---
title: "First-pass OAC meeting-minutes drafting"
role: project-manager
slug: meeting-minutes
status: ready today
updated: 2026-09-05
canonical: https://aiagents.construction/roles/project-manager/meeting-minutes/
---

## The job

The project manager at a US general contractor doing about $5–10M a year — often the owner wearing a PM hat, or one person who also writes RFIs, stamps submittals, walks pay apps, and answers the superintendent at 6 p.m. There is no project engineer whose only job is the meeting log. Weekly (or biweekly) OAC / progress meetings still happen: schedule, RFIs, submittals, changes, safety, owner decisions. After the meeting someone has to turn a stack of scribbles, a voice memo from the truck, last week's open items, and who was in the room into numbered minutes the architect and owner will live with for the rest of the job — and that arbitrators may read later. If the first pass is a vague "discussed schedule — TBD," people leave with different memories. If a fluent draft invents decisions, invents due dates, or treats a hallway agreement as a change order, you have worse than no minutes.

This job is **use an agent**, not build a model. The PM already has a desk: email, Word or a PDF minutes template, last week's issued minutes, this week's agenda, field/phone notes or a recording transcript you made, and a spreadsheet open-item log (Excel, or whatever you already keep). The agent sits in the **assemble-and-draft** step only. It does not decide who owes what. It does not invent attendees. It does not make the minutes "official." It does not become Notice of a Claim, a Change Order, or an RFI.

Without an agent the work is still the same: open last week's open items, write what was decided, name the ball-in-court and due date, mark information-only as Info, circulate a draft for review, revise, issue.

**What minutes are (and are not).** Official AIA Contract Documents do **not** publish a standard GC meeting-minutes form. The G-Series catalog lists payment, change, RFI, ASI, CCD, field-report, and related administration forms — not OAC minutes ([G-Series list](https://learn.aiacontracts.com/contract-doc-pages/71176-g-series-contract-administration-and-project-management-forms/)). Yu-Ngok Lo, AIA, writing on AIA's Construction Contract Administration community: weekly owner–architect–contractor (OAC) minutes are essential administratively and legally because attendees leave with different memories; they record what of importance happened and what was decided, track follow-up, and remind the parties who hold the ball. Responsibility sits with whoever the contract names — usually the contractor or construction manager, sometimes the architect under the owner–architect agreement. Format varies. Basic header items Lo lists: project name and address, preparer (and company), meeting number / time / date, attendees and who they represent, total contract calendar days elapsed, anticipated date of Substantial Completion. Write in a neutral third-person style. Number items chronologically (meeting number + item). Name the responsible party ("ball in court") and a due date; mark information-only as **Info**. Paraphrase is typically acceptable; state the facts clearly. Give attendees a chance to review the draft — Lo's practice note is **at least 48 hours** — before the minutes are official. Revise from comments; if wording is disputed, discuss promptly before final issue. Minutes are often later read by arbitrators and mediators. That is why this job **drafts from what you recorded**, not from a model's memory of a meeting it did not attend. Author's practice note, not a Contract Document — your contract / Division 01 wins.

**Where Division 01 parks the rule.** [CSI MasterFormat 2026](https://www.csiresources.org/standards/masterformat2026) is the current North American shared language for organizing project requirements; Division 01 (General Requirements) received maintenance updates (title clarifications or small reorganizations). A published MasterFormat 2018 numbers listing used by industry references **01 31 19 – Project Meetings**, with common Level 4s including **01 31 19.13** Preconstruction Meetings, **01 31 19.16** Site Mobilization Meetings, **01 31 19.23** Progress Meetings, and **01 31 19.33** Preinstallation Meetings ([AGC Austin MasterFormat 2018 PDF](https://www.agcaustin.org/uploads/1/2/2/9/122909896/masterformat_2018_web.pdf)). MasterFormat is numbering language, not a minutes form. Your project manual and your contract name who chairs, who records, who distributes, and how fast.

