Multitasking is a lot harder than it sounds. If you’ve ever started scrolling on social media while cooking a meal or folding laundry while watching TV, you may have ended up with overcooked food or misplaced jeans on at least one occasion. And if you’ve tried taking meeting notes while participating in a meeting, there’s a good chance you’ve missed a few key points.
Don’t feel bad — only 2.5% of people are capable of multitasking effectively. Translation: Unless you’re a unicorn, you probably aren’t making the most of your meetings by doing two things at once.
When you’re ready to let go of your role as a scribe, automated note-taking can pick up the slack so you can put your best foot forward in every meeting you attend. Here’s what you need to know about turning note-taking into a hands-free task.
What is automated note-taking?
Automated note-taking refers to the use of software that writes meeting notes on your behalf. It eliminates the need to designate someone as the notetaker, so all your attendees can be active meeting participants.
Most automated note-taking tools can transcribe your entire meeting, so you can easily search through a transcription of your notes instead of listening to audio until you find the answer you need. However, more advanced software can also help you organize your notes by identifying speakers, time stamps, action items, and more.
3 automated note-taking use cases
So where can automated notes come into play? Here are three of many use cases for using software to take detailed notes for you.
1. Team meeting notes
If there's an occasion that everyone can use automated note-taking software for, it’s team meetings. Whether you’re running a board meeting, leading a parent teacher organization, or simply doing one-on-ones with a coworker, automated notes can help you avoid inefficient meetings.
While it’s easy to forget your post-meeting to-dos the moment you end your calls, automated note-taking makes it easy to review everything that was agreed upon. When you choose software with artificial intelligence (AI) functionality that can identify action items on your behalf, you’re less likely to let important tasks slip through the cracks.
An extra plus: When every participant knows the meeting is being transcribed word for word, they’re less likely to stray off-topic and into a black hole of irrelevant subjects.
2. Client meeting notes
When you’re aiming to impress a client, you don’t want to make them answer questions you’ve already asked. Automated note-taking helps prevent embarrassing lapses in memory.
Whether you were talking strategy or negotiating pricing with your clients, your automated note-taking tool can create an official document for you to refer back to. Save your client meeting notes in a Dropbox or Google Drive folder for safekeeping in case you ever need to loop back in the future.
3. Interview transcriptions
When you’re interviewing plenty of candidates for a new hire, it’s easy to forget which candidate gave which response. Automated note-taking can generate interview transcriptions for managers and HR teams, so everyone can stay present during their video calls without committing every little detail to memory. When it’s time to select your ideal candidate, you can refer back to your transcripts to see who said what.
Journalists, podcasters, and other content creators can also use automated note-taking to eliminate the time-consuming process of listening back to voice memos or interview recordings. Automated interview transcriptions make it so much faster to quickly pull quotes and publish content.
How to automate note-taking
Automated note-taking is the easiest way to create a record of your meeting. Here are three simple steps that you can take to get the most from your automated notes.
1. Choose an automated note-taking tool
Automated note-taking tools typically fall into two different camps: those that transcribe audio recordings and those that transcribe live audio. If you want to save yourself the hassle of uploading massive files, you’ll want software that can create meeting transcriptions from live audio.
We’re a little biased, but we think Anchor AI is one of the best note-taking apps for meetings. It lets you fully reap the benefits of AI note-taking. In addition to generating a searchable transcript when your meeting ends, Anchor AI identifies speakers, time stamps, keywords, decisions, and action items. Anyone can skim the notes and quickly understand their next steps, even if they were physically (or mentally) away. You can sign up for Anchor AI to be one of the first to try the tool.
Another AI note-taking tool is Microsoft Teams. Microsoft Teams has a built-in speech-to-text tool that creates live transcriptions you can read in real time. While you can always download this script after the meeting, you’ll only get speaker attributions to organize the transcription.
2. Focus on your meetings
With software like Anchor AI, getting your transcription started only takes a few clicks. All you need to do is invite Anchor AI to your Zoom meeting and tap “record.” With the task of note-taking off your shoulders, you can spend your entire meeting making meaningful contributions (and definitely not dozing off).
3. Share notes with your team
When your transcription is ready, keep the momentum of your meeting going by sharing notes with your team and any relevant stakeholders. Instead of letting everything that was discussed slip away and groaning about another wasted meeting, you can keep absentees in the loop and nudge everyone to get started on their action items.
If your organization needs to follow a specific meeting notes template, you can always transfer your automated notes to a Google Doc or Word doc and give it some light editing before sharing.
Want to go the extra mile? Turn your action items into tasks by plugging them into your project management software and assigning them with deadlines.
Spark Your Team into Action With Anchor AI
When you use automated note-taking to streamline your workflow, you can step away from your laptop and give your meetings and team members the undivided attention they deserve.
Automated notes give you the peace of mind you need to fully participate in meetings, interviews, and beyond. With a complete transcription to fall back on, you’ll never have to worry about missing any important points — or worse, forgetting the action items you’re responsible for.
Automated meeting notes also make it easy to share notes with anyone who needs them, from your absent team members to the clients who always have questions about your meeting, right after your meeting.
With Anchor AI, you can make your automated note-taking even more powerful. Anchor AI can highlight keywords, decisions, and action items, so even a quick skim can get your team members up-to-date. Plus, Anchor AI notes are organized with speaker names and time stamps to keep them as searchable as possible. Sign up for Anchor AI and be one of the first to try it out.