, then print these out and use this to capture minutes.

Check-off attendees as they join the meeting

If you know the meeting attendees, you can check them off as they arrive, if not have folks introduce themselves at the start of the meeting or circulate an attendance list they can check-off themselves.

Record decisions or notes on action items

As the meeting progresses, it will be critical to annotate decisions and key points made in your outline as soon as they occur to be sure they are recorded accurately. Include the names of the owners of the action items and other key personnel involved.

Ask for clarification if necessary

Don’t be afraid to speak up if you need clarification on something that was said in the meeting. It’s your job to make these meeting minutes as accurate as possible.

For example, if the group moves on without making a decision or an obvious conclusion, ask for clarification of the decision and/or next steps involved.

Don’t try to capture it all

You can’t keep up if you try to write down the conversation verbatim, so be sure to simply (and clearly) write (or type) just the decisions, assignments, action steps, etc.

Record the meeting

If you are concerned about being able to keep up with note taking, consider recording the meeting (e.g., on your smart phone, iPad, recording device, etc.) but be sure to let participants know they are being recording.

While you don’t want to use the recording to create a word-for-word transcript of the meeting, the recording can come in handy if you want to review the meeting for clarification.

Download our Meeting Minute Checklist for Associations and Nonprofits with sample minutes taken at a meeting and learn how to take better minutes. 

Meeting Minutes Samples:

Still wondering if you’re taking notes correctly? Here’s a sample of what meeting minutes at a board meeting might look like.

Do Meeting Minutes Have To Be Approved?

Yes, meeting minutes typically need to be approved to ensure accuracy and completeness. The approval process usually occurs at the beginning of the next meeting, where attendees review the minutes from the previous meeting and either approve them as written or suggest corrections.

Once approved, the minutes become the official record of the meeting. This process helps maintain transparency and accountability within the organization.

Before you share your meeting minutes, make sure that your board chair has reviewed and either revised and/or approved the minutes for circulation. They are not an official record of a meeting unless this has taken place.

Distributing or Sharing Meeting Minutes

As the official “minutes-taker” or Secretary, your role may include dissemination of the minutes.

Online sharing

The method of sharing or distribution will depend on the tools that you and your organization use. Since minutes and other documentation can create a pile of paper, it’s great if you can use a paperless sharing process. For example, if you are using a word processing tool (e.g., Microsoft Word) that doesn’t offer online sharing, you might want to create a PDF of the document and send this and the other attachments or meeting documentation via email.

Alternately, if you are all using Google docs – for meeting invitations, agenda and additional document sharing – you can simply “share” the document with that group once it has been finalized. Committee or Board members can simply read the documents online and save a few trees!

Sharing in the Cloud?

If your organization is using a cloud-based membership management system (like WildApricot ), you can publish the minutes as a web page and give access only to the committee or Board members, depending on your organization’s needs. Through members-only webpages, you can create a secure online Intranet for your Board and committees.

Tools Specifically For Meeting Minutes:

If you are wondering about the types of tools you might use specifically for meeting minutes, here are some tools that organizations we’ve worked with have found helpful:

• Google Docs:  Also supports collaborative note taking. [Here are some meeting minute sample templates in Google docs.  If you send out a meeting request using Google Calendar, you can attach a Google doc agenda outline. Once minutes are crafted (using the outline), you can simply share the document with the group using their email addresses.]
• OneNote :  (if you are a Microsoft user) – Very fast and allows for organization of notes.  Also support audio recording with corresponding note time-stamping.
• Notion: Notion is a great platform for organizing meeting minutes. It’s hierarchical document structure is a fantastic way to organize your meeting minutes in any way you want.
• Evernote :  Great note taking tool.
• Agreedo : supports creation of meeting minutes and tracking the results.
• minutes.io :  allows you to quickly take meeting minutes with hotkey shortcuts and the ability to work online or offline.

Filing/Storage of Meeting Minutes

Most committees and Boards review and either approve or amend the minutes at the beginning of the subsequent meeting. Once you’ve made any required revisions, the minutes will then need to be stored for future reference.

Some organizations may store these online (e.g., in Google docs or SkyDrive) and also back these up on an external hard drive.  You may also need to print and store hard copies as well or provide these to a staff member or Chair for filing.

What Is the Purpose of Meeting Minutes?

You shouldn’t be intimidated by the term “minutes”, since it’s actually a little misleading. After all, your committee or Board doesn’t want or need a record of its meeting proceedings minute by minute!  But it is important to capture the essence of the meeting, including details such as:

• decisions made (motions made, votes, etc.)
• next steps planned
• identification and tracking of action items

Minutes are a tangible record of the meeting for its participants and a source of information for members who were unable to attend. In some cases, meeting minutes can act as a reference point, for example:

• when a meeting’s outcomes impact other collaborative activities or projects within the organization
• minutes can serve to notify (or remind) individuals of tasks assigned to them and/or timelines

Download our Meeting Minute Checklist for Associations and Nonprofits with examples and learn how to take better minutes. 

Why Are They Called Minutes of a Meeting?

According to Today I Found Out , the “minutes” of “meeting minutes” don’t refer to the minute measurement of time, but to the “minute” (my-newt) notes taken during meetings.

And… If You’re a Nonprofit with Regular Board and Member Meetings

If you’re a nonprofit with regular board and member meetings and you want to save time and money managing your organization, get a free trial of WildApricot , an all-in-one membership management software which allows you to:

• Easily schedule online events with instant online payment processing and automated invoices.
• Create a stunning website with online member applications.
• Access an easy-to-search and filter contact database.
• Send out professionally-designed newsletters and emails.
• and much more.

Find out all the features of WildApricot’s free membership management software here .

WildApricot is also the the #1 rated membership management software used by over 20,000 organizations every day. Get your free trial now .

In Closing…Enjoy Your New Role!

Meeting minutes are important – after all, they capture the essential information of a meeting. But taking and preparing minutes doesn’t have to be a daunting task. We hope this article helps meeting minutes newbies in getting started in creating effective meeting minutes for your organization.

Thank you for reading our guide on how to write meeting minutes!

