Meeting Minutes Abbreviations: MoM, mins., and 5 More Terms Explained (2026)

"BTW, send MoM by EOD. Remember to CC the MKT POC, BR."

The first time I got an email like this, I stared at the screen for a full three minutes.

I recognized every word, but together they made no sense. Later I figured it out: they wanted me to send out the meeting minutes before the end of the day, with a copy to the marketing contact.

If you've ever received a similar email, this article is for you.

Two-Hour Meeting, Three More Hours on Minutes—The Problem Usually Isn't English

Many people think they can't write meeting minutes because their English isn't good enough.

Honestly, I've seen too many cases where the real problem isn't English at all.

First scenario: turning minutes into a verbatim transcript. Writing down every detail of the discussion, ending up with 4,000 words that nobody wants to read twice.

Second scenario: vague resolutions. "Everyone felt the budget could be discussed further"—then next meeting, you ask again and start all over.

Third scenario: writing action items but not specifying who's responsible or when it's due. That's as good as not writing them at all.

This article won't cover advanced English writing techniques. I'll just explain abbreviations, format, and process clearly so you can deliver your minutes within half an hour after your next meeting.

Before You Write Minutes, Understand These 5 Key Points

1. Abbreviations Are Just the Shell—The Core Is the Format

Meeting minutes in English is meeting minutes, or more formally minutes of meeting, abbreviated as MoM, which you often see in emails.

In spoken English, people more often just say minutes. So "please take the minutes" is Do you take minutes, please?, and you can also say keep minutes.

The lowercase mins. is also common, but in some companies it means "minutes" as in time. For formal document titles, I recommend writing Minutes of Meeting in full rather than using just the abbreviation.

2. The English Word for a Resolution Is Always Resolution

Many people get this wrong.

An approved resolution is always called a resolution—not conclusion, not decision. This isn't a grammar issue; it's a convention issue. Write it wrong and insiders will spot it immediately.

A common sentence in meeting minutes looks like this: The committee approved the revised minutes from the previous meeting.

3. How to Write Attendance: Apologies, Not Take Leave

People who are absent or unable to attend are listed under apologies. You can also write Absent with apologies or use regrets.

Never write take leave—that's the action of requesting leave, not a field name in meeting minutes.

4. AOB Is Not Some Mysterious Organization

AOB = Any Other Business—other matters, miscellaneous items.

When the chair says Let's move on to AOB, it means "now we'll open the floor for any other business." Meeting minutes often use AOB as a subheading.

5. AI Is Action Item, Not Artificial Intelligence

AI in meeting minutes usually means action item.

But with AI being so popular these days, the same abbreviation can have two meanings in the same email. My personal habit: always write Action Items in formal documents, no abbreviation. One less misunderstanding saves a lot of back-and-forth.

While we're at it, here are other terms that often appear together: TBD (to be determined), TBC (to be confirmed), FYI (for your information), EOD / COB (end of day / close of business), POC (point of contact), CC (carbon copy).

My Standard Approach: A Set of Minutes You Can Deliver in Half an Hour

Now that we've covered abbreviations, let's talk about how to actually write them.

My approach: always use the meeting agenda as the skeleton. The agenda itself is a ready-made table of contents—you just fill in the blanks.

The skeleton looks like this:

Minutes of Meeting — Project Name
Date / Time / Venue
Chair: [Name]
Minutes by: [Name]
Attendees: [Names]
Apologies: [Names]

1. Review of previous minutes
2. Agenda item 1 — Discussion / Resolution
3. AOB
4. Action Items (Who / What / When)
Next meeting: [Date/Time]

A few habits I've developed after making mistakes:

First, only record things related to the agenda.

Small talk during discussions, off-topic complaints—leave them out. Meeting minutes are not court transcripts; they're summaries for people who weren't there.

Second, use bullet points, not full sentences.

One line per point, starting with a verb. This is crucial—writing full English sentences will take you three times as long, and it won't be any easier for readers to understand.

Third, use action verbs.

Start each entry with a clear action verb: approved, requested, recommended, confirmed, deferred, assigned.

