Action and Decision Logs

This is and alternative way of recording your group's work and progress.  The complement and reduce the traditional (and often lengthy) minutes system.  They help keep valuable information organised and prevent it from getting lost.  

Changing A Mindset - Traditional meeting minutes can be counterproductive. Focus on recording actions instead.

Understand the Purpose of the Meeting - Meetings should be about making decisions, not just discussing things. An action log records what needs to be done after the meeting.  The decision log records what was done with the information and the resources at the time, if done justly it can protect the liability of the board/committee members.

Some reasons to move to this method:

ACTIONS

Clarity of the journey - WHO: Who agreed to the action? WHAT: What exactly do they need to do? BY WHEN: When will they complete it?

Always Clarify Actions - At the end of meetings, review and clarify actions. At the beginning of the next meeting, review the action log and update progress.

DECISIONS

Keep a separate log for votes and decisions.

Record what decision was made, when, and who was involved.

Both logs can be used to trace back to the root of issues or repeat success by understanding what came before.