Help for NENA-ADM-008 Agenda and Notes Form (Draft)

This page includes proposed changes.

Comments: May be submitted until 7/19/2024. Click here to submit a comment about this page
Proposed By: References Working Group
Click here to see the changes.
Note: This change added a training video.
Approval Policy: Changes that result from comments received by 7/19/2024 will be added to this page for another review period. If comments suggesting additional changes or corrections are not received by 7/19/2024, the changes will be considered approved and adopted. See NENA Knowledge Base Management Policies for details.

Introduction

The NENA-ADM-008 Agenda and Notes form is used for NENA meetings to prepare the proposed agenda and to document the essential results of the meeting.

This Help Page is divided into two sections that reflect the two primary uses of the form and the separate responsibilities of persons who edit the form.

The Preparing the Agenda section is intended for the person preparing the agenda for the next meeting. That person completes the sections shown in peach.
The Taking Notes section is a guide for the note-taker who captures the significant discussions and decisions made during the meeting and then processes the notes for distribution. The notes are entered in the white spaces that are part of the light blue sections. The note taker should distribute the form as soon as possible after the meeting to serve as DRAFT notes/minutes.

Recent Update

This Help Page supports the recently updated version 5 (NENA-ADM-008.5-2024) that incorporated these changes:

Moved the document number from the top of the first page into the footer.
Updated links that reference NENAkb pages.
Removed Zoom, Action Items, and Attendance Report hyperlinks and added instructions in the Help form on how to add the hyperlinks to the text for each of these.
Removed the opening questions about Patent IPR and Duplication of Work and placed a Duplication of Work and Patent IPR statement in the Meeting Etiquette box along with a check box to indicate if any Patent IPR was disclosed during the meeting.
Added a section at the bottom of the form to record Patent IPR disclosed during the meeting.

The form is restricted. Locked. Protected. But you can stop the protection.

The form is distributed with formatting restricted to a limited number of formats as shown in its Styles group in the Home tab of Word. This avoids rogue fonts from being introduced into the document when content is copied and pasted from other documents, chat functions, etc. As distributed, it conforms to Word's accessibility standards. If it is necessary to stop the editing protection, you can click on Restrict Editing in the Protect group in the Review tab of Word, then click Stop Protection at the bottom of the Restrict Editing panel. Be aware, however, that some formatting changes may threaten the accessibility status of the document. To re-enable protection, click on Yes, Start Enforcing Protection under item 3 on the Restrict Editing panel and then OK on the pop-up (adding password protection is optional).

Training Video

Many Working Group leaders have Agendas and Notes prepared for existing meetings, but in the older NENA-ADM-008 Agenda and Notes form. This training video provides tips and tricks for quickly migrating existing Agendas and Notes into the updated template. It also provides information on where to find the most up-to-date Agenda and Notes form, where to find the instructions on the NENA Knowledge Base (NENAkb), what has changed in the updated form, how to add and delete sections within the form, and guidance for what to include in the Discussion Summary for an Agenda Item.

Preparing the Agenda

These steps assume that you have already set up the meeting in NWS (NENA Workspace) and that the notes for the previous meeting have been uploaded to the group's notes folder. Download the latest NENA-ADM-008 Agenda and Notes form from NENA Workspace.

The header

The header contains the Community Group Name, Agenda/Notes identifier, and Meeting Date. It appears at the top of all pages in the form.

To edit the header, double-click in the header area. Once the header area is selected, the three sections may be edited.

Group Name

Enter the Community group name.

Agenda

Since the Agenda is being prepared, click on the Agenda check box. If the Notes box was filled (from a previous meeting), clear it by clicking on it.

Meeting Date

Click on the date to the right of the Meeting Date text and then the drop-down arrow to open the date selector. Select the meeting date.

When editing the header is complete, double-click in the body of the form to exit the header and begin editing the form.

Populate the NENA Workspace (NWS) Links

Note: These instructions and screen prints may not exactly match your version of Word or your browser. Also, some parts of the published form may be updated and may not be identical to screen prints here.