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12 Free Minutes of Meeting Samples for Word, Excel, Google Docs

Meeting minutes are important notes that hold the record of necessary information like agenda items discussed during the meeting. As a matter of fact, the outline or format of meeting minutes may vary depending type of information you want to record. On that note, we created different meeting minutes examples and templates to help you easily transcribe the minutes. There are also some basic data a meeting minute must have which we will discuss below.

Simple Meeting Minutes Tutorial and Examples

What should minutes of meeting include, meeting minutes template for word, meeting minutes template for excel, meeting minutes template for google docs, meeting minutes template for pdf.

• Online meeting minutes template (GitMind)

Taking meeting minutes can be done in many ways based on the preference of a certain group or the type of information you are recording. While some groups stick to a specific format, the assigned person usually include these information on minutes of meeting sample:

• Date and time the meeting took place
• Names of participants both present and absent
• Agenda items covered during meeting
• Follow up actions taken to the previous meeting
• Decisions made follow up actions

Meeting minutes do not need to be complicated so you don’t need any special program to get this done. You can create an understandable using the available tools on your computer. One of the most accessible tools you can use is Word.

Example for Word #1

This template provides the necessary information a meeting minutes must-have. At the top-left corner presents the date including the month, day, and year. Along with it is the time the meeting was held. You will also see here the name of the participants, agenda items or topics, time allocated for each agenda, and who presented them. If you are only conducting a simple meeting, this meeting minutes example should be a great help.

Example for Word #2

When conducting a simple meeting, this template is a good place to start. There is no special formatting needed like tables or any illustrations. Another thing to note is that all items to fill out are written in linear form making it easy to jot down or customize the minutes of the meeting sample according to your needs.

You can also take advantage of taking down minutes with the help of a table using Excel. This version allows you to easily keep track of details especially if the meeting involves a bunch of information and different categories. Another advantage is that users may use color-coding so that it’s easy to sort things out. Take a look at the meeting minutes template examples created using Excel.

Example for Excel #1

Five sections are included in this version of the template. The first section comes with the basic information like the date of the meeting, time, who prepared the minutes, etc. Underneath sections are meeting objectives, attendees, admin, and old business.

Example for Excel #2

Here is another meeting minutes template version created using Excel. Before proceeding to the agenda items, the note taker will need to determine first the project title, meeting date, location, and other basic details. You can also use this approach wherein the main categories are arranged in a row and under while items are organized in a column form.

Google Docs is another tool you can use to create comprehensive meeting minutes. It operates like MS Word and offers some basic functionalities as Word. With it, you can customize the font, color, text alignment and so much more. You may refer to the simple meeting minutes template for Google Docs below.

Example for Google Docs #1

Although the tool offers simple functionalities, you can still create detailed meeting minutes in just a few simple steps. Using this version of Google Docs version meeting minutes you may include all the necessary information and show the category of details using a table-based layout.

Example for Google Docs #2

If you are accustomed to writing notes using bullet form, this meeting minutes example should be useful. This version uses both numbering and bullet approaches in listing down information. The only disadvantage though is it takes too much space on the page. The more information input, the more page it will take.

For those of you who are looking for editable PDF minutes, you are free to use the below meeting minutes template examples. What’s good about PDF is that you can secure the file or document with a code especially if it contains sensitive information or you want to keep it private.

Example for PDF #1

Another example is a business meeting minutes where it presents the board meeting date and time in phrase instead of creating another section for the time and date. It also lists the attendees both present and absent, approval minutes, reports, and when was the meeting is adjourned in the latter part of the meeting minutes example.

Example for PDF #2

Want a more organize meeting minutes? you can use the table-layout approach just like the example below. Each table represents a certain category. In fact, you can combine both tables and bullet layouts according to your needs.

Simple meeting minutes template (GitMind)

For a more interactive and creative minute, you can use the mind mapping approach. GitMind is by far the best free mindmaps you can find online. It encourages you to be creative by integrating a variety of mind mapping layouts while making it easy to understand for the readers. Also, if you are interested in creating your first meeting minutes example using a mindmap, see the examples below.

Example by GitMind #1

Using GitMind you can build a simple yet creative minute. With this template, you can present well what were the activities at a specific given time. Also, with its AI Mind Map , you can also upload your written minute and let the tool scan it to generate a mind map for your minute instantly. There are five agendas or activities that took place as seen in the illustration. Interestingly, the tool lets you add floating nodes wherein you can insert additional information. That way, you don’t need to squeeze in all the information on the map or in one branch.

Example by GitMind #2

For a more comprehensive minute of meeting sample, you can download and edit this template from GitMind. The template comes with pictures associated with the activities or actions performed. They make your minutes easy to understand with the integration of attachments while making it appealing to look at.

Example by GitMind #3

Product planning is a gruesome and tiring process. Add that to the fact that there are a lot of information that you should digest during the meeting. That is why taking minutes is highly-recommended for these types of meetings. On that note, you can use the meeting notes template made by GitMind, one of the best meeting minutes apps , the next time that you attend a product planning meeting. It is easy to use, and can be edited so that you can add the information tackled during the entire meeting.

Example by GitMind #4

Meetings are held either by surprise or by schedule. Take this template for example, which is a type of meeting that happened by surprise to set the goals for the new year. For those who are taking the minutes of the meeting, they can simply replace the texts of this meeting minutes template.

There are no rules or standards for taking minutes. As long as you were able to collect and organize all necessary information discussed, you should have no problem. Meanwhile, if you haven’t done this before, you can use these meeting minutes template examples to record any type of minutes.

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Save time, capture key meeting takeaways, and improve the quality of your documentation with these meeting minutes templates and automation hacks.

At any organization, meetings are the setting where most decisions take place. Whether you’re attending a board meeting or an executive goal review session, great leaders know that it is crucial to have a meeting agenda to guide the conversation. However, if you’re constantly attending meetings throughout the day, it can be difficult to plan ahead of all of them.

Holding employees accountable without accurate and organized meeting documentation is difficult, and losing essential details — like action items and decisions —can cause delays, strained client and team relationships, and project setbacks. Meeting minutes can prevent this.

