to hate doing minutes of a meeting

[CaptSkippy]

Last week, due to the absence of a person who usually does the minutes, I was asked two minutes for before a meeting started to do minutes.

I hate doing minutes. I can't keep an accurate record of a meeting and participate in it at the same time. People also talk too quickly for me to take notes of all that was said. The end result is that I always end up with scores of complaints any time I have taken minutes. It also takes me a really long time to write them up afterwards and if things are busy with my main responsibilities people keep pestering me for them when I really have no time to write it all out and share them.

These days I make sure that minutes are not part of my job repsonsibilities anymore and I refuse to even consider a job where that is a requirement.

I told the person who asked that I am no good at doing minutes, that I never end up with anything useful and that I only jot down a few things for myself. Despite my telling him this, he came back later and asked me what I got. I got all of two lines of the two hours meeting. I hope his own notes were more useful, but I never agreed to do them.

So was I being unreasonable?

Surely an admin would be present. Why would participants need to do that? It's a menial task

@SafelySoftly

I just can’t imagine just saying oh no I can’t do it. Everything I’m asked to do at work I give 100% and try my hardest. 2 points from a 2 hour meeting isn’t that. Is this public sector?!? Because I’d be looking at a disciplinary in private sector for this, at least a performance improvement plan! It’s not the hard!!

Why would you assume its public sector?? Because theres more cuts so people have to pick up work? Or because you assume in the public sector people arent working? OP hasnt mentioned anything about the repercussions of not taking adequate minutes (that arent her job) whether there are some or not

Just take action points. That's all people look at minutes for - what has been dumped on them to sort out.

YANBU to hate doing them, but YABVU to be asked, and then to only record 2 lines of a 2 hour meeting.

You need to be assertive.

We don't have any administrative assistance - in our Team we take turns to keep minutes. Before we move to next item on the agenda, the person whose turn it is will often say "Hold on a minute - just for the minutes - what do you want recording about {topic just discussed}". Or "For the minutes - this is what I've put {read out} does that cover everything?".

Just sitting there with the meeting having asked you to take them, and then not doing them, is unreasonable.

I would have refused to take minutes, that's a specific skill I'm not trained to do. It would have been better to record the meeting for someone to minute later.

I would take informal notes at a push but thankfully in the male dominated world I work in no one would dare ask me to take notes, I've had male executive directors offer to take notes rather than ask me and risk appearing sexist. My female line manager is the only one who would ask me, but only notes never formal minutes.

I have to do it once a month and I loathe it. Luckily two of the agenda items are always guest speakers so I can just write ‘XX gave an interesting talk on XX. PowerPoint to follow’.

I don’t take minutes but I do note down key points and actions from important meetings.

Otherwise things just get forgotten.

It’s a skill like any other, you get better the more you do it.

What jobs do you people do??? I am a manager and lead leadership meetings, that is an admin job not an executive one.

Isn't it standard office sexism to expect a woman, however senior or irrelevant her role, to pick up this shit, or book a table for a company dinner. I've seen countless w of senior business women being given as hoc menial tasks, not in their job description, instead asking male office juniours/ interns, or men doing it themselves.

YANBU he isn't your boss, it's not your job and you didn't agree to do it.

@toomanydogsandcats

What jobs do you people do??? I am a manager and lead leadership meetings, that is an admin job not an executive one.

Lots of work areas don't have any admin staff. Admin staff have been cut and their work absorbed by everyone else.

I take minutes several times a week and I enjoy it. What you need to remember, is that as the person taking the minutes you control the narrative and direction of the meeting.

OP, you were asked to minute the meeting, from your post it is not clear that you actually refused and said, "No." From this you tell us you managed two lines in two hours... even on a personal note taking scale that is pretty poor. If you have deliberately done this so you are never asked again, then understandable but not professional. I suggest that next time you are asked, you tell your colleages you do not have the capacity to take and turn around minutes, because currently you are going to be the only one being embarrassed.

I'm not surprised you hate doing minutes, it's not your job, and the fact that you were one of only two women in the group, and a woman was asked, leans highly toward sexism.

if you're asked again, politely say "why have you asked me?.

Back in the day when I did feel obliged to take minutes, I got the feedback "Einstein's minutes seem to say what she would liked to have been said, rather than what actually was". 🥳

@suzyscat

Isn't it standard office sexism to expect a woman, however senior or irrelevant her role, to pick up this shit, or book a table for a company dinner. I've seen countless w of senior business women being given as hoc menial tasks, not in their job description, instead asking male office juniours/ interns, or men doing it themselves.

YANBU he isn't your boss, it's not your job and you didn't agree to do it.

Absolutely, @suzyscat

I facilitated an off-site recently. Old-skool style with flip charts, pens and post its. Bloody lovely!

Attendees were 50/50 men and women. Genuinely enlightened forward thinkers. At the end of the day, when it came to taking stuff off walls etc, no word of a lie, the men went to the bar and the women starting clearing.

I said "you are kidding me" and one of the women - more senior than the men - actually ran out and got them back in.

They were sheepish but it was still instinctive.

