Rogers - Write of Way | Writing For Your Life |

| Agendas and Minutes |

People work in groups to accomplish what they cannot achieve individually. Parents band together to run a softball league. Service club members raise money to fund a multicultural festival. Citizens join a riding association to try to get a candidate elected to the House of Commons. No individual could accomplish these tasks single-handedly.

It usually takes many meetings to turn the group's goals into achievements. In political campaigns, for example, meetings will certainly be held weekly; some of the key people will meet daily. Over a five- or six-week campaign, that's a lot of meetings. More commonly, volunteer groups will meet monthly, although there will probably be committee meetings for smaller teams to work on projects such as fund-raising or membership drives.

Volunteer groups are democratic organizations. Most groups will have a constitution and a set of bylaws. The constitution spells out the rules the group will follow and the roles of the executive members (usually a minimum of a president, vice-president, secretary, and treasurer).

The proceedings of the meetings are usually based on parliamentary procedure, often variations of Robert's Rules of Order, published by Henry M. Robert in 1876. These meetings function most efficiently when everyone understands the basic procedures. The use of agendas, parliamentary rules for meetings, and the keeping of written minutes help democratic groups accomplish their goals.

Imagine you've just agreed to serve on the Board of Directors for the Niagara Youth Concert Band (NYCB). What can you expect? Before you attend your first meeting, the secretary of the NYCB will probably send you a copy of the constitution and bylaws. If you don't receive these materials, ask for them and read them through. You are legally responsible for adhering to them.

The secretary will also send you a copy of the agenda for the upcoming meeting. The agenda serves more than one function for the group. Its principal use is to indicate the business the organization wants to accomplish at the next meeting. But it also serves as a reminder to individual group members of work they must do before the meeting, if the group is to make progress toward its goals.

As is true of so much of the writing in our lives, there are no absolute rules for agendas, or how they are created. The chair of a committee or the president of an organization usually sets the agenda, although the group's secretary often does the typing and mailing of the agenda. The agenda's main use is to help the group conduct its business in a timely, effective, and democratic way by delineating the tasks under discussion and thus, by implication, what is off topic for the meeting.

But most groups will also make the agenda a permanent record in the minutes book, a record that the group keeps as a kind of memory more reliable than the recollections of participants. Records can save time for groups by allowing them to follow prior successful procedures rather than constantly inventing new ones.

Groups vary, too, in when they give their members a copy of the agenda. When agendas are distributed depends at least partly on when and how the agenda is set. Some of the agenda will represent tasks that were not completed before or at the last meeting. New topics for discussion or actions to be taken, though, may come from group members as well as the president, and members may think them up after the last meeting. This has led some groups to follow a procedure of asking members to phone, fax or e-mail agenda items to the president or secretary a week or two weeks before the next scheduled meeting. Even so, some groups will distribute the agenda at the next meeting, while-more commonly-other groups will mail the agenda to group members a week before the next meeting. In this way, the agenda is another reminder of the date of the next meeting and of any work members still need to do.

Look at the agenda that came in the mail (figure 1).

Figure 1: Sample Agenda

As you glance over the agenda, you may see language that is unfamiliar. To gain familiarity with the content of an agenda, examine some of what happened at that meeting on the fourteenth. When you arrived at the library, a sign directed you to the LaMarsh meeting room. Inside the room, you saw a long table. In each place, there was a small plastic name-holder, including one with your name on it. You were enjoying a chat with the person sitting next to you, Nick Bunch, when John Luck—whose name card identified him as president—called the meeting to order: "It's exactly 7:30, and I call this meeting to order."

You noticed that the secretary, Linda Rogers, who was seated to the left of the president, was looking at each person around the table and seemed to be recording the names of those attending the meeting. Then she asked if anyone needed a copy of the minutes of the meeting of November 28. You asked for a copy, and then joined the other directors in reading the minutes of the previous meeting.

After a few minutes, President Luck asked, "Would someone move the approval of the minutes?"

"Just before we do that," said Keith Durkell, "I want to suggest that we correct the figure for our sales at the Book Sale. We sold $34,000, not $3400."

"Right. Are there any other corrections?" asked President Luck.
"I move that the minutes of November 28 be approved as corrected," said Alleyene Quarter.

"I second that," said Nick Bunch.

"All in favour?" said John Luck. All the directors raised their hands. "Carried. Let's move on to the reports. Could you make the Treasurer's Report for us, Keith?" You glance at your agenda and notice Keith's name in parentheses beside the "Treasurer's Report" item on the agenda.