In this article, you will find meeting minutes templates that can be easily applied to your meeting agendas or used as samples – so you can focus on having efficient meetings that move work forward.

The benefit of using templates for meeting minutes is that these can be easily shared across your organization. If you’re a business leader, using meeting minutes templates will set an example of organization and discipline for the rest of your staff.

How to write and automate meeting minutes: 7 best practices

Whether you use an AI meeting assistant like Fellow to automatically generate meeting minutes or prefer to type meeting minutes yourself, these 7 best practices will help meeting hosts at your organization establish a culture of better documentation.

1 Communicate the meeting purpose and objectives

Even with the best intentions, meetings can go off-rail due to unclear objectives. This wastes time and means you’re further from making important decisions.

To make good use of everyone’s time, include the meeting purpose in the calendar invite and at the top of the meeting agenda. When all attendees have a firm idea of why you’re meeting, it sets the stage for more efficient discussions, better decisions, and a clearer record of what happened.

If you’re an executive leader, you can leverage technology like Fellow’s Meeting Guidelines feature to prompt employees to always include a purpose and goals ahead of time so everyone arrives prepared to listen and contribute.

2 Plan a meeting outline using an agenda template

Now that you’ve clarified the meeting objective, use an agenda template to ensure that you start each meeting with your goals in mind. This agenda is meant to keep everyone on track, particularly during long discussions with many talking points.

Using one of Fellow’s meeting agenda templates lets you structure a meeting instantly. You can also create highly customized agendas by editing the headings and discussion topics, embedding images, and adding color and highlights.

Steven G. Rogelberg, the author of The Surprising Science of Meetings , highlights the importance of meeting agendas:

“What matters is not the agenda itself but the relevance and importance of what’s on it, and how the leader facilitates discussion of the agenda items.” 

For more insights like this, listen to this interview with Steven Rogelberg , where he discusses how leaders can use well-structured agendas and positive energy to boost attendee engagement.

3 Record the date, time, and names of participants

Recording the meeting’s date, time, and attendees should be part of your meeting note-taking process. These seemingly minor details help meeting minutes accomplish their primary goal: encouraging accountability since absentees are well-informed. Jotting these details down also makes organizing your meeting notes easier, as you can quickly search your documentation by name or date to find items. 

If you use a meeting management software like Fellow, these details will be automatically recorded and added to the AI meeting summary . This relieves your notetaker so they can concentrate on the session.

4 Track key points and action items

No meeting should end without clear action items . When taking meeting minutes, write down the outcomes and decisions that come out of each agenda item, using your meeting agenda as a general outline. At Fellow, we recommend taking notes in bullet point format under each Talking Point in the product.

Reviewing open action items at the beginning of every meeting is another great way to increase accountability and remove roadblocks, but keeping tabs on them all can be frustrating. Include a section reminding attendees to review action items from past meetings as part of your meeting minutes.

Fellow’s carry-forward feature instantly moves incomplete action items to your next meeting so you can check in on your team’s tasks.

5 Integrate company goals and OKRs

As a business leader, you can play an important role in reminding people of the business objectives and quarterly goals. Meetings can be a great setting to do so.

We recommend adding a section about Metrics, or OKRs to your meeting agenda, whenever possible.

Fellow’s OKR feature helps your team quickly review progress (and solve roadblocks stymieing it). It ensures OKRs are trackable and top of mind and lets you add comments to encourage transparency throughout your team.

This also gives depth and clarity to your meeting minutes. For instance, instead of a somewhat vague goal of “achieve 98% customer satisfaction rating,” you have the objective, the measurable progress, and whether or not you’re on track to complete it on time.

6 Leverage AI tools to create a summary and transcript

Meeting transcription tools are the best way to take meeting minutes that are reliable, unbiased, and easily shareable. They’re cost-efficient, speedy, and save hours of admin time. This technology quickly assesses your transcripts and generates minutes with details like:

• Date, time, and attendees
• Discussion topics
• Action items
• Agenda items covered

Some companies do this for free using ChatGPT , but this platform wasn’t designed for meetings, increasing the risk of error and security issues. 

Fellow’s Meeting Minutes app automatically summarizes and centralizes information, syncing meeting notes to your calendar for easy access. Managers can edit these notes to ensure they’re accurate and focus on the right items.

7 Share the meeting minutes promptly

If you’re manually taking meeting summaries, share them soon after the call via email to offer guidance on the next steps, loop in those who couldn’t attend, and make sure information is fresh in your mind as you craft your summary.

You can also automate this process with technology and ask a tool like Fellow to automatically share meeting recaps with all attendees after the videocall.

Sharing the meeting minutes immediately after the meeting will not only help you look very professional and organized. It will also create a culture of accountability where meetings are settings where employees come together to make decisions and leave inspired to get work done.

Get the most out of every meeting, even the ones you skip .

Fellow is the only AI meeting management platform built for remote and hybrid teams that want to move faster and smarter. The AI Meeting Copilot provides all the key takeaways and outcomes from your meetings so you can revisit discussions, catch up on missed meetings, and get answers to related questions. Try it for free .

4 Top Meeting Minutes Templates for Effective Discussions

Here are our top four meeting minutes templates that, when used with Fellow, are automatically populated with information like the date, attendees, and talking points.

1 Formal Board Meeting Minutes Template

The Formal Board Meeting Minutes Template documents official decisions, which often require approval. This template uses formal language and formatting, making it appropriate to share with every stakeholder and participant as is.

Board meetings typically involve critical decisions and policy updates, so notetakers must pay keen attention to detail so their minutes are correct. This template offers a clear structure so your minute-taker can track essential information in bullet lists under each header.

2 Staff Meeting Minutes Template

This Staff Meeting Template includes sections for a brief check-in, the meeting purpose, discussion points, and key decisions made during the meeting. It can be used as a base for taking meeting minutes for any meeting.

This template isn’t for a highly formal type of meeting, so it’s perfect for any organization looking to organize key points and next steps. It’s also an excellent foundation for companies that want to get creative and build a custom meeting minutes template.