**This job is not a daily, not an RFI, not a change order, and not the president's digest.**

- **Not a superintendent daily.** A construction daily is a contemporaneous, dated, jobsite-level record — manpower, weather, work in place, delays, visitors, a signature by the person who was there. Sister job: [superintendent daily field report](https://aiagents.construction/roles/superintendent/daily-report/). The architect's counterpart is [G711–2018, Architect's Field Report](https://help.aiacontracts.com/hc/en-us/articles/1500009310482-instructions-g711-2018-architect-s-field-report) — present at site, observations, signature by the walker. OAC minutes are the **meeting** record, not the field walk.
- **Not an RFI.** Official [G716–2004](https://help.aiacontracts.com/hc/en-us/articles/1500009444782-summary-g716-2004-request-for-information-rfi): neither the request nor the response authorizes work that increases cost or time. Sister job: [first-pass RFI drafting](https://aiagents.construction/roles/project-manager/rfi/). Minutes may **track** an open RFI; they do not replace it.
- **Not a change order or CCD.** Official [G701–2017](https://help.aiacontracts.com/hc/en-us/articles/1500009384382-summary-g701-2017-change-order) is the signed agreement on Work, Contract Sum/GMP, and Contract Time. Official [G714–2017](https://help.aiacontracts.com/hc/en-us/articles/1500009448081-summary-g714-2017-construction-change-directive) directs Work before sum/time are agreed. Sister job: [first-pass change-order drafting](https://aiagents.construction/roles/project-manager/change-order/). A minutes line that says "team agreed to add X" is not a G701 and not authorization to proceed unless the contract instrument exists (or a valid CCD).
- **Not a submittal stamp.** Shop drawings and product data stay in [first-pass submittal review](https://aiagents.construction/roles/project-manager/submittal/). Minutes may assign "return Submittal 56"; they do not approve the product.
- **Not the president's weekly risk digest.** That seat **reads** issued minutes across jobs and drafts exceptions. Sister job: [weekly project-risk digest](https://aiagents.construction/roles/president/risk-digest/). This seat **writes** one job's meeting record.
- **Not Notice of a Claim.** Official [A201–2017 summary](https://help.aiacontracts.com/hc/en-us/articles/1500010259162-summary-a201-2017-general-conditions-of-the-contract-for-construction): notices may go by electronic means, but **Notice of Claims may not** — certified or registered mail, or courier with proof of delivery, to the designated representative. Claims arising before the end of the corrections period are subject to a **21-day** notice period and an initial decision. An agent-drafted minutes item is not that notice.

**Why a $5–10M GC still does this.** Sloppy or late minutes are the dispute six months later: "we never agreed to that," "that due date was never assigned," "the owner approved it in the meeting." There is no PE drafting every week. There is one PM, a voice memo, last week's PDF, and a Monday agenda. That is why the **first-pass draft after real notes** is the job — and why the human still owns every decision line, every ball-in-court, the 48-hour review, and the issue.

The live project-manager hub already names this as work that holds today: summarizing OAC meetings into action lists. This page is that job.

## Use

This is a use workflow. You do not train a model. You do not ask it to invent attendees, decisions, due dates, RFI numbers, or change-order numbers the log does not have. You give it what you recorded, you get a draft, you edit and circulate only what you would defend.

1. **Confirm you are the writer.** Read Division 01 / the contract: who records and distributes progress / OAC minutes? If the architect owns the minutes, do not let a GC agent issue "official" minutes that conflict with that seat. If you own them, proceed.
2. **Gather only this meeting's inputs.** Last week's **issued** minutes (open items / carry-forward); this week's agenda; attendee list (name, company, role) from who was actually present or called in; your contemporaneous notes, voice memo, or transcript **you** made; roster of open RFIs / submittals / PCOs you already track if the agenda covered them. Do not feed "the whole job folder" and hope.
3. **Separate facts the notes show from calls only a human may make.** Item text can be drafted from notes. Ball-in-court initials, due dates, and whether something was **decided** vs **discussed** vs **Info** are the PM's call — pulled from what happened in the room, not from model memory. If you did not capture a due date, write **unknown — PM to complete**, do not invent Friday.
4. **Feed the agent those files plus your template.** Your Word / PDF minutes headings (or last week's format), plus the numbering habit you already use (meeting # + item #). Prompt shape: draft one set of OAC / progress meeting minutes for this meeting only; fill header fields from the upload (project, preparer, meeting number/date/time, attendees with companies, contract days elapsed and Substantial Completion date **only if present in the upload**); carry forward open items from last week's issued minutes and mark closed / still open / revised from **this week's notes**; number new items; write neutral third-person; for each action item name ball-in-court and due date from the notes, or **Info** / **PM to complete**; quote RFI / submittal / CO numbers **only if they appear in the upload**; do not invent attendees, decisions, schedule dates, or instrument numbers; do not treat any line as a Change Order, CCD, RFI answer, or Claim notice; add a footer: "Draft only — circulate for review; not official until PM issues after attendee review."
5. **Human edit before anyone else sees the draft.** Open your notes and last week's PDF. Strike invented people and phantom "CO-12 approved." Confirm every ball-in-court against who was actually assigned. Confirm due dates you own. Confirm you did not promote a discussion to a decision or a decision to a G701. Confirm schedule and Substantial Completion lines match the contract / schedule you already issued — not folklore.
6. **Circulate for the review window, then issue.** Lo's practice note: at least **48 hours** for attendees to review before minutes are official; revise from comments; discuss disputed wording before final issue. Email or upload only the **edited** draft, then the issued set. Do not let the model mail the owner a raw draft as "issued minutes."
7. **Log the way you already do.** Update the open-item sheet: item number, owner, due date, status. When an item becomes an RFI, a PCO, or a G701, move it to that log — minutes track; they do not replace the instrument.

