BoardPro Podcasts
A series of podcasts designed to demystify the world of business governance bringing practical advice and tips for organizations to improve their operational effectiveness.
BoardPro Podcasts
Webinar: Writing better board minutes
Use Left/Right to seek, Home/End to jump to start or end. Hold shift to jump forward or backward.
From transcription to decision-capture, what really matters
Are your minutes a ‘get out of jail free’ card?
Or are they more like a ‘go to jail, go directly to jail, do not pass go, do not collect $200’ card?
Does your minute taker know the difference?
Board minutes are more than an administrative record. Done well, they can provide powerful evidence that directors asked the right questions, understood the issues, exercised judgement and acted appropriately.
Done poorly, they can leave a board exposed—or create a misleading record of what actually happened. In this practical webinar, we’ll explore how much detail is enough, what should stay out, the opportunities and risks of AI and transcripts, and how to produce minutes that are accurate, useful and defensible — without spending hours getting there.
So, hi everybody. Welcome to our webinar today, titled Writing Better Board Minutes from Transcription to Decision Capture: What Really Matters. Our webinar today, webinar team today, I should say, is Julie Garland McClellan, Joe Kelly, and David Renwick from BoardPro. My name is John McDonald, and I shall be your host and moderator, very much in the background for the next 40 odd minutes. Firstly, though, thanks so much for attending today. We always appreciate the effort you make to be here for our live webinar events. If you have any questions during the session, which we hope you will do, of course, then just pop them in the QA. Or you can use the chat if you would prefer. And finally, if you stay through till the end, which of course we hope you will do, we have a really short one-minute survey that we would like you to consider at the end of the webinar. Your feedback really helps us bring relevant content to you week after week and enables us to position the wealth of expert presenters that we have for you. So please take a minute to complete the survey at the end of the webinar as you exit. Now, for those not too familiar with BoardPro, we are a board software provider, sometimes called the Board Portal. And we serve just over 35,000 users around the world, about 4,000 boards and about 8,500 committees, would you believe? And we're represented in about 34 different countries. We enable organizations to prepare for and run their board meetings more efficiently and effectively with less time and deliver more impact and value for the organization. And as much as we are a software provider, part of our wider mission here at BoardPro is to make the fundamentals of governance free and easy to implement for all organizations, but especially those organizations with resource constraints. And one of the many ways we do this is by providing free access to hundreds of governance templates, guides, and resources, which you'll find in the resources section of our website. And these webinars that we host every week are also a great way of accessing key governance knowledge without the time commitments and costs associated with in-person events. So for the next 45 odd minutes, just sit back and relax and add to the discussion by asking as many questions as you would like. A full recording of the webinar along with the slides from the webinar and the other resources will be sent to you tomorrow via email. So let me have our team introduce themselves, starting with you first, Julie.
SPEAKER_02Hi everybody, Kiora. I'm Julie Garland McClellan. You possibly already know me from previous webinars or from my free director newsletter, The Director's Dilemma. I work with board to help them make better decisions and be able to defend themselves if anyone ever comes attacking them in the future. So really looking forward to talking about today because minutes should be your first line of defense. Over to you, Joe.
SPEAKER_01You're on mute, Joe. Rookie mistake. Always happens.
SPEAKER_04Hello from your rookie of today. Um Cura. Uh it's lovely to be with you to talk about this hot topic. So minutes and AI. It's yeah, it's on the top of everyone's minds. And we'd love to give you some really practical tips here today, um, based on our experience and the the new functions in Board Pro. Um, this is the bread and butter of what we do here at IGS. Um, we do board and company secretarial and um all sorts of governance framework, um, training, uh, advisory services and work with others to deliver what boards need. So a minute taking is a key, a key kind of foundation, along with that whole board reporting circle. So really look forward to yeah, helping you with some practical stuff to take away today.
SPEAKER_00Hello everyone. Um uh happy to be here. Um I'm gonna be showing you some of these board pro functionalities today and also um encouraging you to go and have a trial yourself with a free trial.
