Guidelines For Writing Minutes Of Meeting Properly

Have you ever been a secretary to an organisation or a society? If yes, you would probably know what the writing minutes of the meeting are all about. If not, this article will serve as a guideline for you. Meetings happen all around the world. Some meetings will be casual, and some will be organisational meetings. The meetings that we will discuss today are organisational meetings. The board of directors of a particular company meet and plan a new policy. This policy needs to be written down on a piece of paper. The secretary does this job and writes all the decisions and happenings of the meeting in a document form.

Remember, writing minutes of meeting is a tough job. It seems easy upon hearing the role, but actually, it’s not. It requires a lot of writing and interpreting skills. The purpose of the minutes of a meeting is to keep a record of the previous decisions and policies. They also provide legal protection for the company. Minutes also serve as proof of why and how the company made past decisions.

 

Guidelines for Writing Minutes

Thus, keeping in mind its importance and purpose, the writer must follow some guidelines. A brief description of all the guidelines is as follows as shared by expert writers of academic writing services;

 

Include meeting basics

Every meeting in an organisation is always scheduled before its time. The writer must prepare the minutes of the meeting document ahead of the actual meeting. On that paper, he should include the details of all the basics of the meeting. The fundamental details can be the date, time, and place. It ensures that you have pre-planned everything and waiting for the meeting to happen. It is also essential in the sense that you won’t be able to write this information during the meeting. Thus, prepare the document first hand and include all the essential details.

 

Names of the participants

Attendance is very important in a meeting. During a board meeting, every member of the board must be present. But there could be some emergency when a participant can’t attend the meeting. The writer must note missing members’ names and reasons in such circumstances. Along with missing members, make sure to write all the participants’ names. It will serve the purpose of communication as well. The writer will know who heard what. After the meeting, writing minutes of meeting will help the writer to share it with missing ones.

Purpose of the meeting

Next comes writing the purpose of the meeting. Organisational meetings are organised to discuss an agenda or a new policy. For example, the meeting will be arranged to discuss the employees’ new leave and medical insurance policy. Thus, this is the purpose of the meeting. The writer of the meeting minutes should be able to elaborate on why this meeting will be called. This record will be essential for the individuals who couldn’t attend the meeting.

 

Write the agenda items

Before every high-level meeting, the agenda of the meeting is disclosed. This agenda document serves the purpose of outlining the meeting purpose. The agenda items also help the writer in writing the minutes of meeting in their section. For example, a company’s top leadership gathers to discuss the following items.

• Improving the work-life balance of employees
• Providing accommodation to employees of remote areas
• Discussion on inflation and increment in the salaries of employees

The above three points are the agenda items. It is telling that the new board meeting will discuss these things and decide accordingly. Therefore, the minutes should be on these items. Each minute meeting should also be written in its section. The decisions of the 2nd agenda cannot come in the section of the 3rd item.

 

Action items

Productive meetings result in decisions on the agenda items. The decision is itself an action. For example, the company board approves a 10% increment in the salaries of employees based on the current inflation. This 10% increment is an action. The minutes of the meeting should include all such actions. Sometimes, the board appoints someone to investigate an agenda further. Writing minutes of meeting also include documenting these details too. Most of the time, capturing and writing every action might be difficult. In such cases, remembering and using some kind of recording device can also be beneficial.

 

Next meeting date and place

All the meetings do not end with solid results and decisions. In such cases, the board decides to discuss the agenda on a new date and place. The meeting attendees must know about the following meeting details. Therefore, mentioning the place and date of the next meeting while writing the minutes of meeting is essential. The secretary or writer shares the information with missing members so that they can attend the next meeting.

Example Format of Writing Minutes of Meeting

Associated Consulting Engineers Pvt. Ltd.
27 January 2022

 
1. Call to order
Mr. ABC called to order the regular meeting of the senior leadership of ACE Pvt. Ltd. at 10:00 AM on 27 January 2022 in the conference room.

 
2. Roll call
Secretary Mr. CDF conducted a roll call. The following persons were present:

• Mr FGH (Senior General Manager)
• Mr IJK (Project Managers)
• Engr. Mr. LMN (CFO)

 
3. Approval of minutes from last meeting
Secretary Mr. CDF read the minutes from the last meeting. The minutes were approved.

 
4. Open issues

• Improving the work-life balance of employees
• Providing accommodation to employees of remote areas
• Discussion on inflation and increment in the salaries of employees

 
5. Adjournment
Mr. ABC adjourned the meeting at 11:00 AM. The next meeting will be held on 04 February 2022.

Minutes submitted by: Mr. CDF
Minutes approved by: Mr. ABC

Final Thoughts

Writing minutes of meeting doesn’t need to be stressful. In fact, such minutes bring calm to your life and free you from many worries. Yes, writing by hand can be difficult. In such cases, you can make use of a laptop as it will assist you in writing quickly.