3 Board Meeting Minutes Template

The Board Meeting Minutes Template helps you quickly create an official record of your board of directors’ discussions. It’s similar to the formal meeting template above, helping you track and approve decisions, but it doesn’t use formal language.

This meeting notes example lets your notetaker track old business, new business, and action items, including an estimated timeframe and who’s accountable for what.

4 David Sacks’ SaaS Board Meeting Template

Entrepreneur and investor David Sacks designed the SaaS Board Meeting Template for rapid efficiency. This agenda template encourages board members to stay focused on key topics—and the result is meeting minutes that cover the progress of your whole business, including sales, hiring, and admin.

Improve the quality of your company’s meeting minutes and takeaways with Fellow

Crafting and sharing concise meeting minutes post-session ensures your team is in the know about their responsibilities. But the last thing everyone needs is another to-do on their list. Automate this administrative task with Fellow. 

Fellow offers an AI meeting recap interface that works like a table of contents. It includes time stamps, edit functions, and topic suggestions for upcoming sessions. Plus, your team can use the Ask Copilot feature to find out what they missed in calls and whether they have any outstanding action items.

Onboard Fellow as your dedicated notetaker and enjoy more focused, productive discussions.

Frequently Asked Questions

Who should be appointed to take meeting minutes.

Many roles can craft meeting minutes, like administrative assistants, project managers, and team leads. For small teams, you might make notetaking a rotating responsibility so everyone gets a chance to practice this skill (and, alternatively, to focus on the conversation). 

But you can also offload this role to the Fellow AI Meeting Copilot and let everyone attending contribute to the session. The Copilot automatically shares a complete transcription plus quick meeting minutes, encouraging employee accountability and productivity. This also means the whole team is well-informed—even if they miss a meeting.

Why are meeting minutes important?

Meeting minutes are a written record of meeting details, such as discussion topics, decisions, and next steps. They include key details, like the time and attendees, so employees can quickly gain context on each session.

Some sectors, like government organizations, require meeting minutes to keep official historical records. These notes also provide legal protection because they often capture due diligence, confirming an organization’s ethical, fair practices.

However, every good meeting offers a concise summary to create documentation, keep employees informed, and clarify responsibilities. This summary also helps you better prepare for the next meeting.

Meeting minutes can also make your meetings more productive. According to a McKinsey study, 61% of executives say that at least half of their decision-making time is ineffective, mainly due to inefficient, poorly planned meetings. Thoughtfully creating meeting minutes is one way to better plan these meetings so they’re more effective.

https://fellow.app/blog/meetings/meeting-minutes-example-and-best-practices/#how One final (and fun) note: Yes, meeting minutes save you time, but this isn’t why they use the word “minutes.” The term comes from the Latin word “minutia,” meaning details, directly referring to the little notes you make after a meeting.

Minutes of meeting sample

Call to order.

Facilitated by the ‘Chair of the Board’

• [Meeting facilitator] called to order the regular meeting of [Organization] at [time] on [date] in [location].

The secretary conducted a roll call. The following persons were present:

Approval of minutes

Before any official business can be conducted, the board must approve the minutes from the last meeting.

• [Secretary] read the minutes from the last meeting. The minutes were approved.

Open issues

Items that the board has previously discussed that are ready for formal approval.

New business

These items may be voted on, amended, tabled, moved to committee for consideration or postponed.

Adjournment

After all the open issues and new business have been discussed and documented, the meeting facilitator will adjourn the board meeting.

• [Meeting facilitator] adjourned at the meeting at [time meeting ended].

Submission and approval of minutes

Minute taker must submit the minutes for approval by the Board Chair or meeting facilitator.

• Minutes submitted by: [Name]
• Minutes approved by: [Name]

Hybrid Meetings: 10 Best Practices for Leaders 9 min read

How to Conduct a Meeting Audit in 7 Steps: A Guide for Leaders 6 min read

How To Write and Automate a Meeting Summary for Optimal Outcomes 7 min read

See how leaders in 100+ countries are making meetings more productive and delightful.

Say goodbye to unproductive meetings. Fellow helps your team build great meeting habits through collaborative agendas, real-time notetaking, and time-saving templates.

End every meeting knowing who is doing what by when. Assign, organize, and prioritize all your meeting action items in one place.

Give and get feedback as work happens. Request and track real-time feedback on meetings, recent projects, and performance.

The 12 Best Meeting Minutes Templates for Professionals

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I've Found the Perfect To-Do List App for My Needs: Here's Why It's Amazing

My 4 favorite ways to use pageless formatting in google docs, why checkboxes are excel's most underrated feature, key takeaways.

• Taking meeting minutes is important for setting agendas, documenting commitments and tasks, and providing transparency in the workflow.
• Effective meeting minutes templates should include the date, time, and location of the meeting, attendees and absentees, agenda, and decisions and action points.
• Microsoft Word, Microsoft OneNote, Evernote, and Google Docs offer various meeting minutes templates with different formats and sections to suit different meeting needs.

Whether your business meetings are online or in person, following up with minutes and notes is a sure way to keep everyone on the same page with what took place and what happens next. To make capturing those meeting minutes easy, you can choose from a variety of templates designed for different applications.

Below are 12 awesome options to get you started using the minutes of meeting (MoM) format for your notes. Do you also need an app to schedule your meetings? Look no further!

Why Are Meeting Minutes Important?

Meeting minutes are notes that are taken during the meeting. While they might not be the first thing on your meeting-to-do list, here are a few reasons you should consider taking meeting minutes in every meeting:

• Meeting minutes allow you to set an agenda before the meeting that covers everything that needs to be discussed during the meeting.
• Additionally, meeting minutes provide administrators with a record of each team member's commitments and duties, along with specific instructions and deadlines.
• They make the workflow transparent. You can share the minutes with the members that were not present during the meeting, as well as saving them for corporate defense in the future.
• Since meeting minutes allow you to keep track of everyone’s commitment, you can use them to measure the progress of individual team members as well.
• Meeting minutes provide insights into past discussions, so you can use them to form your future strategies, projects, or initiatives. During this process, you can review the past meeting minutes to learn from your mistakes and ensure there is no repetition.