SPEAKER_02So it's yeah, okay, so let's get straight into it with what is wrong with minutes. Um, I've never yet met a board that's totally happy with their minutes. Um and some of the complaints that you hear both from board members and company secretaries and CEOs are, well, one of the most common ones is people make the minutes too long. They put too much detail in, we can't find the important stuff. Um, give me a thumbs up. You find your reactions and give me a thumbs up if that sounds true. Um, another thing that people complain about is that when the minutes come to the next board meeting, uh, people spend far too long going through them and wordsmithing in the meeting rather than having that all already done so that they can just quickly approve them, maybe clear up one or two tiny edits and move on with everybody knowing that they've done a good job. Um another problem, often linked to the first one, is that the minutes aren't always that clear. They'll say that the board discussed management's plans, but they won't say whether they were actually approved or endorsed. Um, or they say that the board's decided something but don't say how to move forwards. And then the other thing that often causes angst is when there's a disagreement about what should be captured in the minutes, um, particularly people's names, whether or not a conflict really is a conflict and deserves to be in or out, that sort of thing. Um I haven't seen any thumbs up, so I'm assuming that I must be um oh, the reactions functions off. Okay, well, never mind. Um you'll just have to type in the chat yes or no. Um, but those I think are some of the common things. Yay, Barbara's found a thumbs up for me. Um some of the things, oh, Wendy, a bit of a thumb. Fantastic. We'll have to find out what the rest of your thumb is and see if we can help. Um does that ring true to you, David and Joe?
SPEAKER_03Is that something you see? Thank you very much.
SPEAKER_04And a range of issues. Um, of course, subjectively around the board table, you'll have multiple opinions of the detail that should be included. And then also you have to put some thought to um what the size and risk and all of that sort of thing of your organization is. So in fact, some things generally the length of the minutes of a section would reflect the length of that conversation. But if it was more of an update type conversation, it wouldn't add much, especially if it was um reflected in the board pack. If it was a decision that led to, sorry, a discussion that led to a big decision, you'd want more detail. Um in such circumstances. And so um it's about making that call, you know, if there was health and safety, you want to cover certain things, say things in certain ways, etc. Um, and I think a lot of people are um we're actually quite green in terms of really knowing our fiduciary duties, probably more particularly New Zealand, I guess, where a lot of kind of volunteer boards, etc. Um, and so having knowing exactly what you need to record is super helpful. Um and so people will complain but not understand the importance sometimes of having those things there. So it's a catch-22 and it's a hard place to be taking the minutes for the rest of it.
SPEAKER_02It sure is. Um but hopefully we'll make it an easier place. Um because ideally, your minutes should be your get out of jail free card, particularly if anyone is ever alleging that the board did not fulfill its duty, whether that's managing conflicts of interest or being aware of key data. Um and as somebody said, the minutes we tend to ignore them until they have to be read again later. Um, yeah, then it can be a little bit too late. So, really important if you're not happy that your minutes prove you did your job diligently and well, um, is you need to do some work. Because nobody ever knows which minutes are going to be called into question in the future. Um, you always assume this is a good meeting, you're doing your your best, and then maybe five years later somebody says, Well, hang on, how did you make that decision? Or who was in the room? Um So I think one of the important things when people look back is do we actually know which set of minutes were the ones that the board accepted? Um, can we demonstrate that there have been no edits to them after they were endorsed? And the edits between them being entered into the record and being endorsed have only been minor tidying up. Um not knowing which version can be the difference between being banned for five years and facing a really large fine and being exonerated for doing your job. So and yeah, people sometimes say, oh, you know, why is this such an issue? And and the issue is there are hard black letter written laws about what you do with your minutes. So people go, oh, you know, they they're good enough for us. But legally, um yes, Wendy, totally agree. That's exactly the idea that you should know which version was signed off. Um, I actually still like a paper version with a signature, which can be scanned and uploaded. Very hard to argue with that unless you've got some really good hackers in your organization. So, really important in Australia, the Corporations Act says that you must put your minutes in the record within one month. Now, it goes on to say that your minute book can be electronic, but you must within a month of your meeting have made those minutes. Um, I would suggest try to do it quicker than that. The minutes must record the proceedings as well as the resolutions of the directors' meetings. They must be signed within a reasonable time after the meeting. That's usually at the next meeting, um, and they must remain complete and unaltered from any added endorsement. And this is the one that gets boards into a tithy, especially when people have been um have been commenting and suggesting edits. Um not uncommon, is it, Joe, to see boards arguing about what's the correct one.
