2) Summarising chronologically
Chronological summary is similar to timestamping, but slightly more detailed, and with more potential for intervention by the documenter. You can see an example here .
How to do it:
Work chronologically through the meeting and summarise the key point that each speaker makes, together with a timestamp. (Sometimes speakers cram in several points each time they speak - but these are often different aspects of one core point. Try to find the core point.)
If someone’s point doesn’t add any new information (for example, if it is simply to agree with what’s been said before), you can omit it - however lengthily the speaker says it!
You can also omit any off-topic discussion, jokes or digressions (whereas in a verbatim transcript, you’d include them).
Then add headings, to break the text up and make it easier to navigate. These might be based on the agenda, if there is one; but often, an agenda item will need to be broken down into several subheadings; and might need to be phrased in a way that describes more accurately what is covered in that agenda item. Of course, if the meeting diverges from the agenda, so will your headings - your summary should reflect what actually happens in the meeting, not the agenda or plan.
Since you are summarising what someone says rather than quoting them directly, ensure that you represent their point accurately and fairly even if you disagree with it. Don’t editorialise.
Add links in the text to any organisations, individuals, or key ideas mentioned, or any jargon words or any acronyms used - remember that your summary should make the meeting more accessible to people who don't know a lot about the topic. For links to ideas (for example "sociocracy", "decentralisation", etc), a neutral source such as Wikipedia is often best.
Annotate anything you notice from looking at the whole meeting from a “zoomed-out” perspective. For example, if a person says one thing early on, and then contradicts themselves later, this might be worthy of a note, with a link to the relevant timestamp; or if the meeting doesn’t hear or acknowledge a point made by a particular speaker, or appears to have misunderstood what someone says; or if people are clearly talking at cross purposes; or if the meeting digresses significantly from what it originally planned to discuss.
You can also add points of information, if someone gives information in a meeting that you are aware is incorrect.
However, note that any interventions of this kind must be clearly marked as coming from you, not from the meeting; and should be descriptive only, not prescriptive (i.e. you can note that it happened, but avoid comment on whether it is a good or a bad thing.)
NOTE: In general, we have found that chronological approaches to documentation are best in Catalyst.
This is partly because so much of the material being documented is video-based, which has a built-in chronology; working from the start of the video to the end enables a person to follow the video for themselves.
Chronological documentation also requires less editorialising or reorganising from the documenter, making it faster, and keeping the documenter’s intervention more lightweight.
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