In my experience with minutes, it is important to keep them handy and organized, especially in anything involving a group and a long term project. For our capstone group, our advisor encourages or even requires us to take copious meeting minutes. This is important for the success of the project, so that everyone is on the same page when it comes down to what was discussed. For example, if someone was absent for the meeting, they can read the minutes and still be up to date with what was discussed. Even if everyone was present, it aids in remembering what was said and who was responsible for each task. It is important to keep everyone accountable for what was discussed at the meeting, and it leads to a more successful group dynamic.
Creating an outline – as discussed earlier, having an outline based on the agenda makes it easy for you to simply jot down notes ideas 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. Check-off attendees as they enter the room - 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 in your outline as soon as they occur to be sure they are recorded accurately
Ask for clarification if necessary – 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 write just the decisions, assignments, action steps, etc.
Record it – literally, if you are concerned about being able to keep up with note taking, consider recording the meeting 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 need clarification.
Meeting minutes is good to keep track of because this also helps you keep in track of what phase you are in in a project. For Capstone, I have weekly meetings with my group members and advisor, and everything that was discussed in the meeting is logged; we also discuss where we currently stand regarding the project which tells us what we need to do for the following weeks. This log is a great way of keeping everyone on their feet to ensure no one slacks that can cause delays in the project.
Taking minutes in meetings and reviewing them after are very important. They often provide when certain projects are due and what is needed to be completed. If you miss something in a meeting or forget what might have been said, the minutes will give you an overview of everything that was stated in the meeting. This will allow you to stay on track and complete tasks as scheduled. Even if nothing is forgotten from the meeting, the notes will help you to make sure that everything is completed as needed. There is less confusion when notes are taken in meetings because they are always there as a reference.
I have been to few meetings, where minutes are taken, this are really important especially if you are forgetful or busy in general, because you can always look back at it to know what happened in the meeting. The main reason for this is, because lots of tasks are assigned during the meetings. People have finish this task by given deadline. This are important because sometimes people forget, who was assigned what and by whom. With the minutes, no one can go back on their word, because its recorded. They also act as guideline for people who either missed the meeting or arrived late to the meeting, so that they know what happened in the meeting.
Meeting minutes, we can all agree, are useful in retracing and revisiting topics covered during meetings. As has been mentioned above, meeting minutes can help track some of the thought processes and logic that lead to decisions. Acting as a sort of narrative of the ebbs and flows of a project. In my own personal experience, meeting minutes have provided varying degrees of usefulness. At my current company, Pfizer, meeting minutes are not nearly as critical in my division. The work is very regimented and experimental and development work occurs in different groups. However, at my previous job, meeting minutes were absolutely essential. Primarily in order to keep my micromanaging manager in check. It helped to cover myself in the event that a "midnight inspiration" led him to question a decision or doubt the reason a particular course of action was being employed. In either case, meeting minutes have proven to be helpful.
In our student organizations, minutes were always a chore delegated to the lowest ranking member. However, last year it became an issue when our minutes were not posted on the website. We were finalizing a project and erroneously left out an important aspect of it that was discussed during the previous week's meeting. While tedious, minutes are important in order to highlight important parts of a meeting and to set tasks for revisiting and completion.
Meeting minutes are extremely important! While I have not worked in any form in the engineering industry and have no experience on how their meeting is conducted I have been a member of several student body organization on NJIT campus that hold weekly or bi-weekly meetings. In EVERY organization that I have been a part of there is always a secretary position on the leadership team/e-board. The main job of the secretary to complete the meeting agenda and then add to the meeting notes as the meeting is taking place and topic and discussing and voted on. The secretary is also responsible for marking down who said what in the meeting. For example, if the floor is open or closed for voting or to discuss a topic before voting the secretary marks who is requesting this and what points are product up by whom. This is so we can all look back and review what happened at that meeting if needed and remember what was said and who said it. I have to agree with Dr.Simon because clear meeting notes have come in handy when trying to argue something or clear up a situation in the future.