Expected shape of the gain: less time turning notes and last week's open items into a readable first draft the room can review. That is not "the model ran the meeting." There is no published, independent hours-saved or accuracy number for a $5–10M GC first-pass minutes draft that this page will invent. Time a week of *your* minutes (draft + your edit vs writing cold) before you change anything you pay for.

## Build

A general-purpose model that can read PDFs and notes can draft numbered minutes and an action table from last week's open items plus this week's notes. Whether something was decided, who holds the ball, whether the due date is real, and whether the line should have been an RFI or a change package, need a person. Do not treat the draft as official, and do not build from invented attendees or decisions.

> A workable v1: a prompt template that returns one minutes package — header fields, carry-forward table, new numbered items, action / Info / ball-in-court / due-date columns, flags (**decision vs discussion vs Info / possible RFI needed / possible change path / not in notes**), and a "draft — not official until issued after review" footer. Keep the transcript or notes with the minutes file. Require "not in the uploaded notes" instead of filling a gap.

Do not build a custom classifier this quarter. Do not fine-tune. Do not connect a model to auto-email the distribution list. This meeting's notes and last week's issued PDF are the only corpus that matters.

## Deploy

1. Pick five recently issued minutes packages you still stand behind — one clean weekly progress meeting, one with a hot schedule fight, one heavy on RFIs/submittals, one where wording was disputed in review, one quiet meeting that was mostly Info / carry-forward.
2. Run the agent on the same last-week PDF + agenda + notes/transcript (no later emails that rewrite what was said unless you are testing edit, not prophecy). Time upload, draft, and your edit.
3. Diff the draft against what you actually issued. Record invented attendees, invented decisions, invented due dates, invented RFI/CO numbers, carry-forward items dropped or falsely closed, and lines that treated a discussion as authorization to change Work, sum, or time.
4. Decide using a rule set in advance: no draft leaves as "issued" without your edit and the review window; every attendee and instrument number must exist in the upload or your verified roster; if the model invents a decision on the clean package, it is not ready.

Use your real notes and last week's real PDF, not a vendor demo. Keep the workflow only if the issued minutes are still something you would put your name on.

## Manage

**What "good" looks like**

- A named human **edits every draft**, runs the review window, and owns the issued PDF.
- Raw model text is never emailed to the owner, architect, or subs as "issued minutes."
- The upload includes the notes and last week's open items actually used — not a memory of "typical OAC."
- Minutes vs RFI vs G701 / G714 vs Claim notice stay distinct. Sister seats stay those jobs.
- If you already have a project app that stores minutes, the agent drafts **into that**. This page does not sell a new one.

**Who owns the seat**

The PM / owner-PM (when the contract puts minutes on the contractor) owns the draft, the ball-in-court truth, the review circulate, and the issue. On a $5–10M GC that is one person and the laptop they already use. The superintendent owns field facts that show up as notes. The architect may own minutes when the owner–architect agreement says so — then this GC workflow stops at assisting that seat, not competing with it. An agent does not become the preparer of record.

**When to skip the agent (what not to automate)**

- You did not take notes and have no recording/transcript. Do not ask a model to remember the meeting.
- The contract makes the architect (or CM) the minutes author and they already issue. Do not fork a second "official" set.
- Formal Notice of a Claim, stop-work, or anything under A201 Article 15 clocks. Format a chronology from issued minutes if you want; do not let a model "send the claim." Official A201: Claim notice is not electronic.
- Settlement of a dispute, liquidated damages, or backcharge war. Human and counsel.
- Life-safety or structural direction that needs the design professional's instrument, not a minutes paraphrase.
- The minutes habit is already a ten-minute cleanup and writing is not the bottleneck. Leave it.