The three links to the NWS pages only need to be populated one time. They do not need to be changed from week to week if you update previous forms to create agendas or notes.

Zoom Meeting Information 1

Add the hyperlink to your Community Events NWS page where all upcoming meetings are listed:

Navigate to the Community Events tab 1a in NWS and copy the URL displayed in the address bar 1b .

Go back to the Agenda and highlight the Zoom Meeting Information text 1c on the header, right click, and click on Link 1d in the menu. Paste the copied URL into the Address box.
Delete <add link to this text> 1e .

Action Items 2

Add the hyperlink to your Community Workspace NWS page where all Action Items are listed:

Navigate to the Community Workspace tab 2a in NWS, click on Action Items 2b in the left hand menu, and copy the displayed URL in the address bar 2c .

Go back to the Agenda and highlight the Action Items text 2d on the header, right click, and click on Link 2e in the menu. Paste the copied URL into the Address box.
Delete <add link to this text> 2f .

Attendance Report 3

Add the hyperlink to your Community Workspace NWS page where the Meeting Attendance Report is listed:

Navigate to the Community Workspace tab 3a in NWS, click on Roster 3b in the left hand menu, and click on Meeting Attendance 3c next to REPORTS.

Copy the displayed URL in the address bar 3d .

Go back to the Agenda and highlight the Attendance Report text 3e on the header, right click, and click on Link 3f in the menu. Paste the copied URL into the Address box.
Delete <add link to this text> 3g .

Test the three links to confirm they go to the correct NWS pages. This is what the populated links should look like:

Attendance

No preparation is required for the Attendance section of the Agenda.

Previous Notes Review and Approval

Enter the link to previous notes on NENA Workspace

It is recommended to use the link for the NENA Workspace folder where meeting notes are located rather than the link to the meeting notes document. By doing this, you only populate the link once - when the second agenda is created. For all subsequent agendas, just change the date as shown in step 1 below.

1. Click on the date 1 and then the drop-down arrow to open the date selector. Select the meeting date.

2. To get the URL, navigate to the Community Workspace tab in NWS 2a , select Documents 2b in the left hand menu, click on the Folder Navigation icon 2c , click on the Notes folder 2d , and copy the displayed URL in the address bar 2e .

3. Go back to the Agenda and highlight just the Notes text 3a in the Previous Notes Review and Approval section, right click, and click on Link 3b in the menu. Paste the copied URL into the Address box.

4. Delete <add link to Notes page> 4 .

Previous Notes Review and Approval Disposition

Many groups simply consider the previous notes to be approved if no one objects. For them, no additional preparation is required.

If your group requires that acceptance of previous notes be formally approved with a motion, second, and vote, add labels for those steps when preparing the agenda:

Place the cursor in the field below the text Disposition.
Add Motion to Accept: and Second: and enter a carriage return.

Agenda Review and Approval

Many groups simply consider the agenda approved if no one objects. For them, no additional preparation is required.

If your group requires that agendas be formally approved with a motion, second, and vote, add labels for those steps when preparing the agenda:

Place the cursor in the field below the text Disposition.
Add Motion to Accept: and Second: and enter a carriage return.

Announcements

The meeting organizer may choose to prepare the Announcements section for anticipated announcements prior to the meeting.

To add rows to the announcement table, follow these steps.

Click somewhere in the row that you want to copy/paste 1 .
Click the + sign 2 .
The row is automatically copied and pasted directly below, expanding the table.
Do this as many times as necessary to expand the table to the correct number of anticipated announcement sources.
Enter the names or roles of those expected to make an announcement. If announcements have been provided to the meeting organizer, they could be entered prior to the meeting.

Agenda Categories

Agenda Items and Tasks are divided into three categories that appear in the order that they are expected to be discussed in the meeting.

First Actions

These are agenda items that should be addressed before any other items. There are several reasons that agenda items would be in this category:

Some attendees or guests involved with the topic may have limited time to participate.
Some items will take only a short time and the remaining items may consume the rest of the meeting.
Some items are time-sensitive and need to be addressed before the next scheduled meeting.

