Meeting Prep Pack

You make sure the owner walks into every important meeting knowing why they are there, what they want to leave with, who is across the table, and what has happened before, in a page they can read in five minutes. A great brief is short, sourced and opinionated: it recommends the outcome to push for and the risks to avoid. It never contains a fact you cannot trace.

When to use

• "Prep me for tomorrow's call with Northwind."
• "Who am I meeting at 3 and what do they want?"
• "I have the investor meeting on Thursday, get me ready."
• "Brief me on the partnership meeting."
• Automatically, for every tier 1 meeting on the calendar (if the owner asks for this).

What you need

• The calendar event: time, attendees, description, attachments.
• History with the attendees: past emails and meeting notes (connected email and documents), the CRM if the owner uses one, previous briefs (session_search, search_files).
• Public professional information about external attendees and their organisation: company website, recent news, public professional profiles, filings for public companies.
• Internal context: relevant numbers, open deals or issues, commitments made to these people (ask teammates with ask_teammate if you lack it).
• Access: email, calendar, documents and CRM as connected apps or through the agent's own browser signed in by the owner. Without access, ask the owner for the key facts with clarify and research the public side.

Method

1. Pin the purpose. From the invite and the owner, write one sentence: "This meeting is to . A good outcome is ." If the owner has not said what they want, propose an outcome and ask.
2. Profile the people. For each external attendee: name, role, organisation, how they relate to us, what they likely want from the meeting, last interaction with us and what was said, and anything we promised them.
   • Use only professional, public information.
   • Do not dig into personal lives, family, or social accounts.
3. Pull the history. Summarise the relationship in three to five bullets: when it started, key moments, open issues, any tension. Quote commitments exactly and link the source.
4. Gather the facts that matter. The few numbers and facts the owner will need (contract value and renewal date, usage, outstanding invoices, product status, their recent news).
   • Every fact has a source link and a date.
   • If something is unknown, say "unknown" rather than estimating.
5. Shape the agenda. If there is no agenda, propose one with timings that leads to the desired outcome. Note who should speak to which item.
6. Prepare the play. Our asks (specific), their likely asks and our position on each, likely objections with short answers, sensitive topics to avoid or handle carefully, and the decisions needed. Mark which answers need the owner's judgement rather than your suggestion.
7. Adapt to the type. Use the type-specific sections in references/brief-templates.md: investor, customer, partner, hiring, board, difficult internal conversation, press.
8. Keep it to one page. Lead with purpose, outcome and the three things to remember.
   • Put detail and pre-reads below a clear line.
   • If you cannot fit it on a page, you have not chosen what matters.
9. Deliver on time. By the end of the previous working day (48 hours ahead for board and investor meetings), in the channel the owner prefers, and attached to the calendar event if they like. Set this up with cronjob for recurring categories.
10. Close the loop. After the meeting, offer to turn notes into actions (see meeting-actions-and-commitments) and save useful facts about the relationship with memory.

Judgement calls

• Very short notice (under two hours): send a five-line brief (purpose, who, last contact, one key fact, the ask) rather than nothing.
• The purpose is unclear even to the owner: recommend asking the requester for an agenda, or shortening the meeting to 25 minutes.
• Attendees change at the last minute: update the people section and flag the new names.
• Sources disagree on a fact: show both, with dates, and say which you believe is current and why.
• Internal meetings with the owner's own team: keep HR-sensitive information out of the brief unless the owner asked for it.
• Recurring meetings (weekly team, monthly customer review): keep one running brief and update only what changed.

Output

• briefs/<date>-<meeting>.md, one page: header (time, place or link, attendees), purpose and desired outcome, three things to remember, people, history, key facts with sources, agenda, our asks, their likely asks, objections and answers, sensitivities, decisions needed, pre-reads.
• A short message to the owner with the link and the three things to remember.

Example of the top of a brief (fictional company and people):

Purpose: agree renewal terms with Northwind for 2027.
Good outcome: verbal yes to a two-year renewal at today's price, 5% uplift in year two,
and a named date for the paperwork.
Three things to remember:
1. Their usage is up 30% since March (billing dashboard, read 14 Oct).
2. We promised the export fix by 30 Sep and shipped it on 2 Oct, two days late (ticket link).
3. Their new finance director joined in August and is reviewing all suppliers (their press release).

Checks before you finish

• Names, titles and company names are spelled exactly as the people use them.
• Purpose and desired outcome are stated in specific terms.
• Every fact and number has a source and date; unknowns are marked.
• People profiles contain only professional, public or company-held information.
• Commitments to these people are quoted exactly with links.
• It fits on one page above the line.
• It was delivered by the agreed deadline.
• Hypotheses (what people probably want) are labelled as such, separate from facts.
• Anything the owner must not say (confidential deals, unannounced news) is flagged under "handle with care".

Pitfalls

• The dossier. Ten pages of research nobody reads. One page, then links.
• Stale facts. Last quarter's numbers or someone's old job title embarrass the owner. Check dates.
• Guessing motives as facts. "They want a discount" is a hypothesis; label it as such.
• Creepy research. Personal details about attendees' families or private lives have no place in a brief.
• No recommended outcome. A brief that only describes is half done. Say what to push for.
• Forgetting our own promises. Missing a commitment we made last time is the fastest way to lose trust. Search for it.
• Late delivery. A perfect brief that arrives as the meeting starts is useless. Send a short version on time and update it if needed.

See also: schedule-and-protect-time for the buffer before the meeting, and meeting-actions-and-commitments for afterwards.