**How to stand it up this quarter**

Use the model you already have access to. Drop in last week's issued PDF plus this week's agenda plus your notes plus your headings. Edit, click every citation, circulate for review, issue. Repeat next week. Keep the workflow only if the issued set is still something you would put your name on. Do not buy a meeting-minutes product to complete this job.

## Citations

Tools are citations, not new brand pages. Do not invent vendor homepages. This page does not create a Procore, Autodesk, Primavera, or other project-controls vendor listing.

- **[AIA documenting construction meeting minutes](https://communityhub.aia.org/blogs/yu-ngok-lo-aia1/2020/01/15/documenting-construction-meeting-minutes)** (Yu-Ngok Lo, AIA, on AIA's CCA community) — OAC minutes as admin/legal record; contract names the writer (usually contractor/CM, sometimes architect); header fields; numbered items; ball-in-court and due dates; Info for information-only; neutral third person; **≥48-hour** attendee review before official; disputed wording resolved before final issue; later legal record. Practice note, not a Contract Document.
- **[AIA G-Series catalog](https://learn.aiacontracts.com/contract-doc-pages/71176-g-series-contract-administration-and-project-management-forms/)** — no standard AIA GC meeting-minutes form among contract-administration forms.
- **[AIA G711–2018](https://help.aiacontracts.com/hc/en-us/articles/1500009310482-instructions-g711-2018-architect-s-field-report)** — architect's field report; not GC OAC minutes. Sister field record for the GC: [superintendent daily](https://aiagents.construction/roles/superintendent/daily-report/).
- **[AIA G716–2004](https://help.aiacontracts.com/hc/en-us/articles/1500009444782-summary-g716-2004-request-for-information-rfi)** — RFI; neither request nor response authorizes extra cost or time. Sister job: [first-pass RFI](https://aiagents.construction/roles/project-manager/rfi/).
- **[AIA G701–2017](https://help.aiacontracts.com/hc/en-us/articles/1500009384382-summary-g701-2017-change-order)** / **[G714–2017](https://help.aiacontracts.com/hc/en-us/articles/1500009448081-summary-g714-2017-construction-change-directive)** — executed change vs directive before agreement. Sister job: [first-pass change-order](https://aiagents.construction/roles/project-manager/change-order/). Minutes are not either instrument.
- **[AIA A201–2017](https://help.aiacontracts.com/hc/en-us/articles/1500010259162-summary-a201-2017-general-conditions-of-the-contract-for-construction)** — keystone general conditions; written notice; Claim notice not electronic; schedule § 3.10; Changes Article 7; Claims Article 15 / 21-day claim notice before end of corrections period; official preview [PDF](https://contractdocs.aia.org/PreviewFiles/Preview_A201-2017.pdf).
- **[CSI MasterFormat 2026](https://www.csiresources.org/standards/masterformat2026)** / [MasterFormat 2018 numbers PDF](https://www.agcaustin.org/uploads/1/2/2/9/122909896/masterformat_2018_web.pdf) — Division 01; **01 31 19** Project Meetings and common Level 4 meeting types. Numbering language; your Division 01 wins.
- **Word, email, Excel** — draft, circulate, open-item log. If they already have a PM app, the agent drafts into that. No new vendor page on this site. Sister read-side job: [president risk digest](https://aiagents.construction/roles/president/risk-digest/). Sister document seats: [submittal](https://aiagents.construction/roles/project-manager/submittal/).

## Watch-outs

- **Invented decisions, attendees, and due dates.** Models write fluent "Owner approved alternate flooring; due Friday — Arch" lines that are not in your notes. Same failure mode as legal citation hallucination: Dahl, Magesh, Suzgun & Ho, *Large Legal Fictions*, 16 *J. Legal Analysis* 64 (2024) ([arXiv:2401.01301](https://arxiv.org/abs/2401.01301), [doi:10.1093/jla/laae003](https://doi.org/10.1093/jla/laae003)) — public LLMs, asked verifiable questions about federal cases, hallucinated often and often could not tell. Those percentages are **legal-case questions, not minutes accuracy**; do not import them as a construction performance rate. Do import the habit: every name, decision, and date in the draft is unverified until you open the notes. Blank / "PM to complete" is honest; a confident fake assignment is not.
- **Invented RFI, submittal, and CO citations.** Fluent "per RFI 47 and CO-12" when neither is in the upload. Click every reference.
- **Minutes theater / proceed on a draft.** Official G716 replies are not authorization for extra cost or time. Official G701 is the signed agreement. Official G714 is the directive path. Do not let a minutes line tell the field "approved — build it" before the contract instrument exists.
- **Skipping the review window.** Lo's practice note: attendees get at least 48 hours before minutes are official. A model email that says "issued — no comments means accepted" the same afternoon is not that practice.
- **Competing official sets.** If the architect issues the minutes, do not publish a second GC "official" PDF that invents a different history.
- **Claim-notice confusion.** A201: Notice of Claims is not electronic. Minutes are not that notice.
- **Unsigned AI to the owner or architect.** Fluent, late, and wrong is worse than short human minutes. Do not let the model send.
- **Do not replace the PM.** The agent drafts from notes. The PM still owns the record, the ball-in-court, the review, and the issue.