SPEAKER_04Not uncommon at all. Um which, yeah. Plays out differently and for different reasons. Um, but there needs to be a way to track those edits and somebody that is centrally managing the changes. Um and flagging essentially, and that would be um the minute taker um to the chair, hey, these are the um changes, and all of them are fine from my recollection, or if you've got a recording or a transcription um that's reliable, you can you can very very much verify it. Um but from your notes as the minute taker, you should be able to give the chair a heads up. Hey, this is not what I've got recorded, so I just want to flag that. It's ultimately up to the chair to figure out how to resolve, you know, any disagreements. But it it can be tricky, it doesn't crop up that often. Some boards it does all the time, others never, you know, but it's something that needs to be managed appropriately because to that legal protection side of things, often what we see is something being added which is actually helpful context, which should have been put into, you know, verbally said or in a report but wasn't, that someone has thought, let's add that now because that would help them understand the con you know, the context in the now. And it's actually unfortunately that you didn't say that in the media.
SPEAKER_02So and just to be really clear, if you put something in your minutes that didn't happen, it's called fraud. And it's a criminal act. It's not a breach, uh well, it is a breach of the Corporations Act because your minutes should be accurate records. But if you alter the minutes to put something in that didn't happen, um it's called fraud. And there have been cases of people getting done for it.
SPEAKER_01We have some great questions. Uh we have some great questions. Do you want to have a look in the chat there, Julie?
SPEAKER_02Um, yeah, we've got some really good questions and comments in the chat. Um minutes don't actually need to be signed with a pen and ink and a person. Um, electronic signatures are acceptable. Some boards have moved away from signing and merely record a decision of the whole board that this is the version that's been approved. The danger in that is it can be very hard if there are competing versions floating around to know which one actually made it onto the board's table for that discussion. Um so, yes, the law, very similar in both countries, a few small differences, um, but really important, both countries, it is um an offense for the board to um it's an offense for the board to not keep proper minutes. And if the company commits that offense, every single director, so even if you're not the person taking the minutes, you're not the chair who should be signing off on them and and stewarding the process, you are guilty. Um so very, very serious. Yes, I agree with Mark that the um the minutes quick is good, and within 24 hours, turning your notes into something better that you can actually share is a really good practice to aspire to. Um if there's dissent, um I've seen secretaries go, I'm resolving this, and if it's a small dissent, no problem. If there's a bigger dissent, coming to the meeting with two versions and saying, here are the two versions, which one? And then being very clear with your record keeping of the next meeting which set of minutes got approved. Because if the board can't if the board don't agree before the next meeting, it's not the company secretary's job, it's the board's job. Um so really important that um you think through how am I going to keep records of which is the version that was finally agreed. Um there are issues with directors keeping their own notes. You don't want a competing record, especially if it's materially different. Um comments are only being shared with hosts and panelists. Oh dear, what a shame. Um, because there are some really good comments.
SPEAKER_01I've just fixed that, Julie. Sorry.
SPEAKER_02Just fixed that.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_02Um so consequence of not having the minutes in the minute book within a month, the main consequence is that you've breached a legal provision of the act, which immediately, if you are in a hostile legal situation, is going to put the judge on notice that you're not trustworthy. Um so the impact is as much reputation damage, um, but in theory, you could be fined and prosecuted for it. Um taking minutes within one month, as long as you've got the version, it doesn't have to have been signed off by the board. Some boards meet quarterly. Um so as long as the minutes are created within a month of the meeting, then it can be two months before because they are in the record. Um, so it's it's an interesting, pedantic little point. Um I like to see the minutes signed by the chair of the meeting or the chair of the next meeting if there's been a change in chair or the previous chair isn't available.
SPEAKER_04That's an interesting point, Julie. Is that a an Australian specific um requirement that a month within a month that's not a New Zealand requirement? It's not. But in effect, it's sort of the same. Forget the the month thing. It's um it's basically it's got to be signed off by the next meeting. If you don't do it by the next meeting and you've got multiple sets building up that are unapproved, you I mean, what are the chances of getting to agreement?
