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Huh. So I've never taken meeting notes. I guess you write down some things people said. Do you then refer back to that later, or is it a memory aid thing? I do

Huh. So I've never taken meeting notes. I guess you write down some things people said. Do you then refer back to that later, or is it a memory aid thing? I don't feel like I'm missing anything, but equally the op has built a product to automate this, so it's got to be important in some contexts. Would like to know what I'm missing

Aperocky 4y ago
I've always took notes because I cannot remember anything in detail after a weekend. Taking notes doesn't have to be painful, for me it's just one `diary` command away and it will open/create the appropriate note file in my favorite editor: I've also packaged it as a pip package for distribution: https://github.com/Aperocky/diarycli https://github.com/Aperocky/diarycli
- umeshunni 4y ago
  There are notes like 'minutes' - i.e you're writing who said what in a meeting and 'notes' - capturing key decisions, next steps etc. Most tools are great at the minutes, but cannot have the context to do 'notes'
amelius 4y ago
For some people it is part of their job to take accurate notes of meetings.
mason55 4y ago
IMO the two important parts of meeting notes are 1. Decisions and supporting details 2. Action items with dates and assignees Those should be sent out to all attendees of the meeting (or written in a place that's accessible to everyone). Beyond that, each person needs to take notes for themselves for other things they want to remember.
thenerdhead 4y ago
Most managers do all their work through meeting summaries/notes. It is usually a symptom to a larger problem given that if people just showed up to meetings that mattered to them, they would be driven to do the things needed to get done from said meeting.
tekla 4y ago
I dont know how it would be possible to build anything reasonably complex with groups of people without taking meeting notes. Every single meeting would be everyone hallucinating what was said before in previous meetings, and lots of lying.
- pcrh 4y ago
  Quite. An important part of meeting notes is to establish what decisions had been made, and by whom. Most formal meetings start with approval of the minutes of the previous meeting.
- randomdata 4y ago
  > I dont know how it would be possible to build anything reasonably complex with groups of people without taking meeting notes. I don't imagine it is. I've never seen anything reasonably complex successfully built by way of meeting, notes or not. The actual work always happens when ideas are formally written down and iterated upon asynchronously. > Every single meeting would be everyone hallucinating what was said before in previous meetings, and lots of lying. Yup. Even with notetaking, that's all you can get out of meeting. You simply don't have immediate access to all the information you need (critical in complexity) in the heat of the moment to present useful thoughts, so anything that does come up is bound to be invalid anyway. Noting the invalid expression made during the meeting doesn't serve any purpose. As such, your notes are only as good as the trash that it is. It's a nice break from work, but that's about it.
amalcon 4y ago
I don't think every meeting needs notes, but there are three levels that I've found useful (as a dev). I don't take all of these at every meeting, but I make at least one of them at most. - An email to the group summarizing my action items, which I also add to my own to-do list. This way, if someone thinks I'm supposed to be doing something, they'll usually reply to the email to let me know. This also doesn't need to be recorded during the meeting; it can happen shortly thereafter (but it's often more efficient to write it during). - A list of useful bits of information that came up. "X is a thing; I should read more about it", "This person is working on Y; that's who to go to with questions", that sort of thing. - An outline of substantial discussions and key decisions. I don't need to write down every word of a twenty minute discussion of what color to make the button, but it's handy to have a reminder that "There was an extensive discussion of the color of the button. The agreement was that it should be red." If I'm asked to take notes for a group, this is what I generally produce; I've never had any complaints.
LocalPCGuy 4y ago
FWIW, it's been shown that just the act of taking notes enhances the memory of the person doing it, whether they refer back to the notes at a later time or not. As to the value of note taking in general, for devs, I equate it to telling someone to "put that in the ticket, don't verbally instruct what needs to be done". Documenting decisions made, who will do what, etc. can all be valuable and prevent needless discussions later about who's memory is correct about X (i.e. how something is supposed to function). Some people have great memories, but others do not, and even if you think yours is not in need of this kind of assistance, having something to reference back to can be a big help, especially when you can say something like "hmm, that's interesting, in my notes, I wrote down we decided to go with Y, but you are saying Z, when did that change?" I should note that taking notes is a skill like any other, done poorly it can probably have the opposite effect of causing distraction and missing things that are being discussed.

