# How to take meeting notes your team will use

> Good meeting notes record decisions and actions, not a transcript. Learn a simple structure, who takes notes and how to make sure actions happen.

Meeting notes are not a transcript. They are a record of what was decided, who will do what by when and what was set aside.

Web page: https://kansohq.app/guides/how-to-take-meeting-notes

Updated: 5 October 2026

## What notes are for

Notes let people who were not there catch up, and let people who were there remember the same thing. They are also the difference between a meeting that changed something and one that only felt busy. If nobody reads the notes, they are written wrongly.

## A structure for notes

1. **Decisions, first.** Only what was actually decided, in one line each. Put them at the top, because that is what most people want.
2. **Actions.** Each one has an owner and a date: “Owner, what, by when”. An action with no owner will not happen.
3. **Discussion.** The reasons and the options, kept short. This is for the reader who wants to understand why.
4. **Parked.** Topics raised but not settled, so they are not lost and not argued again.

**Notes from a planning sync**

> **Decision:** We ship the new onboarding in the next release, without the video.
> **Action:** the product lead updates the onboarding copy by Thursday.
> **Action:** the engineering lead confirms the staging fix by Wednesday.
> **Parked:** Whether to translate the onboarding.

## Who takes the notes

Someone who is not leading the meeting. Rotate the job, so one person is not always the clerk. Take notes live in a shared document, so everyone can see them and correct them as you go.

## Make the actions happen

- End the meeting by reading the actions aloud, with names and dates.
- Put each action where the person already looks: their task list or the board, not only in the notes.
- Begin the next meeting by checking the last one’s actions.

## Keep the notes findable

- One page per meeting, titled with the topic and the date.
- One place for a recurring meeting, with the newest at the top.
- Link the notes from the project they affect.

## Notes for different kinds of meeting

| Meeting | What to write down |
| --- | --- |
| Planning | The goal, what was chosen, what was left out and why |
| Design review | The decisions, the objections and who owns each follow-up |
| One to one | Anything either person promised, and what to revisit next time |
| Stand-up | Nothing, if the board is up to date. Write only blockers and who will help |
| Customer call | What they said in their own words, what they asked for and what you promised |

## Notes without a meeting

Many meetings can be replaced by a written update. Put the question and the context on a page, ask people to add their answers by a time and write the decision at the top when it is made. It takes people less time, works across time zones and leaves a record. Keep a call for the things that need it, and still write the notes.

## Mistakes that make notes useless

- Writing down everything that was said. The notes become as long as the meeting and nobody reads them.
- Leaving out the decisions, because they seemed obvious in the room. They will not be next month.
- Writing actions as “we should…”. Name a person and a date, or it is a wish.
- Keeping the notes in a private notebook that nobody else can open.
- Sending the notes days later, when the details are gone and the actions have stalled.

## Meeting notes in Kanso

The [meeting notes template](https://kansohq.app/templates/meeting-notes.md) has decisions, actions, discussion and parked ready. Write an action as a to-do and promote it to a card on the [board](https://kansohq.app/product/boards.md), and @mention the owner so it reaches their [inbox](https://kansohq.app/product/inbox.md).

## Questions

### What should meeting notes include?

The decisions, the actions with an owner and a date, a short summary of the discussion and anything parked for later.

### Who should take meeting notes?

Someone who is not leading the meeting, and the role should rotate. Take them live in a shared document so they can be corrected on the spot.

### How long should meeting notes be?

One page at most. If the notes are longer than the decisions and actions they record, they are a transcript.

### How do you make sure meeting actions get done?

Give each action an owner and a date, put it in the owner’s task list as well as the notes, and check last meeting’s actions at the start of the next.

## Keep reading

- [How to run a retrospective that changes something](https://kansohq.app/guides/how-to-run-a-retrospective.md): A retrospective is only worth it if something changes afterwards. Learn a simple format, how to run it in an hour and how to follow through.
- [How to plan a sprint without overcommitting](https://kansohq.app/guides/how-to-plan-a-sprint.md): Sprint planning in five steps: set a goal, check capacity, choose work, break it down and name the risks. Includes how teams without sprints do it.
- [Why team chat should link to the work](https://kansohq.app/guides/team-chat-linked-to-tasks.md): Chat and task tools drift apart. See why team chat should link to tasks, how to keep decisions from getting lost in threads and habits that help.
- [Meeting notes template: decisions and actions | Kanso](https://kansohq.app/templates/meeting-notes.md): A meeting notes template that puts decisions first, then actions with owners and dates, then discussion and parked topics. Copy it, or start it in Kanso.
- [Retrospective template for software teams | Kanso](https://kansohq.app/templates/retrospective.md): A retrospective template with what went well, what did not, what we learned and what we will change, each change with an owner. Copy it, or start it in Kanso.

## Parts of Kanso used

- [Kanso Docs](https://kansohq.app/product/docs.md): Pages with headings, to-dos, tables and code, kept inside the project they describe, next to its board and its release.
- [Kanso Boards](https://kansohq.app/product/boards.md): A board for each piece of work. Cards carry a priority, an owner, a due date and the criteria that say when they are done.
- [Kanso Inbox](https://kansohq.app/product/inbox.md): Mentions, messages and work assigned to you, one line each, in the order it arrived.

[Kanso home, with plans and prices](https://kansohq.app/index.md)