SPEAKER_02Yeah. And I mean, you look at big companies like James Hardy, they got into so much trouble because their minutes weren't signed. And then there were questions about whether or not they were a true record.
SPEAKER_04Um if the board can't get on the same page about what the minutes actually need to say, and they can't do that for months, that highlights a lot more bigger issues. Yeah. So that's a bigger issue than just not treating the the need to do it um as important, right? And just not doing it for that reason.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_04Um just not caring about it, essentially.
SPEAKER_02Um the practice to avoid is doing your minutes when you want to send out the pack for the next board meeting. That is way too late. Um, it might feel like you had more important things to do in the interim, but trust me, you didn't. Um, let's move on, because we didn't really come here to debate the law. Um the only practical advice I have about the law is comply with it. Uh, next slide, please, Sean. So the process I like, which is very similar to the one that people have done, is get your draft out within 24 hours. Everyone here who takes minutes will agree with me that if you sit down the next day, you can get those minutes done within an hour or so. If you sit down a week later, it's gonna take you a morning. And if you are inclined to try sitting down three weeks later and doing them so they can go out with the next board pack, um really important. Your minutes aren't going to be as good. And it's probably gonna take you all day to get something decent. So do the first draft quick, get it to the chair quick. Impose upon the chair that they must get back to you quickly with their comments. And then the phrase I love is for the company secretary to send the draft to the directors. It's not an approved version, be careful with your language, because only the board can approve, not an individual person. But say something like here are the chairs approved draft minutes, please get back to. Me with comments within 48 hours, if there's any edits you would like. And that way, within a comfortable working week, you have got a set of minutes that every board member has had the opportunity to comment upon. And most board members will actually write back and say they're okay. And at that point, you can formally say, right, this is the version that's going to the next board meeting. They're now in the record. I know which version I'm talking about. And then at that next meeting, you sign them. Lovely little story in the chat from Una, aware of a situation where the chairman of the committee wasn't present, the acting chair wouldn't sign the minutes and indicated that it must be signed by the chairman of the committee. Actually, legally, it can be signed by the chair of the subsequent meeting. However, if the acting chair hadn't been present at the previous meeting, a very good idea to get somebody who had been present to be authorized to sign.
SPEAKER_03Any comments on that one?
SPEAKER_04Because we're it should be signed by the chair, the ex or the it should be signed by somebody who's actually at the meeting.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, the fact that you've put your signature doesn't mean you're responsible. Um you've put your signature to say that the whole board believes this is a true record.
SPEAKER_04Um, the first decision is a board's decision unless dissent is noted in the minutes, right? Um on that particular thing. So but also yeah. So minutes being signed have to be essentially unanimous or close to covers the ground. Yeah.
SPEAKER_02Okay, let's pop on. Um yeah, eight to ten pages, probably a bit long, Wendy. And yes, there's a reasonable time. Um if you want to have your chair sign them earlier, send them as a circular resolution. Um but 24 hours will be hard, but if you set aside the time, you will find that it is much quicker. The closer you are to the meeting, the faster it is to actually get those minutes out of your notes. And we might move forwards and talk about AI as somebody has mentioned it. Um, the really important thing is never assume that an AI note-taker is good enough for board minutes. Most of those note-takers are developed to take notes of meetings. They are not developed to governance grade of the sort of rigor that you require when everybody is personally responsible. Um, so really important to think through when you're looking at this, it is about AI helping the person, not about AI taking over the job. Um they're a record, they're not just a summary. And again, if you find it's taking you a long time with your minutes, prepare a template of what you think the minutes will be when you prepare the agenda so that you have that ready to be able to populate and make the changes and edits after the meeting for the things that need to be changed or edited. Um, you need to make sure that you read your minutes. Um, it's very tempting to just skim them and go, yeah, yeah, that looks vaguely like what happened. I sort of remember that all. Um you need words are important, grammar is important, the placement of commas is important because it can change the meaning. So you need to read your minutes very carefully. They are actually one of the most important papers in your pack. And the other one is when you're using um AI to help you make sure you are using an AI that is only trained on your data and specifically trained and developed for board work. Don't use a generic one. Um comments, David?