Looking for some recommendations regarding AI note taking.
At work we’re an all Google shop, and while I’m generally sceptical of things AI, the note taking of Gemini is pretty impressive, including suggested actions etc.
In my own time, I volunteer with a not-for-profit youth group and we received Office365 under the MS charity program. I’ve recently started using Co-Pilot to create minutes from MS Teams transcripts, it’s ok but not great. For example, in a typical meeting you might have the treasurer’s report, this was only mentioned in passing with the profit / loss figure. When I asked it “include all financial figures” it then went back and added the break down of income and costs.
We have a much longer meeting for another committee coming up - this is two 2-3 hour sessions so obviously keen to try and leverage more of this sort of smarts for that meeting. Does anyone have recommendations / experience with other systems like Notion etc?
In the US at least, Google makes Google Workspace available at no charge to registered non-profits. One of the non-profits I work with has taken advantage of this program. Gemini comes bundled with our plan, but I don’t know if it comes with any usage caps and the like. If you like Gemini, perhaps your organization could get a free Workspace account and leverage that for AI powered note taking.
For in-person meetings, I’ve been bouncing between MacWhisper, Superwhisper, and Alter. They all allow you to create custom prompts that generate a meeting summary how you want, so I have things pretty dialed in to how I’d write it myself. Superwhisper had some crashing issues for a short while, but they seem fixed. I’ve been leaning toward MacWhisper for meetings (and Superwhisper for general dictation, and Alter most the rest of my AI needs).
We summarise Teams transcriptions all the time, you might just need to play around with longer prompts. If its not giving the output in the format you want, you can just tell it to do it differently. We have a shared prompt library, the below is what we use for the transcription, you might find some tips in there.
We use Claude btw, for some reason we get poorer results with CoPilot than anything else. But its about to start using GPT5, so it might get better when that happens.
You are tasked with reviewing and summarising a Microsoft Teams meeting transcription. You will be provided with both the meeting agenda and the full transcription. Use UK English, use plain english. Please analyse both documents and provide a structured summary following the format below.
Input Documents:
Meeting Agenda: [Insert agenda here]
Meeting Transcription: [Insert full transcription here]
Required Output Format:
MEETING SUMMARY
Present a high-level overview in table format:
Meeting Details
Information
Date
[Extract from transcription]
Duration
[Calculate from timestamps]
Attendees
[List participants from transcription, cross-reference with agenda if names provided]
Meeting Objective
[Summarise main purpose]
Key Outcomes
[2-3 bullet points of main results]
AGENDA ITEMS REVIEW
Structure your analysis according to the provided agenda items. For each agenda item:
[Agenda Item Number]. [Agenda Item Title]
Discussion Summary: [Concise overview of what was discussed]
Key Points: [Main points raised during this section]
Decisions Made: [Any decisions or conclusions reached]
For financial agenda items, include a table preserving all exact figures:
Financial Item
Amount/Details
Context
Status/Decision
[Item 1]
[Exact figures]
[When/where discussed]
[Any decisions made]
[Item 2]
[Exact figures]
[When/where discussed]
[Any decisions made]
DETAILED DISCUSSION NOTES
[Provide detailed notes organised by topic or agenda item, maintaining chronological flow where important]
DECISIONS & COMMITMENTS
Important Decisions Made:
[Decision 1]: [Description and any conditions]
[Decision 2]: [Description and any conditions]
Commitments & Undertakings:
[Commitment 1]: [Who committed to what and by when]
[Commitment 2]: [Who committed to what and by when]
ACTION ITEMS SUMMARY
Throughout your analysis, highlight all action items in bold text as they appear in context. Then provide this consolidated table:
Action Item
Assigned To
Due Date
Details/Context
Agenda Reference
[Action 1]
[Name]
[Date]
[Additional context]
[Agenda item #]
[Action 2]
[Name]
[Date]
[Additional context]
[Agenda item #]
[Action 3]
[Name]
[Date]
[Additional context]
[Agenda item #]
Instructions for Analysis:
Agenda Alignment: Carefully map discussion topics to the correct agenda item numbers and titles from the provided agenda
Name Accuracy: Use participant names as they appear in the agenda when possible, but also note any additional participants mentioned in the transcription
Financial Precision: For any financial agenda items, include exact amounts, currencies, and all contextual details in the table format - never summarise, round, or paraphrase financial figures
Action Item Tracking: Identify both explicit action items (“John will prepare the report”) and implicit commitments (“We need to follow up on this next week”)
Chronological Flow: When discussions span multiple agenda items or return to previous topics, note this clearly
Missing Elements: If agenda items were not covered or were deferred, note this explicitly
Quality Checklist:
All agenda items accounted for
All financial details preserved in full
All action items highlighted in bold throughout the text
Action items table complete with all assignments
Names correctly referenced from agenda
Clear section divisions maintained
No financial information summarised or approximated
We had a meeting last weekend, two sessions over 4 hours on Teams (in all different states of Australia so we have two big planning meetings per year).
I tried using Co-Pilot to summarise and it literally did the first four items and said “meeting closed”
I loaded. the same transcription in Google Gemini and straight off the bat, it was good enough to impress the other committee members so I think we’re on a winner, that’s just the 2.5 Flash model.
The meeting agenda is fairly structured so obviously helps immensely.
