Suggested Notetaking Guidelines

by Tree Bressen

The essentials of notetaking are:

• date of the meeting (including the year)
• who was present
• title of each item clearly labeled
  (skip a line between items)
• agreements and decisions (put a star next to decisions)
• next steps

On decisions, it's also helpful to include:

• reasons and intentions for a decision
• name and reason of anyone standing aside

If it's a major item, then it's also good to include:

• main points of discussion
• questions answered
• range of opinion
• concerns raised
  • whether each concern was resolved or not
• "sense of the meeting"
• new ideas

Tree Bressen, facilitator and teacher, has been assisting intentional communities, nonprofits, and other organizations with group process since 1994. Pages from her website are available for copying and distribution free of charge as long as you continue to include these credit lines and contact information.

Tree Bressen
1990 Orchard Street
Eugene, Oregon 97403
541-343-3855
tree@ic.org