I take minutes several times a week and I enjoy it. What you need to remember, is that as the person taking the minutes you control the narrative and direction of the meeting.

This. I'm good at it, and depending on the audience may add sarcastic or exaggerated comments (there's never actually been fisticuffs in any meeting I've been in, but my minutes may have suggested otherwise, after a contentious discussion...) I've even had feedback that people enjoyed reading my minutes, which must be a rare thing indeed. (I was quite surprised they actually read them!)

It is important to catch decisions and actions, which is the main point of it. Even if I'm not minuting the meeting, I will often note those points anyway, at least for projects I care about.

However as much as I'm good at doing it, and often don't mind, no one is daft enough to ask me to do it often, because I am usually the only woman there, and most of them will have previously been subject to me pointing out sexist assumptions around who should do certain tasks etc.

@toomanydogsandcats

Surely an admin would be present. Why would participants need to do that? It's a menial task

Really? Menial?

They can form the basis of a criminal prosecution. Get them wrong and potentially somebody dies or goes to prison, depending upon what it is that is being minuted. That's not menial by any stretch of the imagination.

@Hercisback

I'd argue if there was only 2 lines in a 2 hour meeting then was it worth your time being there?

If you were asked because you're a woman that puts a whole different spin on things.

This!!

@okletsdothis

Teams has a transcription tool so if you set it up it will transcribe everything said by everyone and the provide it at the end

Have you ever actually used this though? Maybe it's just the accents (our team is made up of scottish, irish and welsh accents) but the transcription that came out of our last meeting was hilarious, and would have been absolutely no use if you were relying on it for minutes. 'Clear and concise' for example, somehow became 'thieves in the night'

But yes, I hate minute taking with a passion, and dread every meeting.

Yes we are the same! Hilarious read back, but not a reflection of our actual meeting!

It's also worth mentioning that the requirement for Minutes can vary depending on the business, but as a PP said in an industry that is required to demonstrate governance and compliance the need for accurate Minutes and recording of events/actions/approvals etc as a legal requirement is very different to keeping a record of a team meeting in another industry sector.

In the first example it is a skilled and well paid role and certainly not menial!

I don't love doing them but they're not hard.

It's minutes not a transcript, it just needs to capture the talking points and agreed actions so my basic format is

For you. They aren’t hard for you. There are plenty of bits of my job that are really easy that you wouldn’t be able to do as well as I can if you aren’t doing it all the time.

The point is, it’s not OP’s job and it shouldn’t fall to her to take the minutes. People used to try it on me, usually because I was the only woman in the room and I always said no, not doing them, it’s not my job.

The person who chairs the meeting should do the minutes, unless they have an assistant who does it for them.

I've always been terrible at taking minutes, but I have an ADHD diagnosis so thankfully not having to do them is one of my reasonable adjustments. In my team minute taking is rotated through the whole team, not just purely an administrator task. It's one of those things that some people seem to be able to do without even trying whereas for me I'd get maybe two legibly lines down, like the OP, then pages of incoherent scrawl!

@toomanydogsandcats

What jobs do you people do??? I am a manager and lead leadership meetings, that is an admin job not an executive one.

It's a senior admin job, it requires training and experience to do well. I check minutes for a meeting I attend and even with an experience minute taker who's recognised as being pretty good I make at least small amendments every month where she's not quite understood something technically or included something that wasn't particularly relevant. You need a good chair and good supporting papers as well as a competent experienced minute taker for good minutes, ours get referenced in papers for other meetings and audited. Action notes for an informal meeting are different.

What jobs do you people do??? I am a manager and lead leadership meetings, that is an admin job not an executive one.

😂 “leadership meetings” which train people that admin tasks are beneath them 😂

Yeah, we’ve all worked for those “leaders” before.

Urgh. I HATE doing minutes. Like you said I would not apply for a job with it listed. I started a new job in Jan 2020 after 15 years in the same team. Two weeks later I was asked to do minutes for a meeting with 32 people the names of whom I did not know. I was a wreck. Had to make little cardboard things with the participants initials and was also part of the meeting - difficult to concentrate and write things down. It was horrendous. They made me do it a couple more times despite me saying I wouldn't have gone for for job if I'd know. In the end I said if I continue having to do them I will start proactively looking for a new job! They transferred the minute taking to someone who was actually an admin person and had experience of writing minutes.

@BoredZelda

What jobs do you people do??? I am a manager and lead leadership meetings, that is an admin job not an executive one.

😂 “leadership meetings” which train people that admin tasks are beneath them 😂

Yeah, we’ve all worked for those “leaders” before.

And also unaware of something known as a Governance Professional, who can be the person whose works determines whether the manager is promoted or reported to the Police.

Of course, it can be useful to be viewed as nothing more than a glorified typist, as it's then possible to document discussions where illegal actions are being attempted - how would a mere typist know that what you've just said is proof you're committing an offence, after all? - but it's a skilled professional role with professional standards the person is legally obliged to keep to.

Competent managers are aware of this. Incompetent ones, not so much.

@toomanydogsandcats

Surely an admin would be present. Why would participants need to do that? It's a menial task

Wrong, another governance professional here (ICSA too!). Minutes are not a menial task!!!