Key Elements of Effective Meeting Minutes Templates

To ensure the effectiveness of your meeting minutes, here are some key elements that you should include:

• Date, time, and location of the meeting : Mention the date, time, and location of the meeting. You can also mention the type of the meeting; on-site or online.
• Attendees and absentees : List down the names of everyone who was involved in the discussion. If there are individuals who could not make it to the meeting, you can list their names separately, to ensure accountability.
• Agenda : To help the participants stay focused, start by mentioning the main agenda of the meeting (you can provide a brief overview), followed by topics to be discussed.
• Decisions and action points : Note down the decisions made during the meeting, followed by the action points identified. While you are at it, you can also create a list of the tasks that need to be done along with the individuals responsible for each one. If these tasks have deadlines, it is best to mention them as well.

With these elements, you can make sure all the information is captured comprehensively.

Meeting Minutes Templates for Vertex42

From Vertex42 , this basic template provides only a few sections, which are just enough for small meetings. This style works well for team status meetings, one-on-one get-togethers, and informal last-minute meetings.

You can easily insert a short agenda, including action items, add attendees, and write up other notes as needed.

For a detailed meeting minutes template, this option also from Vertex42 lets you add information for more official meetings. Whether you are getting together with your department, staff, or committee, these additional details bring more formality to the document than the basic MoM template.

You can include the names of those who called the meeting, the timekeeper, and the note-taker. You can also add an objective and meeting type, along with decisions made during the session.

Meeting Minutes Templates for Microsoft Word

Microsoft Word is probably one of the most popular applications for meeting minutes templates, and the template options available are plentiful. Here are just a few templates that are effective and useful.

Microsoft Word 2021

If you are a Microsoft Word 2021 user, you can take advantage of the meeting minute templates within the application. Select File > New to open the template section. In the search box, type the words Meeting Minutes to find relevant results.

This detailed meeting minutes template not only adds a splash of color to your document but it's also formatted in a nice, neat table. You will see a section at the top for adding names, just like with the detailed template from Vertex42.

This one also breaks down each agenda topic into its own section. You can then pop in the discussion, conclusions, deadline, person responsible, and action items for each topic separately. This MoM format in Word offers great organization of notes for project meetings where tasks are assigned and, deadlines are crucial.

Another attractive and useful template in Word 2021 falls into the PTA meeting category. It includes all necessary sections for principal and committee reports, budget details, and board information. Each area has a clean separation for easy reading, and you can add information in either paragraph or bullet format.

Obviously created for PTA meetings, you could also use this template for business meetings, conferences, or volunteer committee meetings with just a few adjustments to the section titles. With some tweaking, both these templates can work as your default MoM email formats.

Microsoft Word Online

If you prefer to use Microsoft Word Online, you can access several meeting-minute templates from the Microsoft Office website. When you arrive at the site, just select Minutes from the Browse by Category section on the left.

One option is a formal MoM template that includes a call to order, approval of minutes, reports, and adjournment sections. At the bottom is a spot for the secretary to sign and date the notes. This type of template, with its formal sections, is appropriate for committee, executive, and board meetings.

Another good template option for Word Online has a more basic professional meeting minutes format with a bit of color. With sections for attendees, discussion, announcements, and roundtable, this is an all-purpose meeting minute format. You can easily use it for area, team, or department meetings.

While you can edit and add your details to these templates using Word Online, you can also save them to and access them from Microsoft OneDrive for additional flexibility. This helps make them ideal MoM email samples to work from.

Meeting Minutes Templates for Microsoft OneNote

Microsoft OneNote is a wonderful tool for capturing meeting minutes in the MoM format. Depending on the version of OneNote, you can access up to five built-in templates for business notes and choose from a basic to a formal look with sections to match.

Unfortunately, on the Windows 10 app, you still need to download the Microsoft OneNote meeting template you want or create your own. The good news is that the internet has plenty of reliable sources.

To access templates in OneNote 2016, however, simply select Insert from the top navigation and then click Page Templates . You will then see a list of recently-used templates and an option to open all of them by selecting Page Templates in the drop-down box.

For older versions of OneNote, begin by opening a new tab in your notebook. You will then see New Page on the right side, and when you click the arrow, you will see a drop-down box where you can select Page Templates .

Basic OneNote meeting minutes templates are perfect for small team meetings or even a get-together with your boss. The two simple templates for OneNote have just three sections where you can add the agenda, attendees, and action items.

Informal yet detailed meeting minute templates are ideal for those meetings that fall between a small team and a large group of executives. Along with the basic information, these templates include sections for announcements, discussion, previous action items, and next meeting details.

Formal meeting minute templates are normally used for executive, board, or official meetings with many discussion points. This OneNote template includes sections for opening and closing the meeting, pending issues, new business, and approvals, in addition to the basics.

Meeting Minutes Templates for Evernote

If Evernote is your note-taking tool of choice , a couple of meeting minute templates are available on the Evernote website. A nice feature of these templates is that they include both a meeting agenda and meeting minutes.

To save and use a template, select Use Template or Save Copy to Evernote from the top right of the template preview page. You will need to log into Evernote, unless you already are. Next, you will see the template pop right into an Evernote note for you to use. Check out the instructions in green and then remove them to use the template.

The first template is an expanded meeting minute option that includes agenda and action items, each within a clean table structure along with checkboxes for completed items. There is also a small section for free-form note-taking.

This type of format is useful for most small to medium-sized meetings that are considered informal, like team or weekly updates meetings.

The second template is very standard, with three main sections for agenda, notes, and action items. This option is more useful for extremely informal or quick one-on-one meetings due to its simple structure.

The convenient thing about using Evernote for your meeting minutes is that you can easily share with the attendees directly through the Evernote application. Plus, you can take advantage of Evernote's attachment and reminder features.

Meeting Minutes Templates for Google Docs

If you prefer to use Google Docs for your business documents , meeting minute templates are readily available. To access your options, log in to your Google Docs account, and at the top, under Start a new document , select the Template Gallery arrows to expand the section.

Then, scroll down to the bottom under Work and you will see a few meeting note templates.