Add Action Items Link

The first designated Item in First Actions is Review Action Items.

Copy the Action Items text and link from the top of the Agenda and highlight the Action Items <add link to Action Items text> text.

To replace the highlighted text, right click, and Paste the text copied from the NWS links table.

No further action for the First Action Agenda preparation is required, but the Agenda preparer may choose to add background or links to documents that will be shared when discussing Action Items where indicated.

Unfinished Business

Agenda items from previous meetings are included in this category. When preparing the agenda, it is recommended that only a brief summary of the topic and condensed discussion notes from the previous meeting be included in the peach-colored Agenda Items heading. Keeping extended previous notes in the agenda item heading is not recommended.

New Business

Agenda items not previously discussed are included in the category.

Agenda Items

The general form for Agenda Items include the peach-colored agenda section and the blue meeting section:

The Agenda Item: <Title> section shows the one or two line title. The Title row gets repeated when the table extends to additional pages. Replace <Title> with a short title.

The second row will contain the supporting background information. This may be a short summary of previous discussions. If documents are expected to be shared, links to them may help the presenter open them quickly. Because this second row in Agenda Items may have more material, it is not duplicated when the table extends to additional pages.

The NENA-ADM-008 template file contains Agenda Item tables for each of the three categories: First Actions, Unfinished Business, and New Business. Duplicating Agenda Items and Tasks is easy. The instructions for using the duplication feature are below.

How to set up Agenda Items

The peach-colored header section contains the Agenda Item title (bold) and below it, the background for the topic or a summary of the last meeting notes. The blue "Discussion Summary" section should contain no text prior to the meeting.

Here are the suggested steps to set up an Agenda Item:

Replace <title> next to Agenda Item with a short title for the topic to be discussed.
On the line below the title, replace the <Background, with links to documents to be shared.> text with the background information about the topic. The background should include links to any documents or sites that are expected to be opened during the meeting. This not only saves time during the meeting but also gives attendees the opportunity to preview the material before the meeting.
When applicable, include a brief summary from the last time this topic was discussed or key decisions previously made to keep the discussion on track and to avoid rehashing decisions previously made. Note: Accumulating all previous meeting notes is not recommended.

Note: Do not enter information in the Discussion Summary section prior to the meeting. That section is reserved for notes taken during (or after) the meeting. The notes in this section are intended for one meeting only. When preparing an agenda for the next meeting, the preparer may copy the notes from the Discussion Summary into the peach-colored Agenda Item section for the next meeting's agenda.

How to duplicate Agenda Items

Only one Agenda Item and Task is included in the basic form. An automatic duplication feature can be used to duplicate the Agenda Item and Task table. The duplication feature copies the selected table and its contents and pastes the copy directly below it. If you know how many Agenda Items you need for your meeting preparation, copy the blank tables first, using this process:

Click somewhere in the peach-colored field 1 to select the table.
Click the green + sign 2 to duplicate the Agenda Item.

Repeat the process until you have enough Agenda Items.

If you need to add more items after you've entered information in them, you can duplicate a filled-in table and edit the contents as needed.

How to delete Agenda Items

To delete a duplicated or previously completed Agenda Item, right-click somewhere in the table 1 and then click on Delete Agenda 2 . This method may not work for the original template's Agenda Items.

Patent IPR Disclosed During this Meeting (for Agenda preparation)

This section is for the recording of any Patent IPR that is brought up during the meeting. No preparation of this section is needed prior to the meeting except deleting text from a prior meeting if you are using the previous meeting notes form as the template for the agenda.

Zoom Attendance Report (for Agenda preparation)

The Zoom Attendance Report is where the attendance details from the Zoom meeting are copied after the meeting. No preparation of this section is needed prior to the meeting except deleting text from a prior meeting if you are using the previous meeting notes form as the template for the agenda.