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, so I'm happy to take us through this now. Um I'll show you a bit of a demo as well. So, you know, as you said, Judy, like starting with that first draft within 24 hours is important. That's obviously the hardest part to get done, the most time consuming. Um, we kind of say that working back through that recording takes time. And, you know, you're looking for decisions, you're looking for who agreed to do what, um, working out how much of that disruption to include, as some of the commentators here have said. Um, so that's where those two complaints that we started with come in. Too much detail and then too much time spent editing. Uh, and when we kind of came to look at this product, a board product, like what would AI minutes look like for us? We were starting with those two questions. And we wanted to sort of really just focus on helping you get that first draft together. Um, so Sean, would you mind going to the next slide? So we basically want you to stop writing them and start reviewing them. We want to keep that um approval role here. You are responsible for everything going into the record. We are just giving you that first draft to help you um cut some of that time out on a Monday morning. So uh we will have a look at this in a second, but just um what do you kind of get out of AI minutes? You get three things. You get notes, which are kind of that discussion captured by topic. So if you discuss things like say Q3 revenue and then expenses, those appear as separate notes, making them easy to review. And I'll show you some of the tools and control you've got over that in Board Pro as well. Um, you also get actions. So that's where you know you have like an OER and a due date. And again, if it's in the discussion, it gets converted into an appropriate action in your minutes. And then decisions too. So this is where we capture things like motions and resolutions, including uh outcome mover, and second, where they're stated. So that's quite key. And again, first draft we want you to be going through with that lens of is this correct and does this match what was discussed? Um and the aim really is that you leave off out of the back of this process um with the substances of meeting everything captured there for you to send through for approval and you can fill in up fill in the gaps. So I'll just screen share to show you what it actually looks like. You're all processing the board pro dashboard, quick nod from Julie, which are yeah, right. Okay. So this is the board pro dashboard. I suppose many of you might be familiar with it, but for those that aren't, this is uh where you see everything kind of related to your board pro profile. So you can see I've got a few different um boards showing up in here, a few different committees. I'm gonna hop into one. So I'll just hop into my Riverside Community Trust, and I'll go to a March meeting. It is a demo account, so there will be some inconsistencies, but this is just uh the purposes of this demo. And here I've got my meeting set up, I've published my agenda, I'm ready to take the minutes. Uh so I'll just head over to take minutes up here, just so I'm ready to go. And as I just mentioned, like you know, note, decision, and action. If you're doing minutes without AI, this is where you'd be capturing those in board pro manually. So you might just say the minute. Say there's a note, you might say but decision as well. You could say, as it says here, approval of budget. And we could say approved, and Nari is our approver, and Albert is our seconder, we can just say it's noted. And we could do the same for an action as well. And you can see how these displayed here. Um, importantly, too, you can see here on the left uh our AI minutes, sorry, our minutes function has shown that we've added two minute items. Um, and obviously that's the traditional way. With AI minutes, it's a little bit different. So you've actually got this import transcript button here, and this works from uh the transcript of a meeting. So typically works best when everyone is remote or hybrid where you've got the recording set up. And the more detail or the better quality of the transcript, the better the output you'll get here. So if you've got speaker names assigned, you know, you can turn those on with Zoom and Teams and even with some phone recorders. That will help tremendously with assigning actions, uh, action owners. Um and obviously recording quality will be a big dictator here. But just show you some of the control you've got over your AI minutes. So we'll pop into settings. And for those that aren't aware, like WordPress philosophy with AI is really that you've got full control over it too. So you can just turn it off and it strips it out of the entire platform if you don't want it. If it's on, it's on as seen here. And then with our minute controls, uh, got a few different options for style. So by default, we'll just use the previous two sets of minutes in your BoardPro account to infer the AI minute style. You can also choose from preset defaults, which have two levels of detail, concise and detailed, obviously a bit more um verbose there. And then we have this custom prompt capability too. So this is our default uh instruction set, but you've got again control over uh the style here. So you might have um some. Well, every board is a particular set of style and minutes, but you've got the ability to change that here. And we like to say, like, if you're trying this for the first time, get a transcript that you know is of quite good quality, um, play around with these settings, import it, and I'll show you you can actually delete a set of minutes too and re-import it so you can fry this out, get a feel for the different settings, what the minutes quality looks like before you go into the meeting to do it yourself later.