Aperocky 4y ago

I've always took notes because I cannot remember anything in detail after a weekend. Taking notes doesn't have to be painful, for me it's just one `diary` command away and it will open/create the appropriate note file in my favorite editor: I've also packaged it as a pip package for distribution: https://github.com/Aperocky/diarycli https://github.com/Aperocky/diarycli

umeshunni 4y ago
There are notes like 'minutes' - i.e you're writing who said what in a meeting and 'notes' - capturing key decisions, next steps etc. Most tools are great at the minutes, but cannot have the context to do 'notes'

amelius 4y ago

For some people it is part of their job to take accurate notes of meetings.

mason55 4y ago

IMO the two important parts of meeting notes are 1. Decisions and supporting details 2. Action items with dates and assignees Those should be sent out to all attendees of the meeting (or written in a place that's accessible to everyone). Beyond that, each person needs to take notes for themselves for other things they want to remember.

thenerdhead 4y ago

Most managers do all their work through meeting summaries/notes. It is usually a symptom to a larger problem given that if people just showed up to meetings that mattered to them, they would be driven to do the things needed to get done from said meeting.

tekla 4y ago

I dont know how it would be possible to build anything reasonably complex with groups of people without taking meeting notes. Every single meeting would be everyone hallucinating what was said before in previous meetings, and lots of lying.

pcrh 4y ago
Quite. An important part of meeting notes is to establish what decisions had been made, and by whom. Most formal meetings start with approval of the minutes of the previous meeting.
randomdata 4y ago
> I dont know how it would be possible to build anything reasonably complex with groups of people without taking meeting notes. I don't imagine it is. I've never seen anything reasonably complex successfully built by way of meeting, notes or not. The actual work always happens when ideas are formally written down and iterated upon asynchronously. > Every single meeting would be everyone hallucinating what was said before in previous meetings, and lots of lying. Yup. Even with notetaking, that's all you can get out of meeting. You simply don't have immediate access to all the information you need (critical in complexity) in the heat of the moment to present useful thoughts, so anything that does come up is bound to be invalid anyway. Noting the invalid expression made during the meeting doesn't serve any purpose. As such, your notes are only as good as the trash that it is. It's a nice break from work, but that's about it.

amalcon 4y ago

I don't think every meeting needs notes, but there are three levels that I've found useful (as a dev). I don't take all of these at every meeting, but I make at least one of them at most. - An email to the group summarizing my action items, which I also add to my own to-do list. This way, if someone thinks I'm supposed to be doing something, they'll usually reply to the email to let me know. This also doesn't need to be recorded during the meeting; it can happen shortly thereafter (but it's often more efficient to write it during). - A list of useful bits of information that came up. "X is a thing; I should read more about it", "This person is working on Y; that's who to go to with questions", that sort of thing. - An outline of substantial discussions and key decisions. I don't need to write down every word of a twenty minute discussion of what color to make the button, but it's handy to have a reminder that "There was an extensive discussion of the color of the button. The agreement was that it should be red." If I'm asked to take notes for a group, this is what I generally produce; I've never had any complaints.

LocalPCGuy 4y ago

FWIW, it's been shown that just the act of taking notes enhances the memory of the person doing it, whether they refer back to the notes at a later time or not. As to the value of note taking in general, for devs, I equate it to telling someone to "put that in the ticket, don't verbally instruct what needs to be done". Documenting decisions made, who will do what, etc. can all be valuable and prevent needless discussions later about who's memory is correct about X (i.e. how something is supposed to function). Some people have great memories, but others do not, and even if you think yours is not in need of this kind of assistance, having something to reference back to can be a big help, especially when you can say something like "hmm, that's interesting, in my notes, I wrote down we decided to go with Y, but you are saying Z, when did that change?" I should note that taking notes is a skill like any other, done poorly it can probably have the opposite effect of causing distraction and missing things that are being discussed.