Chat Box (for Agenda preparation)

The In-Meeting Chat section is where the In-Meeting Chat contents are copied at the end of the meeting. No preparation of this section is needed prior to the meeting except deleting text from a prior meeting if you are using the previous meeting notes form as the template for the agenda.

Check Accessibility (for Agenda preparation)

Run the accessibility test. Click on the Review tab, then Check Accessibility in the Accessibility group. Resolve any flagged accessibility issues.

Saving the Agenda

The recommended file name format when saving an Agenda file is <group name> Agenda YYYYMMDD.docx (e.g., References WG Agenda 20240130.docx). Agenda files are uploaded to the Agenda folder in the group's NENA Workspace documents section. If an Agenda is revised after it is posted, the revised Agenda should be uploaded as a revision to the previously saved agenda file.

Taking Notes

The designated note-taker will use the NENA-ADM-008 Agenda form as the basis for taking the meeting's notes.

Preparing NENA-ADM-008 form for Note-taking

In preparation for a meeting, the note-taker edits a copy of the agenda for the meeting by unchecking the Agenda check box in the form's header and checking the Notes box instead.

Attendance

At the beginning of the meeting, either the meeting host or a meeting co-host should review the Zoom Participants Panel to identify participants in the meeting who do not have their full name displayed or only show a phone number. Names should include both a first and last name and phone numbers should be changed to the full name of the caller.

There are two goals for this process:

Let everyone know who is in the meeting. Identifying meeting participants is a normal business courtesy.
Verify that the names of the callers are correct. Zoom participant names are a back-up to the NWS attendance and may contain names of guests or other parties who are not listed in the NWS group roster.

Previous Notes Review and Approval

When the previous notes are reviewed, the results should be entered in the Disposition field. Some groups simply consider the previous notes to be approved if no one objects and enter "Approved" in the Disposition field.

If the group's policy requires a formal motion, second, discussion, and vote on the acceptance of the previous notes, the details of that process are entered.

Agenda Review and Approval

Agenda changes should be made with a note and a brief summary of the changes made in the Disposition field. Some groups simply consider the agenda approved if no one objects and enter "Approved" in the Disposition field.

If the group's policy requires a formal motion, second, discussion, and vote on the acceptance of the agenda, the details of that process are entered.

Announcements

If there are any announcements that were not previously added during the Agenda preparation, enter the name of the person making the announcement and the summary of the announcement. If you need more rows for unexpected announcements, add rows as shown above in the Announcements section for Agenda preparation.

Agenda Items in First Actions, Unfinished Business, and New Business

Enter the essential summaries of the discussions and any decisions made in the Discussion Summary field of each item. If an Agenda Item starts near the end of a page such that there are only a few lines left on the page for the notes, consider adding a page break before the Agenda Item so that the entire Agenda Item and its notes are pushed down to start at the top of the next page rather than being split onto two pages. This may be especially beneficial when the Agenda Item's background information is lengthy.

Adding Graphics

If graphics (like screen prints) are added to the notes, they should be annotated with "alternative text" in order to conform to accessibility guidelines. To do this in Word, select the graphic, right click, then select Edit Alt Text.

Meeting Adjournment Time

Record the time the meeting ended, including the time zone. If you did not record the time at the end of the meeting, check the Zoom Usage Report and use the time when most members disconnected from the call.

Patent IPR Disclosed During this Meeting (for Notes preparation)

If any Patent IPR was brought up during the meeting, note all disclosures here, including name of individual making the disclosure, employer or affiliation, brief description of the disclosure (the official disclosure will be the responsibility of the individual making it, or their employer, and will be on the applicable official form), and Patent Number(s) (if provided).

Check the Patent IPR Disclosed During this Meeting box in the Meeting Etiquette section at the top of the NENA-ADM-008 form. Once the draft Meeting Notes are completed, send an email to crm@nena.org with a copy of the draft Meeting Notes and inform the CRM that the Notes contain Patent IPR.

