Zeldeen Muller, CEO, AgendaWorx, Board Portals
The role of the fund secretariat has always been multifaceted, demanding exceptional organisational skills and the ability to capture and document crucial information accurately. One crucial aspect of their responsibilities is the creation of minutes during meetings, which often proves to be a challenging task. Moreover, minute taking can become burdensome with multiple meetings scheduled, resulting in a continuous cycle of converting agendas to minutes and back again, which consumes valuable work hours.
Although modern virtual meeting apps like Zoom and Microsoft Teams, have introduced transcription tools that capture discussions, they often leave secretaries overwhelmed with copious amounts of transcribed text.
However, with the emergence of artificial intelligence (AI) and innovative solutions in board portals, secretaries can now experience newfound efficiency and ease in creating meeting minutes, thanks to three powerful tools.
The struggle with meeting transcriptions
The introduction of virtual meeting apps with built in transcription features appeared to be a breakthrough for secretaries, offering the promise of automating this laborious task. However, secretaries soon discovered that these tools transcribe every aspect of the discussion, including informal chatter, jokes and non-essential exchanges. A two hour meeting recording can result in a 111 page transcript.
Next, secretaries turned to summarising tools, which have the functionality to condense transcripts. However, many discovered that these tools would keep the chit chat and discard the important meeting decisions.
As a result, secretaries were left with the tedious job of sifting through numerous pages of transcription to identify and extract the essential decisions made during the meeting. Or, failing that, listening to the entire two hour recording, looking for a specific discussion.
The three key board portals tools: simplifying minute taking
Recognising the challenges faced by secretaries in the age of virtual meetings, board portals have emerged as game changing solutions.
The three key tools that can assist secretaries in preparing minutes more quickly and effectively include:
Tool 1: Voice recordings at every agenda item
When secretaries have the facility to audio record meeting decisions and important points at every agenda item during the meeting, it provides them with the essential content necessary to prepare the minutes.
How it will save them time
Secretaries no longer have to sift through a 111 page transcript to pinpoint the key decisions. They can easily revisit a specific discussion about an agenda item by listening to the saved recording. These important recordings, stored at each agenda item, serve as a valuable reference for trustees in the future.
Tool 2: Time saving transcription
AI technology then takes over, transcribing the voice recordings at agenda items into text with the click of a button.
How it will save them time
This feature saves secretaries valuable time and effort that would otherwise be spent on manually transcribing the minutes. Moreover, the transcriptions produced by board portal tools, are highly accurate, ensuring that no critical information is missed or misinterpreted. They usually also accommodate a range of accents.
It is important to ensure that the transcription tool used by your board portal accommodates the accents prevalent in your region. This will ensure accurate transcriptions.
Tool 3: Effortless Grammar Editing and Rewriting:
Where board portals that use AI truly excels, is their ability to check and edit the grammar of the transcribed text, significantly reducing the time and effort required to create accurate meeting minutes.
How it will save them time
Secretaries can view the original transcription and the edited version side by side. With a simple click of a button, they can choose which version to insert into the minutes and they even have the option to edit it afterwards.
Secretaries are no longer burdened with the arduous task of manually transcribing minutes, thanks to the innovative solution offered by board portal tools with imbedded AI. By enabling voice recordings at agenda items and automating both the transcription and grammar editing of content using AI, board portal tools revolutionised the way minutes are created.
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