Meeting prep: how to prepare for a meeting in 20 minutes

Most meeting prep is either nothing or too much. Nothing means you spend the first ten minutes catching up. Too much means a folder of documents you will not open while someone is talking.

What works is a short page you write before the call and glance at during it. Twenty minutes is enough for most meetings. Here is what goes on it, in the order to write it.

The day before: 15 minutes

1. Why the meeting exists, in one sentence

Write what a good outcome looks like when the call ends. "Agree the scope for phase two and who owns the estimate" is a purpose. "Sync on phase two" is a calendar entry. If you cannot write the sentence, ask the organiser before you prepare anything else; the meeting may not need to happen.

2. Who will be there, and what each person wants

One line per person: their role, what they care about, and what pressure they are under. You do not need a dossier. You need enough to not be surprised when the finance lead asks about cost instead of features.

3. What happened last time

Open the notes, the email thread or the ticket from the previous meeting. Write down what was promised and by whom. Half of most follow-up meetings is checking whether last meeting's promises were kept.

4. The facts you might need, with where they came from

The numbers, dates and commitments someone may ask about: the price, the deadline, the figure in the report. Next to each one, the document it comes from. If you cannot point to a source, leave it off the page; that is the fact you will get wrong under pressure.

5. Your questions

The two to five things you need to learn in this meeting. Write them as you would say them. These are the easiest thing to forget once the conversation moves.

6. What you must not say

Things you cannot commit to, claims that are not true yet, and topics that need someone else's approval. "Do not promise a date before engineering confirms." "Do not discuss pricing for the other region." One line each.

Fifteen minutes before: 5 minutes

1. Read the page once, top to bottom.
2. Check the agenda in the invite against your purpose sentence. If they disagree, raise it in the first minute.
3. Open the one or two documents you are most likely to need, and close everything else.

A meeting preparation checklist

Copy this into your notes:

• Purpose in one sentence.
• One line per attendee: role, what they want.
• Promises from last time, and whether they were kept.
• Facts you may quote, each with its source.
• Your questions, written as you would ask them.
• What you must not say or commit to.
• Read once, today.

For high-stakes calls like a renewal or a negotiation, add positions, concessions and red lines. What to prepare before a negotiation call covers that version field by field.

Where AI meeting prep tools help, and where they do not

There are now tools that prepare for you: they read your calendar, look up the attendees, and summarise past emails. That saves time on steps 2 and 3.

They help less with steps 4 and 6, which are the ones that matter when the call gets hard. A tool that summarises the web does not know your discount ceiling, and it does not know which claims legal told you not to make. Those come from your own documents, and you are the one who knows which documents count.

How Savvy does meeting prep

Savvy is a free, open-source Mac app built around this page. You point it at the folder for a client or project, and it reads the documents and drafts the brief: purpose, positions, facts with their sources, questions, and the things you must not say. You edit it and approve it.

During the call, nothing joins the meeting. Savvy listens on your Mac and shows a card when the other side asks a question, when someone touches one of your "must not say" lines, or when you press Advice. Each card says what to say, what to avoid, and which of your files says so. How Savvy decides when to speak explains the rules.

If you would rather keep the page on paper, the checklist above works without any software. That is the point of writing it down.