The three templates have a somewhat informal look and feel, so you can use them for almost any type of meeting, from casual to formal. With the necessary sections for the agenda, attendees, action items, notes, and next meeting details, these options are well organized.

The only difference between the three templates is the font and color scheme.

Prepare to Capture Those Meeting Minutes With Great Templates

Whether you use Word, OneNote, Evernote, or Google Docs for your meeting minutes, each has attractive, organized, and helpful template options.

And if none of the available MoM template formats suit your needs, you can always import a third-party template and make it work with your favorite note-taking tool. In fact, keep exploring available apps. You'll be surprised at the range of meetings and projects they can help with.

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Meeting Minutes Templates

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Minutes of Meeting of Directors First Template

Companies or any form of organization in general typically conduct meetings to formally discuss particular matters that must be addressed properly. During these discussions, a secretary is assigned to note down the meeting minutes. Through this document, the participants of the meeting may stay on track to their given agenda and provide a clear summary of what has been tackled for the benefit of those who were unable to attend. But producing meeting minutes can be quite tricky, considering how this demands proper construction and multitasking. To properly streamline this process, using a template can be the best solution. Luckily, we at Best Templates strive to bring you Efficiency and Effectiveness in one collection!

We have a remarkable library of over 500,000+ Professional and Industry-Grade templates specially made to cater to your every need. Our collection consists of some of the finest design and business templates as well as legal documents that are made suitable for any occasion, brand, and business type. In order to produce usable meeting minutes documents, our templates are formatted according to the recommended style sheets as well. To offer you a series of Professionally-Made templates, we gathered a skilled team of experts and technical writers who each bear exceptional knowledge in proper business management. With the best of our abilities, we develop each template from scratch to offer you High Standard written content that stays relevant to your purpose. Through our Ready-Made business templates, you can keep yourself organized, refine business-related documents, and improve work productivity for a better overall performance. Each one of our templates is also made to suit personal and business requirements. This leaves you with high-quality templates to effortlessly record meeting minutes! Each template from our incredible collection possesses the following features you won’t find anywhere else:

Professionally Drafted Content - An average of 1600+ uniquely crafted templates from our library are revisited regularly to suit the constantly evolving business and corporate compliance laws. Each template consists of a ready-made outline to serve as a guide for you to formally develop your business document. These documents are made from the most knowledgeable experts in the industry as you deserve nothing but the best quality content for your personal and business needs.

Fully Customizable - We carry templates which are styled and formatted with suggested titles and text placeholders that you may freely customize as per requirement. This allows you to add, edit, and replace any given content to properly record meeting minutes.

Pre-formatted and Print-ready - Looking for a business medium that’s easy on the pocket? We got you covered! We have over a thousand templates in our collection that are readily available for you to use at the most affordable price!

High-speed Downloads - For your utmost convenience, we guarantee swift downloads using any device, anywhere, anytime. Our templates come in all possible file formats for you to access as well.  

With us around, you don’t have to worry about Downloading, Printing, and producing professional meeting minutes documents anymore! We give you time-saving and cost-effective templates for your personal and business use.  

In a construction company, very often, meetings are conducted to ensure all the activities are carried out efficiently. This neat and professional meeting minutes template makes things easy for you. All you need to do is download it, replace the highlighted texts with your the details; like attendees, issues, agendas, decisions, protocols etc., and hit print.

Construction Meeting Minutes Template

Whether it’s a corporate staff meeting, a board meeting, or an informal corporate meeting minutes are always necessary to have. Download our committee meeting minutes template and be able to take important notes, keep meetings on track, and provide a clear summary of the meeting. Available for download at a very low price, you can modify this template to serve the needs of your company or organization.

Committee Meeting Minutes Template

Easily record corporate meeting minutes with this Corporate Meeting Minutes Template. Download now to get instant access to this very useful 4-page document with business standard fonts in A4 and US letter sizes. Use MS Word or Pages to edit this fully customizable template. Share via email or your corporate social media accounts. Hurry and don’t miss this wonderful opportunity.

Corporate Meeting Minutes Template

Become more efficient at taking minutes of a meeting with this customizable and professional template. This easy to edit multi-page file comes in multiple formats including Microsoft Word ‘13, ‘16, and 356, as well as Mac Pages, making it easy to share to the rest of the company. Simply replace the highlighted texts and write your own appropriate content.

Team Meeting Minutes Template

Having problems remembering highlights of your meeting? Use this Staff Minutes of Meeting Template to record minutes of any meeting. This 6-page, easy to edit template comes with business standard fonts and is available in A4 and US letter sizes. Open using your favorite app compatible with file formats for MS Word or Pages. Easily share with your staff through email or your social media accounts.

Staff Minutes of Meeting Template

Impress your Church community with your note-taking skills. This Church Meeting Minutes Template is easily available and customizable, with three pages worth of details that will make minute-taking much easier. Simply download in any of its available file formats, edit, print, or share with your church group to keep proper records of your discussions.

Church Meeting Minutes Template

Get your club records straight and discussions recorded properly with this Club Meeting Minutes Template. Click on the download button and open this fully customizable template with your favorite application that is compatible with MS Word or Pages file formats. Easily share to attendees using email or through your club’s social media accounts like Facebook, Instagram, Wechat, Snapchat, and others.

Club Meeting Minutes Template

Keep track of all the discussions during any board meeting with this Board of Directors Meeting Minutes Template. Use this easy to edit template for your meeting minutes report. This 5-page document uses business standard fonts and is available in A4 and US letter sizes. Edit with your favorite application supporting MS Word or Pages file formats. Share with the rest of the attendees through email or your corporate social media accounts.

Board of Directors Meeting Minutes Template

A project meeting minutes template with layout done by professionals that includes a comprehensive design to maximizes your efficiency at work. This can be opened at MS Word and Pages, and is easily editable and customized to suit your preferences. It is also supported by Google Docs and can be share with many available online platforms.

Project Meeting Minutes Template

Tired of manually recording minutes of your meeting? Download our Business Meeting Minutes Template and edit in your favorite app supporting MS Word and Pages file formats. We offer this fully customizable, 2-page template at lightning fast downloads digitally shareable via email or through popular social media sites.

