Minute Taking

Course suitable for:

This programme is for you if you are, or plan to be, responsible for recording minutes of meetings and noting important action points as part of your role. You will be brought up to date with the latest thinking on meeting records and all the practical skills of minutetaking. A key message is that minutetaking can only be effective as part of the wider process of meeting administration. Minutes should be brief, but how should they look? Examples in a range of formats will be used, and participants can take away ideas for improving the quality of their own work.

Helping to make meetings work

• What are minutes for
• Purpose of meetings
• Types of meetings
• Benefits of good minute taking
• Preparation and planning
• Writing styles
• What to avoid

Roles in a meeting

• Clarifying meeting objectives
• What is an agenda?
• How to construct an agenda
• Using the agenda as an agent of control
• Keeping up

Active listening skills

How to intervene

Notetaking formats

• What to note down
• Taking minutes
• How to create a table of actions
• Styles of minute taking
• Editing the minutes

Key words

• What was agreed?
• Action to be taken following the meeting

Feedback, summarising and closing

• Proof reading
• Final presentation
• Minute taking practice: The opportunity to take the minutes of a meeting
• Rewriting badly written minutes

Review of Programme

Other Recommended Programmes

• Making Meetings Work
• Microsoft Word Level 1