SPEAKER_03And if your board doesn't have a prefix child, just one important one.
SPEAKER_00And now our AI will go through and analyze the relevant points and pull them in against our agenda.
SPEAKER_03I know exactly. Um shall we oh very good.
SPEAKER_00Now you can see we've done the import, you can see my two prior sets of minutes. And again, for any professional minute takers on the call, I apologize for my draft minutes. Just purely to try the functionality. Um you can see how AI has well, one thing to call out first is this generated by Board Pro AI label. Really important, actually, because this is showing you that it's not something you've put in there. I mean, you'll know anyway, but this is really just for you to use as a check mark that you can see something has been added and it's AI. Um we pop to another agenda item with Richard and not this my test notes have added, um, you can see it's added here too. And it also gets this little star flourish against the agenda item where there's an AI minute. And we like to say you should be using this as kind of a check mark when you're going through and reviewing the minutes. So if you click into a note here and make an edit, um, or just make something you know immaterial, just remove the full stuff, save it, you can see that that little flourish gets removed. Um, and that again, just this is giving you that first drive, it's not giving you the final set. You should not be obviously, as Julia said, importing this and then sending it for review. We want you to go through this, you know, line by line and um review it. Yeah, so let's just say for the purposes of the demo, we have reviewed this. We will finish our draft and we'll send it out later, but I'll just show you what the preview looks like, which is just a clean set of minutes with our action items and we'll put a few action items in here. And so it comes on me, and then we can close it off, and then just quickly we can roll back and um delete them all too and start again. So back to you, Julie, I believe.
SPEAKER_02Wonderful. Um, while we're waiting for the next slide to come back up, a really good question from somebody anonymous. Um, use that anonymity well. If there's dissent, how do I integrate that into the meeting minutes? Is written dissent acceptable after previous meeting minutes have been accepted with no raised dissent during the acceptance of the previous minutes? Um short answer: no. Once you've approved those minutes, they are the enduring legal record of what happened. If anybody wants to dissent, they should do it before the meeting if they can't attend, so that the others can consider it, or they should do it at the meeting. Um, writing an email afterwards saying, I don't agree that those minutes are correct, you are just removing the bedrock from under your feet and placing yourselves on shaky ground because whilst you might remove the certainty that those minutes record what happened, um you haven't created any alternate certainty as to what really did happen. So always, once the minutes are approved, the discipline of those are our minutes. And if things change after the meeting, note the change. Don't go back and rewrite history because you're straying into fraud. Um, so back on because our slide is back. Um really important to think through how much detail you want. You notice David there picking the amount of detail. Um, board papers are an official record. You absolutely must detail any conflicts of interest and the way you handled them. Any additional data. So if you've had good, diligent board members who've gone out and done their own independent research into the decision, any data that wasn't in the papers that was then discussed and incorporated, that's quite a useful thing to include in your minutes. Um be really clear about specifying the decision. And if there are any, I've called them conditions precedent, which is a lovely legal term. But basically, if you've said if you do this, then you can do that. This is a condition precedent. And that is not approved until this has happened. So, for example, if you check the law and it's okay, then you can file the minutes without them being signed in New Zealand. Um, but if you don't check the law, or if when you check it it says they must be signed, then you can't file the minutes. So make sure that you've got anything like that. Um the jury's out on the use of coded language, saying things like the board discussed in depth or at length, um, or there was a um a vigorous debate. But I find that those words, whilst they're not precise and they don't indicate the quality, they do give some idea of the diligence, the fact that you put time and effort into something. So I like code, um, and I would rather say there was vigorous debate and the board decided than actually go through the debate and record conflict, because if those minutes in some remote possibility get queried in court afterwards, you do not want to give opposing counsel the idea of how to pit your board against itself. Um, boards must be united as one. Again, really good practice, don't refer to names unless you absolutely have to, because you're welcoming a new director to the board or farewelling someone who's leaving or recording a conflict of interest. Otherwise, the board requested, a director commented, or the directors did. Um, and record your decision, don't just say this was approved. Actually explain what this was so that when somebody, if they do come back and want to read your minutes, um, they can understand what the decision was without going from the minutes to the papers and starting to then want to gain access to the whole of your corporate records. As much as possible, write the minutes so that different people who weren't in the meeting can read them and go, yeah, I know what went on. Um really important the areas we struggle with. Um Jo, over to you. Um I guess your struggles in New Zealand are just the same as the ones we have here in Australia.