Business Meeting Minutes Template

Be able to effectively document important details during annual meetings with our easy to use annual meeting minutes template. Instant download anytime, anywhere. This 7 page document is fully customizable and easy to edit with all versions of MS Word and Apple Pages. It is print ready and perfectly suitable for personal or commercial printing.

Annual Meeting Minutes Template

Impress your boss with detailed minutes of your board meeting, thanks to this savvy template that makes your job a whole lot easier. With four customizable pages available for download in Microsoft Word and Mac Pages, you don’t have to worry about missing a beat. Simply edit and print or share with the rest of the board for a better way of keeping records.

Board Meeting Minutes Template

This template serves as the master copy for every meeting that you need to keep minutes of. Available for download in Microsoft Word or Apple Pages, simply edit the highlighted yellow areas and input meeting details as you deem necessary. Supported by Google Docs, you can also opt to share the document online as you see fit.

Minutes of Meeting Master Template

Make it easier to record the minutes of your meeting with the directors by downloading this highly customizable template. Available  for download in Microsoft Word and Apple Pages, this simply edit the details in this highly customizable document is also supported by Google Docs for easy printing or online sharing as necessary.

Minutes of Meeting of Directors Template

This two-page document is the best template to use for recording the minutes of a formal meeting with your boss. Available for download in multiple file formats such as Microsoft Word and Apple Pages, this fully-customizable document is also supported by Google Docs to make sharing easier by printing or via email as necessary.

Minutes for a Formal Meeting Template

Companies or any form of organization in general typically conduct meetings to formally discuss particular matters that must be addressed properly. During these discussions, a secretary is assigned to note down the meeting minutes. Through this document, the participants of the meeting may stay on track to their given agenda and provide a clear summary Read more

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• January 11, 2023

Board Meeting Minutes 101: Free Template and Examples Included

• --> Written by Toni Hoy
• BLOG , Issues and Trends

As commonplace as it is for board secretaries to take nonprofit board meeting minutes, it may surprise you that boards of directors are not legally required to take minutes at all. Taking minutes with  board meeting software  has become a best practice to support  good governance .

Here, you’ll discover everything you need to know about board meeting minutes and how to take them with examples and a meeting minutes template.

What Are Board Meeting Minutes?

Board meeting minutes provide a record of what happens during a board meeting. Nonprofit board minutes, which typically fall under the responsibility of the board secretary, detail the board’s actions, decisions and key deliberations in connection with the agenda in narrative form. Below, you’ll find a few examples to help answer the question, “What do board meeting minutes look like?”

Examples of Board Meeting Minutes

While nonprofit board meeting minutes follow a similar format, there is no overarching standard for how to write minutes. The following examples will give you a general idea of how other nonprofits approach taking minutes.

• Basic sample #1 
• Basic sample #2

Printable Board Meeting Minutes Template — Nonprofit

A free board meeting minutes template for nonprofits gives your board a good place to start when establishing a process for taking minutes.

Printable Template for Board Meeting Minutes from BoardEffect

Members of organizations are entitled to obtain certain records like financial reports and meeting minutes. More importantly, board directors have legal and fiduciary duties , so it’s important to have a record of the actions that the board took during meetings.

In addition, the minutes of board meetings serve as guidance for the board as they plan and make strategic decisions. Taking board meeting minutes using a specified format and template also serves as legal protection for the board and the organization.

Need a PDF or printable nonprofit board meeting template to share with colleagues? Download your copy here .

What Information Do Board Secretaries Need to Record?

The best source that board secretaries can  use as a guide  for recording board minutes is  Robert’s Rules of Order .

The most important part of the minutes is documenting an accurate account of board members’ actions during the meeting. Secretaries will also want to include a statement of whether the minutes of the previous meeting were read and approved.

When writing board meeting minutes, secretaries should include an overview of what took place at the meeting without being overly wordy. It should include items such as:

• The meeting’s date, time and location
• Whether it was a regular or a special session
• A list of the presiding officer, directors, staff, guests and other attendees

Designating the percentage of present members constituting a quorum is not necessary. The secretary only needs to document whether  a quorum  does or does not exist.

You will find a more comprehensive list of items to include in board meeting minutes later in the article.

Writing Board Meeting Minutes: Step by Step

Effective minute-taking requires the  secretary  to take four steps. The steps include:

• Planning before the meeting
• Taking notes during the meeting
• Writing a formal report after the meeting
• Filing and sharing the minutes of each meeting

Step 1: Preparation for the Board Meeting

In learning how to take board nonprofit meeting minutes, it’s important to note that every organization records its minutes a little bit differently. The board president can fill the secretary in on any expected meeting minutes formats they should use. Secretaries can also review past meeting minutes and use them as a template. The board president will have a copy of the meeting agenda and the names of all attendees, including guests or speakers.

Step 2: Taking a Record of the Board Meeting

Unless your organization requires the secretary to type notes at the meeting, they can either type them out or write them longhand. A strong board meeting minutes template can help maintain more structured minutes. The two most important things to know when writing board meeting minutes are what information to record and how to present it. To take effective meeting minutes, the secretary should include:

• Date of the meeting
• Time the meeting was called to order
• Names of the meeting participants and absentees
• Corrections and amendments to previous meeting minutes
• Additions to the current agenda
• Whether a  quorum  is present
• Motions  taken or rejected
• Voting-that there was a motion and second, and the outcome of the vote
• Actions taken or agreed to be taken
• Items to be held over
• New business
• Open discussion or public participation
• Next meeting date and time
• Time of adjournment

Detailing the discussions during a board meeting is as crucial as including the information in the bullets above. For each agenda item, write a short statement of actions taken by the board and a brief explanation of the rationale for the activity. If there are extensive arguments, write a summary of the significant ideas.

When writing board meeting minutes, record discussions objectively and avoid inflammatory remarks and personal observations. A good way to do this is by avoiding adjectives and adverbs whenever possible. Check your language to be sure that it is clear, unambiguous and complete.