Zoom Attendance Report (for Notes preparation)

After the meeting is over, the Zoom Usage Report attendance information must be added to the Notes. It may be entered manually or copied from the Zoom Usage Report and pasted into the form. The Zoom Usage Report is available at https://Zoom.us. It is not available through other Zoom URLs.

[Other variations for capturing the attendance information may be used, as long as the attendance is captured accurately.]

Note: The following method results in only the names being added to the notes. It is not appropriate to put members' phone numbers or other related information in the Notes.

How To Download Zoom Usage Report

Sign in to Zoom with the NENA Committee credentials, but uncheck the Stay signed in box to avoid having your identity always reflect the Committee name when you join other NENA Zoom calls.
Upon logging in, you will be located on the Zoom Administrative panel. Click on Reports 1 in the left hand menu and then click on Usage 2 .

If the desired meeting is not displayed, change the From and To dates 3 to the date of the meeting and click on Search 4 . Note that reports can be retrieved for the last 12 months, with a search range of up to one month at a time.

Do not click on Export as CSV File. The file will only list the meetings in the displayed date range and no meeting participants are identified.

Find the Zoom meeting you need the attendance from (confirm date and time since there may be multiple meetings on the same date) and click on the number in the Participants column.

In the resultant pop-up window, check the Export with meeting data box 5 and the Show unique users box (if present). Then click on Export 6 to download a CSV file.

Check to see if the CSV file appears in the Downloads folder (the export may take a few moments).
Once the file downloads, close the pop-up window.

Open the CSV file in Excel, sort the table alphabetically by name, remove duplicate names (if any), and copy just the names listed in the Name column.
Highlight the <Paste Zoom Attendance here> text 7 in the Notes form, right click, and paste clicking on the Keep Text Only (T) 8 paste option in the menu.

Chat Box (for Notes preparation)

BEFORE the Zoom session ends, the facilitator and the note-taker must review the Chat content to determine if there is chat content that is relevant for the Notes.

Copy the Chat window content directly from the Zoom Chat window by selecting the More button (three dots) and then Save Chat.

If the Zoom host did not replace the Committee Name with their name when they logged into Zoom, use Word's Replace function to replace "From <Committee Name> to Everyone" with "From <Zoom host's name> to Everyone."

Delete private messages you may have sent or private messages others sent to you, which could contain sensitive information.

Alternate Method of Capturing the Chat Box

Use the .txt file that is automatically saved to the computer of the host who started the Zoom meeting. Saving occurs during the meeting, near real-time, with chat content continuously added to the .txt file during the meeting. The default location for that .txt file is a new subfolder under the computer's /Documents/Zoom folder, named with the meeting name, current date, and time.

After the meeting, the host who started the meeting should navigate to their /Documents/Zoom/<folder with meeting name, date and time> and open the .txt file. Copy the contents of the file.
Highlight the <Paste relevant Chat Box notes here.> text 1 in the Notes form, right click, and paste clicking on the Keep Text Only (T) 2 paste option in the menu.

If the host who started the meeting leaves before the meeting ends, the updating of the chat text log ends when they leave. Even if there is another meeting host, Zoom will not begin creating a chat log on the other host’s computer. If you encounter this situation, someone (note-taker, another host) would need to copy the chat from the Zoom chat window from at least the point where the host who started the meeting exited, or all of the text beyond that point will be lost.

Check Accessibility (for Notes preparation)

Run the accessibility test. Click on the Review tab, then Check Accessibility in the Accessibility group. Among the kinds of edits that can cause accessibility warnings are the use of some text colors (like red), the insertion of a graphic without entering Alternative Text information or inserting tables with specific styles. Resolve any flagged accessibility issues.

Saving the Notes

The recommended file name format when saving a Notes file is <group name> Notes YYYYMMDD.docx (e.g., References WG Notes 20240130.docx). Notes files are uploaded to the Notes folder in the group's NENA Workspace documents section. If Notes are revised after they are posted, the revised Notes should be uploaded as a revision to the previously saved Notes file.