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, oh exactly. I mean, Juliet's Yeah, it's uh I suppose I just had some uh some other thoughts to add in rather than just agree with you on that. Um, is that you always have to come at it from that legal protection lens. And so um making sure that especially again going back to if you're going to use AI and everyone is moving to AI, so let's be honest, it's clear to just good to just set some really basic ground rules around that. Is that do you have the recordings? And so do you have a protocol for deleting them the moment that those minutes were approved, they get deleted. Properly deleted. So what platform are you using as well? And is it feeding into the ether or is it all local? Depends on your settings and your subscription and your LLM and everything. Um are you getting the proper sign-off to record meetings? Um, are you watching out for hallucinations? Um, are you training it? Because and that's the whole thing, is AdBordPro's got this feature built in. You don't, unless you're taking really good notes yourself, and if you're only plugging in a transcript and you don't have a recording that you can refer back to, and you're not taking your own notes, how can you verify that what the AI has produced is correct? And often, unfortunately, people are not going back 24 hours later. So it's things like that. Um, it's just all about it doesn't, you've still got to have that human element of oversight. Someone is responsible for it, and they just need to know those basic breakdowns of what's required, the comings and goings from the meetings, etc. So I I think you spot on um with that, Julie.
SPEAKER_02Thank you. Um, and this is the area we we briefly looked at that done in Kruger. People who don't know very much about the legal framework around minutes or the current professional standards of practice are very often the people who most confidently assert that they want this recorded or they want that not recorded or that they would like it done in a certain way. Um there is room for a whole board to create a standard of how they want their minutes, but don't let the loudest voice overrule common sense. Um I think we are out of time, which is why I'm looking at my face and not looking at the picture that I was hoping to talk with you about. But what we will do, as we have done in the past, is go through and get all of the questions and all of the answers, and I will commit to recording a response to every single one and we'll pop it out somehow, somewhere. Sound like a plan? Thanks for Julie.
SPEAKER_01Sean? Thanks, Julie. Yeah, thanks everybody for all of your questions. I'm sorry we ran out of time. There was just some really good conversation going on there. So, look, we've got something really exciting coming to a city near you in October, November. That's certainly for our Audience, Kiwi viewers that is. Introducing governing with impact, a full day exploring what governance looks like in the new AI world with keynotes from leading subject matter experts and governance and AI and a tech style QA session. Plenty of great conversation and after function networking drinks to close things out. So we'd love to see you there. If you are in uh Sydney, Brisbane, Perth, Melbourne, Auckland, Wellington, or Christchurch towards the end of October or early November, we would love to see you there. Early bird tickets are available now, saving you 35% off the ticket price. And you can just use the uh code EarlyBird at checkout to lock in that pricing. You can find the link to the roadshow on our homepage, which is boardpro.com. And if you're looking for past webinars to hone your knowledge, then you'll find our library of webinars in the community portal now. And we invite you to join and be part of that growing community. The community is free to join, by the way, and only here will you find the slide decks, the transcripts, and the other resources from the webinars. You can follow the link on the screen to join. It's also on the homepage of our website as well. So you shall receive an email from me tomorrow now, which will include a recording of today's webinar, the transcript and the presentation slides. And of course, if you are considering board management software for your organization, we'd love to hear from you, of course. But still, why not try our free 30-day free trial? It's really simple and straightforward, and you do not need any credit cards to get started. Thank you again, everybody, for your attendance. I really hope you enjoyed the session today. Thank you, Julie, Joe, and David, for your great insights today. David for the demonstration. Thank you. I look forward to seeing you all at our next webinar, everybody. So don't forget the really short one minute survey, as we leave it, really helps us craft this great program for you. So have a great day. See you next time.