Meeting Agenda

When to Use This Skill

Use this skill when you need to:

Create a structured agenda for a team, client, or stakeholder meeting
Design recurring meeting templates (weekly standups, quarterly reviews, board meetings)
Build an agenda that ensures decisions get made and action items get assigned
Prepare a meeting that respects everyone's time with clear time allocations

DO NOT use this skill for meeting notes, post-meeting summaries, or facilitation scripts. This is for pre-meeting agenda creation only.

Core Principle

EVERY MEETING EXISTS TO MAKE DECISIONS OR ALIGN ON INFORMATION — IF THE AGENDA DOES NOT SPECIFY WHICH DECISIONS NEED TO BE MADE, THE MEETING WILL END WITHOUT MAKING THEM.

Phase 1: Meeting Brief

Gather meeting context before building the agenda.

Required Inputs

Input	What to Ask	Default
Meeting type	"What kind of meeting? (team sync, client call, strategy session, 1:1, board meeting, brainstorm)"	Team sync
Duration	"How long is the meeting?"	30 minutes
Attendees	"Who is attending and what are their roles?"	2-5 team members
Objective	"What MUST be decided or accomplished by the end of this meeting?"	No default — must be provided
Pre-read materials	"Any documents, reports, or context attendees should review beforehand?"	None
Recurring?	"Is this a one-time meeting or recurring?"	One-time

GATE: Confirm the meeting brief before building the agenda.

Phase 2: Build Agenda

Structure the agenda with time-boxed sections.

Agenda Architecture

Every agenda follows this structure, adjusted for meeting type and duration:

Opening (5% of meeting time) — state the objective, confirm agenda
Information sharing (20-30%) — updates, context, data review
Discussion (30-40%) — debate, input gathering, problem solving
Decisions (15-20%) — explicit decision points with owners
Action items + close (10%) — assign tasks, confirm next steps, set deadlines

Agenda Template

## Meeting Agenda: [Meeting Title]

**Date:** [Date]
**Time:** [Start] - [End] ([Duration])
**Attendees:** [Names and roles]
**Objective:** [One sentence — what success looks like when this meeting ends]

**Pre-read:** [Links or documents to review before the meeting]

---

| Time | Topic | Type | Owner | Notes |
|------|-------|------|-------|-------|
| 0:00 | Welcome + agenda review | Align | [Facilitator] | State objective |
| 0:02 | [Topic 1] | Info | [Name] | [Key question or context] |
| 0:10 | [Topic 2] | Discuss | [Name] | [Decision needed: Y/N] |
| 0:20 | [Topic 3] | Decide | [Name] | [Options to evaluate] |
| 0:25 | Action items + next steps | Close | [Facilitator] | Assign owners + deadlines |

---

**Decision items for this meeting:**
1. [ ] [Decision 1 — options: A, B, C]
2. [ ] [Decision 2 — options: A, B]

**Parking lot:** (topics raised but not on today's agenda)
-

Time Allocation Rules

No single topic should exceed 40% of the meeting duration
Decision items need at least 5 minutes each — do not rush decisions into 2 minutes
If more than 3 decisions need to be made, the meeting is too short or needs to be split
Buffer 2-3 minutes for transitions between topics

GATE: Present the agenda and get approval before finalizing.

Phase 3: Enhance

Add facilitation elements that keep the meeting on track.

Discussion Prompts

For each discussion topic, provide 1-2 specific questions the facilitator can ask to keep conversation focused:

**Topic: Q1 marketing budget allocation**
- "Given our Q4 results, which channel deserves more budget and why?"
- "What would we cut if we had to reduce the budget by 20%?"

Pre-Meeting Checklist

## Pre-Meeting Checklist

- [ ] Agenda sent to all attendees at least 24 hours before the meeting
- [ ] Pre-read materials linked and accessible
- [ ] Decision items clearly stated so attendees can form opinions beforehand
- [ ] Meeting room / video link confirmed
- [ ] Note-taker assigned

Action Item Template

## Action Items from [Meeting Title] — [Date]

| # | Action | Owner | Deadline | Status |
|---|--------|-------|----------|--------|
| 1 | | | | [ ] |
| 2 | | | | [ ] |

Phase 4: Recurring Template

If the meeting is recurring, deliver a reusable template.

Template Customization

Mark which sections are fixed (always present) vs. variable (change each meeting)
Include placeholders for rotating topics
Suggest a cadence for agenda distribution (e.g., "Send every Monday by 9 AM for Tuesday meetings")
Provide a quarterly review prompt to evaluate if the recurring meeting still needs to exist

Anti-Patterns

No stated objective — "Team sync" is not an objective. "Decide on Q2 launch date" is an objective.
Topic without owner — every agenda item needs one person responsible for driving that section.
All information, no decisions — meetings that only share updates should be emails instead.
No time limits — without time boxes, one topic will consume the entire meeting.
Too many topics — more than 5 topics in a 30-minute meeting means nothing gets depth.
Agenda sent during the meeting — if attendees see the agenda for the first time in the meeting, they cannot prepare.

Recovery

User cannot define the objective: Ask "If this meeting goes perfectly, what is different afterward?" The answer is the objective.
Too many topics for the time: Force-rank topics by urgency. Move lowest-priority items to a follow-up meeting or async channel.
User wants a meeting but it should be an email: If there are no decisions and no discussion needed, suggest an async update instead and draft that.
Recurring meeting feels stale: Recommend a meeting audit — skip the meeting for 2 weeks and see if anyone notices. If not, cancel it.
Attendee list is too large: Meetings with 8+ people rarely produce decisions. Recommend a core group of decision-makers with a summary sent to the broader group.