Intervals Workflow — keeping track of meeting notes

John Reeve | January 23rd, 2008 | ,

As a developer I work much better once I have a list of tasks in front of me. I’m also required to sit in many meetings, which conclude with me trying to distill action items from the various topics of discussion. I’ve tried notepads, which work well, but rely on me recalling conversations behind numerous, and often times cryptic, symbols i’ve jotted down. It’s much easier if I can type the notes down instead of writing them, and Intervals makes this process easy and ensures that my notes are all in one place. Here are some ideas on how to use Intervals to keep notes.

#1 The Scratchpad.
If the meeting is a loose discussion that isn’t based around a specific task or project, i’ll keep notes using the scratchpad feature (That’s this notepad symbol Intervals Scratchpad in the upper left-hand corner). Later in the day, I can copy and paste those notes over to task notes and project notes.

#2. Project Notes
If we are discussing a specific project, I can enter my notes into the project notes area in Intervals. The nice thing about this is that these notes are shared with other members of my team. If any of us have any questions about a project, the first place we look to are the project notes.

#3. Task History
When writing down action items for a task, I find it most useful to update the task during the meeting. Now my notes about what to do next are also part of the task history.

Using a lightweight project management system like Intervals means that your business intelligence (i.e. meeting notes, brainstorms, correspondence) is combined with your project, task and time tracking efforts, all in one place. Having run a web development shop ourselves, since 2000, we understand the advantage of using one application that provides a complete solution for our small business.

One Response to “Intervals Workflow — keeping track of meeting notes”

  1. Anders says:

    Another thing to keep an eye on is the meeting time itself…

    I made a simple tool to keep track of wasteful meeting time. You switch between productive time, partially wasteful time, and complete waste of time. When the meeting is over, you get an estimate of how much time and money was wasted.

    Try it… http://trakti.me/ =)

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John Reeve
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John Reeve

John is a co-founder, web designer and developer at Pelago. His blog posts are inspired by everyday encounters with designers, developers, creatives and small businesses in general. John is an avid reader and road cyclist.
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Jennifer Payne
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Jennifer Payne

Jennifer is the Director of Quality and Efficiency at Pelago. Her blog posts are based largely on her experience working with teams to improve harmony and productivity. Jennifer is a cat person.
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Michael Payne
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Michael Payne

Michael is a co-founder and product architect at Pelago. His contributions stem from experiences managing the development process behind web sites and web-based applications such as Intervals. Michael drives a 1990 Volkswagen Carat with a rebuilt 2.4 liter engine from GoWesty.
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