"Certainly," said Keith Durkell, distributing a spreadsheet showing this year's financial transactions. "Most of the players have paid their fees. We've paid for the new music and the annual rent for our rehearsal space. There are no unpaid bills. You can read the details on the spreadsheet. Our balance is $10,322.35."

"I move that we approve the treasurer's report," said Alleyene Quarter.

"Seconded," said Kathy Ganapathy.

"All in favour?" asked John Luck, looking around at the raised hands. "Carried. Thank you, Keith, for looking after the finances for us. We're in good shape this year."

The procedure was much the same for the next two reports. You noticed that the secretary seemed to be the hardest working person at the meeting. She took notes constantly as the other directors spoke.

"Is there any correspondence to report?" asked John Luck.

"We have a letter from the Niagara Parks Commission," said Linda Rogers, "I don't think I need to take the time to read it aloud. They just say that they will not be scheduling summer concerts at the Queenston Heights Bandshell until January."

"That's plenty early," said John Luck. "All right, we're making good time tonight. Let's go on to matters arising from the previous minutes. The first item on this part of the agenda is the exorbitant rent we are paying to the school board. It would be great to find a less expensive practice venue. What can we do?"

"I don't think this is something we can solve here tonight," said Irene Silken, "but I would certainly like to find a cheaper practice space. Perhaps we could strike a committee to investigate different places, such as church halls or the Optimist Club's building."

"I think we should stick to public buildings. If we rent a hall from any particular denomination, some of our players might feel odd about playing in someone else's place of worship," said Linda Rogers.

"Nobody's going to care about that," someone called out.

"I can see that this is not going to be anything we can resolve quickly," said John Luck. "How would members feel about striking a committee to gather information and report on this at our next meeting?"

"I move that a rehearsal space committee be established," said Kathy Ganapathy.

"I second that," said Nick Bunch.
"I move to amend the motion to indicate that the committee report at the next board meeting," said Irene Silken.

"That's fine by me," said Kathy Ganapathy. " I withdraw my motion and second Irene's."

The amended motion was carried and it was agreed that those interested would stay a few minutes after the board meeting to apportion the work and set a time to meet.

You've seen enough of this meeting to get a feeling for how a chair moves along a meeting that follows parliamentary procedure and the role the agenda plays in helping group members conduct their business in a, well, businesslike fashion. After all of the business on the agenda had been concluded, Nick Bunch moved, and Kathy Ganapathy seconded, a motion to adjourn. You decided to try to help find a less expensive practice hall, so you went over to where the new committee members were sitting down.

Take a look at the minutes that secretary Linda Rogers wrote for this meeting (figure 2).

Figure 2: Sample Minutes

Every group records minutes uniquely, but underneath the surface differences, there is a common core: Good minutes aim to allow members to learn from past successes and failures and to plan to fulfil commitments made for the next meeting. To create effective content, then, for minutes, the minute-taker tries to accurately set down the most important points of discussion and the action decisions made by the group. Group members need this information to do their jobs.

There is no one way to organize minutes of meetings, but there are some widely observed conventions. It's important to identify the nature of the document right at the top where it can be spotted immediately by a reader. It's logical to include the title Minutes, the name of the group, and when the meeting took place. Most groups also record in the minutes who attended the meeting, and who was absent. If you know you must miss a meeting, call the minute taker and express your regrets. It's important information: Those absent will need to catch up on what occurred, and many groups will remove a board member who misses some designated number of meetings, especially if the absences are unexcused.

Usually before considering the business scheduled for the meeting, members will check to determine that the record of the last meeting is accurate.

After this, the order of events of the agenda may vary and, thus, the order of the minutes. It is common to deal first with reports because that can often be done quickly so members are still fresh when they reach the most important items of the meeting. New business tends to be scheduled later; often, it will be referred to the agenda of the next meeting because members have neither the time nor the preparation to deal with it adequately when it is first raised.

There is one other convention that some groups follow. Some recorders format the minutes so that there is a column at the right margin. In that column, the record shows the name of the person(s) charged with taking the action indicated in the motion. This method of organizing minutes makes it easier for members to quickly remind themselves of the work to be done.

There are even fewer conventions about the appearance of the minutes documents. The keyboarder of the sample minutes uses block capitals, bolding, and sub-points to make it easy for readers to tell at a glance the information in each part of the minutes. A minute taker who creates documents with consistent use of these embellishments creates minutes that will be increasingly easy for members to use.