## Verdict

**Yes** — a $5–10M US GC should run this job this quarter if OAC / progress minutes already start as notes, last week's PDF, and an agenda; the bottleneck is turning that stack into a readable first draft; and a person will still own every decision line, every assignment, the review window, and the issue. Use an agent to **draft OAC meeting minutes from notes, agenda, and open items**; the PM owns accuracy, ball-in-court, and issue. Skip this quarter if you expected the model to invent what happened in the room, to authorize Work from a minutes line, to replace an RFI / G701 / Claim notice, or to email raw drafts as issued minutes; or if you were about to buy a meetings product you do not already have. Do not publish this page as a vendor listing.

## Tools cited

1. [AIA documenting construction meeting minutes](https://communityhub.aia.org/blogs/yu-ngok-lo-aia1/2020/01/15/documenting-construction-meeting-minutes) — Practice note — OAC minutes as admin/legal record; who writes; header fields; numbered items; ball-in-court; 48-hour review before official Last verified 2026-09-05.
2. [AIA G-Series contract administration forms](https://learn.aiacontracts.com/contract-doc-pages/71176-g-series-contract-administration-and-project-management-forms/) — Catalog of G-forms — no AIA standard GC meeting-minutes form (contrast G711 field report, G716 RFI, G701 CO) Last verified 2026-09-05.
3. [AIA G711–2018 Architect's Field Report](https://help.aiacontracts.com/hc/en-us/articles/1500009310482-instructions-g711-2018-architect-s-field-report) — Architect site observation form — not GC OAC minutes Last verified 2026-09-05.
4. [AIA G716–2004 RFI](https://help.aiacontracts.com/hc/en-us/articles/1500009444782-summary-g716-2004-request-for-information-rfi) — Information only — neither request nor response authorizes extra cost or time Last verified 2026-09-05.
5. [AIA G701–2017 Change Order](https://help.aiacontracts.com/hc/en-us/articles/1500009384382-summary-g701-2017-change-order) — Executed agreement on Work, Contract Sum/GMP, Contract Time — minutes are not this instrument Last verified 2026-09-05.
6. [AIA G714–2017 Construction Change Directive](https://help.aiacontracts.com/hc/en-us/articles/1500009448081-summary-g714-2017-construction-change-directive) — Directs Work before sum/time agreed — not a minutes line item Last verified 2026-09-05.
7. [AIA A201–2017 summary](https://help.aiacontracts.com/hc/en-us/articles/1500010259162-summary-a201-2017-general-conditions-of-the-contract-for-construction) — Keystone general conditions — written notice; Claim notice not electronic; schedule § 3.10; Changes Article 7; Claims Article 15 Last verified 2026-09-05.
8. [AIA A201–2017 (official preview)](https://contractdocs.aia.org/PreviewFiles/Preview_A201-2017.pdf) — Official preview PDF for contractor study of notice, changes, claims Last verified 2026-09-05.
9. [CSI MasterFormat 2026](https://www.csiresources.org/standards/masterformat2026) — Shared North American numbering for project manuals; Division 01 General Requirements received maintenance updates Last verified 2026-09-05.
10. [MasterFormat 2018 numbers (Project Meetings)](https://www.agcaustin.org/uploads/1/2/2/9/122909896/masterformat_2018_web.pdf) — Published listing — 01 31 19 Project Meetings; .13 preconstruction; .16 mobilization; .23 progress; .33 preinstallation Last verified 2026-09-05.
11. [Word / email / Excel](https://www.microsoft.com/microsoft-365) — Minutes draft, distribution, and open-item log (desk tools they already have) Last verified 2026-09-05.

## Changelog

- 2026-09-05 — Published from Scout’s job playbook.