As noted earlier, nonprofit board meeting minutes are an official and legal record of the board meeting . In a legal arena, meeting minutes are presumed to be correct and can be legal evidence of the facts they report. Boards have legal liability, so keep information basic and language simple to avoid any legal complications that place the organization at a disadvantage in any legal proceedings. Use names only when recording motions and seconds.

After the meeting, the secretary will want to write the formal record when everything is still fresh in mind. It helps to prepare the document soon after the meeting.

Step 3: Writing the Official Record of the Board Meeting Minutes

Review the agenda to gain the full scope of the meeting. Add notes for clarification. Review actions, motions, votes and decisions for clarity. Edit the record so the minutes are concise, clear and easy to read.

It’s better to attach meeting handouts and documents referred to during the meeting to the final copy rather than summarizing the contents in the minutes.

Step 4: Signing, Filing and Sharing Minutes

Once your board meeting minutes are fully written, you are responsible for making them official by having the board secretary sign them. Your organization may also require the president’s signature.

As part of knowing how to take minutes for a board meeting, you should always follow your organization’s by-laws and protocols for storing minutes. It’s a good idea to have backup copies either in print, a hard drive, or (best case) a  board portal .

The secretary also has the responsibility for sharing minutes. Ensure the president has approved the minutes before sharing them in print or online.

Helpful Tips for Taking Board Meeting Minutes

• Use a template
• Check off attendees as they arrive
• Do introductions or circulate an attendance list
• Record motions, actions, and decisions as they occur
• Ask for clarification as necessary
• Write clear, brief notes rather than full sentences or verbatim wording
• Maintain the same verb tense

Common Mistakes in Taking Board Meeting Minutes

• Failure to document a quorum
• Ambiguous description of board actions
• Including information that could harm the board in a legal sense
• Lengthy delays in providing minutes after a meeting
• Delays in approving minutes from past meetings-missing mistakes
• Failing to file and manage documents
• Failing to get documents signed, so they serve as an official and legal record

Always be mindful that the purpose of taking meeting minutes is to reflect the true intentions of the board and that they are an official and legal record. Given the breadth of detail and complexity of the process associated with proper documentation of meeting minutes and learning to take minutes for a board meeting, many organizations find using  board portal software  helpful. Board portal tools help make this work easier and more efficient, ultimately elevating organizational performance.

As serious as the job is, taking and preparing minutes can also be a rewarding and edifying experience.

Board Meeting Minutes Best Practices

The exact format of board meeting minutes varies by the organization, although best practices for governance indicate that all meeting minutes should contain the basic information we bulleted in Step 2 as noted earlier in Taking Board Meeting Minutes: Step by Step.

Best practices also encourage boards to do the following:

• Obtain information from the board president about attendees, guests and any speakers or special presentations.
• Review the past meeting’s minutes and gather any documents for the meeting.
• The board secretary and board president should concur on the agenda and finalize it.
• Be consistent in the method of reporting so that the information is reliable.
• Carefully document any decisions the board makes.
• Document any next steps the board needs to take.
• Keep your statements short and concise.
• Utilize the minutes to track action items and follow-ups.

What Should Not Be Included in Meeting Minutes

Not everything should be included in nonprofit board meeting minutes. The wrong entries could pose problems for boards later on.

These are some of the things board secretaries should leave out of board meeting minutes:

• Abbreviations, acronyms, and jargon unless the meaning is obvious
• Judgmental comments
• Personal observations about members at the meeting
• Notes about personal arguments
• Statements with political undertones
• Exact discussions where lawyers gave legal advice
• Words of praise

As noted previously, board meeting minutes serve as legal records in a court of law. Discussions, comments, and direct quotes by board members could someday be taken out of context or be misinterpreted in court hearings. In the event of a lawsuit, the opposing counsel will be looking for weaknesses detailed in board meeting minutes. Too much information can lead  to legal risks .

Board Meeting Minutes Legal Requirements

Governance for nonprofits falls under state laws. Each state has its own mandates for registering a nonprofit. In most states, nonprofit boards are required to take and record board meeting minutes. It is best to store meeting minutes with other books and records.

States do not list requirements for how nonprofits must take minutes. Board secretaries routinely rely on best practices for meeting minutes as standard practice for recording meeting minutes properly.

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)

How detailed should meeting minutes be.

It is not appropriate to record everything board members say at a meeting. Minutes should only summarize the major points of a meeting relative to the board’s actions and decisions.

When Should Board Meeting Minutes Be Distributed?

Board meeting minutes should be distributed as soon as possible after the meeting so board members have sufficient time to review them and make corrections before voting to approve them. BoardEffect streamlines the process of getting minutes distributed and approved, as it all happens electronically.

What Is the Purpose of Board and Shareholder Meeting Minutes?

The purpose of board meeting minutes is to record motions, decisions and key discussions in connection with the board meeting agenda.

Who Should Take Minutes at a Board Meeting?

Any board member can take board meeting minutes, although it is typically the responsibility of the board secretary.

How Do Boards Approve Minutes at a Board Meeting?

At the start of a board meeting, boards must approve meeting minutes for the previous meeting. A unanimous consent vote must approve minutes.

Preparation for Board Secretaries: Using a Board Meeting Template

The board secretary and president should agree on the board minutes’ content. They should also decide what to leave out to protect the board and its directors from legal liabilities.

Board secretaries can prepare for meetings by reviewing formats of past meeting minutes and using templates for sample board meeting minutes. Templates will have areas to fill in pertinent information, such as the date, time, and regular agenda items, with flexibility for adding new items. It helps to review formats for nonprofit board meeting minutes that other organizations have used successfully.

Before each meeting, the board secretary will need to obtain information from the board president about attendees, guests, and any speakers or special presentations. The secretary will also want to review the past meeting’s minutes and gather any documents for the meeting. Finally, the secretary will work with the board president to set and solidify the agenda.

Some Final Words About Board Minutes

Templates and formats are essential tools for board secretaries. Why not use them to take much of the work from  recording board minutes ? A good rule for minute-takers is recording a statement for every board action to avoid being overly wordy.

Hopefully, your board meeting minutes will never be evidence in a court of law. If they are, however, using these tools, your board can rest assured that the minutes accurately reflect board business.

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