Reflecting on meetings.

It is easy to close your notes, open the next invitation and move on. I have done that for much of my working life.

But the next meeting will not get better just because the previous one happened.

Reflecting on meetings is a short pause after a meeting to notice what happened, decide what needs following up and change something for next time. Not another meeting. A few lines in the notes you already have.

A recap is not a reflection.

A recap records what we discussed and agreed. Who will do what, and when.

Reflection asks different questions. Did this conversation help? What did I miss? Was there a remark I moved past too quickly? Did the format give us what we needed?

Both matter. Sending the action points does not mean you have learned from the meeting.

Three questions.

Before moving on, I use three questions:

1. What did this meeting achieve? A decision, a clearer problem, a useful next step. Or less than we hoped.
2. What did I notice? Something that worked, a moment of tension, a question left unanswered, or something I wish I had handled differently.
3. What will I change before the next one? My preparation, the format, who attends, the frequency. Or whether we need another meeting at all.

The aim is not a perfect account of everything that happened. It is one useful observation and something to do with it.

Make room for it.

In the routine I described in 2020, I added a small reflection section at the bottom of my meeting notes, including my 1:1 template. Alongside takeaways and next steps, I noted the meeting’s impact and mood.

Those are different things. A pleasant conversation can achieve very little. A difficult one can move something important forward.

I also left time between meetings to reflect and follow up. Sometimes that meant a fifteen-minute calendar block. It does not need to be fifteen minutes after every call: a short pause can be enough.

An end-of-day block was my fallback when the day ran away with me. A chance to revisit the notes and send the follow-ups I had not yet sent.

The important part is making room somewhere, rather than assuming it will happen by itself.

Let it change something.

Sometimes the next step is a recap. Sometimes it is a message to someone whose comment I did not give enough attention to.

It might mean changing the next agenda, preparing differently or updating the template. It might mean meeting less often.

Keep the observation where you will see it when preparing for the next meeting. Otherwise, it is just another note you will never open again.

This is the “after” of Before, during, after: a model for giving a meeting attention before and after, not only while everyone is in the room.

Preparation helps you enter a meeting well. Reflection helps you leave it with more than action points.

First published 21 May 2020; rewritten in October 2026 from my original post. The three questions make the original routine more compact. Related: Doings instead of meetings is about what you do together. This ritual is about what you learn from it.