Examining the relationship between the simulated meeting and the minutes for it will help you learn the principles of agenda creation and minute keeping. When you join a group, you will want to see how they create agendas and keep their minutes, but you will find it easy to follow if you've studied this example. Later in this section, there is an activity to further familiarize you with the conventions of minute keeping.

Some Final Tips for Participating in Meetings

The rules for making, amending, and voting on motions or resolutions are the heart of parliamentary procedure. Those motions are the action plans of the organization. You'll participate in groups more capably and confidently when you understand just a few more of the conventions, conventions that are derived from Robert's Rules of Order.

Raise your hand to get the Chair's attention when you want to make a motion.
Use the language "I wish to move/amend the motion ...."
If the motion has become confusing because of amendments, say, " I move the substitute motion...."
When the motion has been moved and seconded (and the chair has opened discussion), show that you want to speak by raising your hand to get the chair's attention.
You have two options to consider if you feel there has been enough discussion:

If you say, "I move that we table the motion," and someone seconds your motion, the chair will call for an immediate vote. If the majority of the group votes to table the amendment, it cannot be addressed again at that meeting.

If you say, "I call for the previous question," the chair will immediately call for a vote. In most groups, the discussion ends if two-thirds of those present vote to end the debate.

If you want to ask a question to clarify any part of the debate that puzzles you, get the chair's attention and say, "I rise for information" or "Point of Information." Then ask your question.

If you know this much about parliamentary procedure, you'll be well on your way to being an effective member of democratic decision-making groups, from minor hockey associations to municipal government committees for the arts. Minute-taker or recording secretary-you can really help a group by taking this role. To consolidate your ability to take the role of minute-keeper, try this activity.

Activity 1: Analyzing Minutes of Meetings

Content:

The minutes record the decisions of the group. The decisions are usually expressed as motions moved, seconded, and voted for by the majority of the group. In the minutes for the Niagara Youth Concert Band, what is the earliest example of a decision the board made although the minutes do not show a motion was ever made, let alone seconded and voted on? What might account for the lack of a motion?
Give an example from the discussion about the Play-a-Thon that shows that a group that keeps good minutes can build a better event by learning from a previous attempt recorded in the minutes and will be able to avoid repeating the mistakes of the past.

Organization:

What is the relationship of the order of the agenda to the order of the minutes? How similar are the headings of the two documents? Why?

Appearance:

Why does the keyboarder use block capitals in the minutes?

Answers to Activity 1: Analyzing Minutes of Meetings

Kathy Ganapathy indicates in the Tour Committee Report that she will find out the amount of the final payment players must make to pay for their trip to Newfoundland. She agrees to do this although the minutes do not specifically say that a motion to this effect was passed.
There are a couple of reasons why the group may not have passed a motion about the fee payment. Perhaps the secretary—because of haste or absentmindedness—did not record in her notes the mover or seconder of a motion that was made. It is also possible that no one made a resolution and the chair forgot to ask someone to do so. This is especially likely to happen when consensus is quickly reached on an issue.
If the board members look back at their minutes for the previous Play-a-Thon, they will read that they could probably raise even more money—and certainly get more publicity—if they scheduled their event to coincide with the arrival of Santa Clause at the shopping mall. Without a written record, this idea might be forgotten.
The minutes of the meeting are arranged chronologically, in the same order as the agenda.
The headings of the agenda are quite similar to the heading used in the minutes. Indeed, for the substantive parts of the agenda, the headings used in the minutes are the same. This practice makes it easy for the reader to follow a particular project through several sets of documents, tracing what happened. Many organizations use the same heading on agenda and minutes every time the same business re-occurs, and the business appears on every agenda even if, as the minutes will show, the group takes no action on that item at some of the meetings.
The keyboarder, it seems, made it easy for readers to identify the major sections of the minutes by consistently showing them in bold block capitals.

Activity 2: Comparison of Agendas

Ask a friend who belongs to a community group to give you a copy of an agenda for a meeting. Bring this to class on the day scheduled. Form a group of five people. Have each member briefly show an agenda. Discuss the differences. Record the features that you feel comprise the most effective agenda. Present your findings to a meeting of the whole class.

Activity 3: Comparison of Minutes

Follow the same procedure as for "Comparison of Agendas," but find and compare copies of minutes taken at meetings of community groups.

Recommended Reading

Ten Points for Meetings. N.p.: Canadian Auto Workers, 1986.

Watson, Jane. The Minute Taker's Handbook. North Vancouver, BC:
Self-Counsel Press, 1992.

Wolfe, Joan. Making Things Happen: How to be an Effective Volunteer.
Washington, DC: Island Press, 1991.

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