I believe that meeting minutes are very important because they help show the department and everyone else which tasks are the most important and what should take priority when it comes to projects. They also show people when deadlines are coming up which can be referred back to when it is days later (or even weeks) after the meeting. These meeting minutes will also show different departments where everyone is with their projects and assignments to see if they need more time to finish it or if it’s being done on time. When there are discussions at meetings, many things can be said that can confuse people but the minutes will give you the final say which can clear up confusions. Also, there are some people who do not take notes during meetings so the minutes will help them stay up to date with what they’re missing or what they forgot about. The minutes essentially saves them from anything getting messed up. When there are deadlines that are missed, it can cost the department and the company a lot of money. Finding alternatives can also be difficult so with minutes, if this is the case, everyone is aware and knows to take action earlier on. These meeting minutes also show who is responsible for which task. Those responsible will have to make sure to finish their assignments or ask for help otherwise they will be the ones who get in trouble. This also shows ownership if it’s someone who is taking on a new role which can look good for the boss. These minutes also give legal protection. They are legal documentations which can be checked by auditors and courts so if it’s not in the minutes it could be said that it doesn’t happen. Meeting minutes also show structure and organization for the department.
Meeting minutes are important because there are specific points that can pointed out in a meeting that are important in moving the project forward and it is helpful for keeping the meeting productive. Also, it keeps issues discussed in the meeting and decisions regarding to these issues. Minutes can also be used as proof that a meeting took place to provide reference for those who were unable to attend. In addition, It keep tracks of the deadline and not to be behind with the project. Beside that, it is important in guiding the team to complete deadlines and having everything done on schedule.
Taking minutes and reviewing them has multiple benefits that I personally have noticed greatly during my time working in the industry. One obvious benefit of taking minutes for meetings is that it keeps everyone informed of the status of important projects. In the industry, every minute is valuable and cannot be wasted. Especially when projects have strict deadlines. The reality is, it would be inefficient and unrealistic for everyone involved in a project to attend all meetings. Especially if that project holds daily meetings. Keeping the individuals that support the projects up to date and informed is crucial for them to effectively and quickly provide the resources necessary to move forward when the time comes. Personally, I hold a supporting role and I am responsible to provide test orders when projects are required to conduct tests. If I were to not attend the daily meetings and not read the meeting minutes provided, I would spend a good amount of time to catch up with the status of the project to ensure whatever I provide the others is appropriate and sufficient for their testing at the time. When there is very little time to reach deadlines for a project, there really is not much time to ask many questions or make mistakes so depending on the meeting minutes to avoid any delays. In addition to this, meeting minutes are also essential to even those who attended the meeting. Referring back to conversations and details that may have been missed or forgotten over a period time is critically helpful. In many cases, meetings are taken over skype with people across the country and even the world. Having to contact people from long distances at a time in the day that aligns with their work hours just to repeat what was discussed in the past is difficult, inconvenient, time consuming, and unprofessional.
The minutes in the meetings are very important because of they often specify how the team members are assigned their works and the deadlines, so that the responsibilities will be clear for the members to bear in mind. For instance, if you are gonna write about how you will make a bone implant design works, many small details should be taken seriously. Members from different department should have their own specialty to look at this design and try to settle down the material issues, the technique issues, the analysis issues, the installment issue, and so on. These minutes will be then built up to the DHF, the design history file. This file is what FDA will examine very carefully to the details that could possibly cause trouble, so it basically decides the success of the whole project.
Honestly, minutes are one of the most important aspects of a meeting. If something is not in the minutes, it did not happen. That's why it is important that the person taking the minutes is paying attention and takes great meeting minutes. You also don't want to mishear something and write it down because as with my second sentence if it's in the minutes, it happened.
My experience with minutes for meetings was in a non engineering setting. I was a secretary of a church group and I had to write down the important dates we went over in the meeting. This was mostly done so it could be sent out to the two representatives from each church so they can give the information to the church. It was very helpful because not everyone can make the phone call meetings so to have minutes that just explain the important parts that can be given to the other members of the church helps give out information more efficiently. But I feel like the members who attended the meeting really do not care for the minutes and that they are just there. They are mostly used so that when the next meeting happens we know what we did the meeting before. Minutes are important because they do document important information that happened during the meetings.
Minutes for meetings has been very important and useful to me in the medical device industry. For example, I had to take minutes for a quarterly quality meeting that we had. In the meeting we discussed some important points that our site needed to focus on and improve. We also discussed some steps we should take and who to contact for help. My manager went to me at the end of the meeting and mentioned she can't recall all the points that were mentioned. We went through the minutes and were able to recall everything. That is why documentation is important.
