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On Thursday, August 25, 2005, TECHWR-L digest wrote:
> I started my present job at the beginning of May '05. Part of my job
> is to capture the meeting minutes for the team's weekly meetings. *I
> am trying to learn how many other tech writers have this kind of a
> responsibility and how they do it.*
In a previous life I worked as the executive asst. to the CEO of a
company. I sat in at least three meetings a week and part of my
responsibility was to record the minutes. One was a management
meeting that lasted 2-3 hours (ugh!). Other meetings were technical
project meetings which were typically at least an hour. I was given
this task because I was good at it and because I understood the
technical side well enough to produce viable notes (and because I
was the CEO's right hand...).
I recorded the meetings on tape and I also took handwritten notes. I
did not know formal short hand, but I devised my own short cuts
which helped speed the process (fairly intuitive ones -- a delta
character for change, three parallel horizontal lines to mean
between, etc....).
I typed the minutes from my notes. I used the tape as a back up to
listen to something I might not have completely understood. I typed
up more of a narrative, not the outline form like others have
suggested. Like anything else, it is a skill that improves with
practice. Things that help are: learning to write fast :) (and coming
up with some of your own short hand), having a good memory, and
the ability to separate the wheat from the chaff. Essentially, all of
these (especially the latter) are skills that you need to be a
competent technical writer to begin with.
In summary, I agree with your boss. Use your handwritten notes.
Rely on the tape only if there's something you feel like you didn't
completely understand the first time around. As others have
mentioned, this is not a word by word transcription but a summary of
the meeting.
And *relax*. Get the pertinent points down on paper in a manner in
which others can readily understand and call it good :)
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