This way, readers can scan and immediately know the status of each item without reading the whole paragraph.

Fourth, action items must have an owner and a date.

The format is three columns: who, what, when. If any column is missing, it's not an action item—it's a wish.

Fifth, start by reviewing the previous minutes.

Meetings usually begin by looking at the last minutes. You can memorize this sentence: To begin, let's quickly go over the minutes from our last meeting.

Sixth, send them out the same day.

The value of meeting minutes decays quickly over time. If you send them the next day, everyone's memory of the discussion has faded, and you'll be bombarded with questions.

Beyond Handwritten Bullet Points: Other Approaches

Not everyone is suited to pure handwriting. Here are three common alternatives, each with its own use case.

Full verbatim transcript: Suitable for situations requiring a word-for-word record, such as legal, contract negotiations, or audits. The downside is it's extremely time-consuming, and almost no one will read the whole thing. If you just need internal communication, this is overkill.

Recording plus speech-to-text: Suitable for bilingual meetings, fast speakers, or when you have to both chair and take notes. First transcribe, then manually edit down to bullet points. Note that the transcript is raw material, not a finished product—sending it out directly would be embarrassing.

AI summarization tools: Suitable for regular meetings with a fixed structure. But remember one thing—AI can capture what was discussed, but not necessarily what was decided. For the resolutions section, I recommend always manually verifying before sending.

You can mix these three approaches. My own combination: record important meetings and write bullet points manually; for regular meetings, just handwrite.

Pitfall Guide: The 4 Most Common Mistakes in Writing English Meeting Minutes

Pitfall 1: Chasing full sentences.

Many people think English writing should be beautiful. Wrong. The evaluation criterion for meeting minutes is how quickly others can understand them, not how grammatically correct they are. One key point per line, starting with a verb—that's enough.

Pitfall 2: Writing resolutions as discussion summaries.

"Everyone discussed the budget issue" is not a resolution. A resolution is "Approved a 10% budget reduction, to be implemented by [Name]." The former is as good as nothing; the latter can be checked at the next meeting.

Pitfall 3: Writing only what to do, not who does it.

This is the most common disaster. The "actions by whom" column must exist. Without a name, that action item will turn into "Hey, weren't you handling this?" two weeks later.

Pitfall 4: Using minutes as a verb for meeting minutes.

Minutes is a noun; the action goes with take or keep. Writing to minute the meeting isn't impossible, but it looks odd in formal documents. Take minutes is the safest choice.

Conclusion: Which Approach Should You Use?

Here's the bottom line.

Bilingual cross-border meetings requiring formal archiving → Use the full Minutes of Meeting format, write the full title, and use bullet points with action verbs in the body.

Weekly regular meetings with high repetition → Pure handwritten bullet points are enough. Use the agenda as a template and overwrite each time. You'll definitely deliver within half an hour.

Bilingual meetings with fast speakers → Record first, then transcribe, then manually edit down to resolutions and action items. Remember: the transcribed text cannot be sent directly.

Requires verbatim archiving (legal, audit) → Verbatim transcript plus manually annotated key sections, both kept.

Just want to understand what colleagues are writing → Memorize these six: MoM, AOB, AI, TBD, EOD, POC. You'll understand 80% of mixed-language emails.

One last honest thought: how well you write meeting minutes has less to do with your English level and more to do with whether you listened carefully for the conclusions during the meeting.

Next meeting, try recording just three things—what was decided, who will do it, and when it's due. Start with those three columns.

References

• [Business English Meetings] How to Say Meeting Minutes in English? A Detailed Analysis of Related Terms and Note-Taking Techniques | Lado Enterprise English Training
• A Super Practical Guide to Writing English Meeting Minutes
• Easily Write English Meeting Minutes and Improve Your English Dramatically! | Womany
• A Super Practical Guide to Writing English Meeting Minutes | CommonWealth Magazine
• 18 Office English Abbreviations You (Probably) Need to Know. Do your colleagues like mixing Chinese and English? If so, you've probably received confusing emails like the one below... | by Fei Fan | UX & Product Design | Medium