An approach that I've used in stakeholder meetings (e.g. a project review with external customers) is to have a designated note-taker who creates a record of de

An approach that I've used in stakeholder meetings (e.g. a project review with external customers) is to have a designated note-taker who creates a record of decisions and actions. They can add additional content as they so wish. At the end of the meeting they quickly summarise the decisions / actions. This helps to ensure that sure everyone leaves the meeting on the same page and also allows people to comment if they thing something has been omitted. This record can be distributed almost immediately including to people who couldn't make it or who have an interest. If everyone keeps track themselves it is easy with the best will in the world for actions to get forgotten or misinterpreted. If the meeting is complex and the chair has to get involved (e.g. to adjudicate) then they often will be too busy to take the notes themselves; I for one cannot steer a discussion and take notes at the same time. This is also a good way to introduce competent juniors to meetings - make them the record taker (they need to be be briefed first on what is expected). Even tracking who people are can be quite challenging. If there are lots of new faces (e.g. external reviewers) the chair may need to get people to introduce themselves (name and role only, not a bio), and the meeting recorder can concentrate on matching faces with the names on the invite list. If the meeting is in a conference room, writing names around a little picture representing the table can help with this. Finally, in the sense that history is written by the victors, owning the minutes can be quite a powerful position.