Automate Meeting Next Steps from Transcripts

Get the transcript text for a completed online meeting and store it as plain text. If you do this manually, copy the transcript into a doc; if you do it programmatically, download the transcript file and keep the meeting id + participants list for context.

Actionable Prompt / Code:

Checklist:
1) Transcript text (required)
2) Meeting title + date/time (required)
3) Attendees emails (recommended)
4) Any constraints ('do not schedule Fridays', 'timezone: JST')

Output bundle (save as JSON):
{
  "meeting_title": "string",
  "meeting_start": "ISO-8601",
  "timezone": "string",
  "attendees": ["email"],
  "transcript": "string"
}

Pro Tip: If the transcript is long, keep speaker labels because they dramatically improve action-owner accuracy.

Send the transcript bundle to GPT-4o and force strict JSON output. This creates a machine-checkable plan you can review, schedule, and track.

Actionable Prompt / Code:

System: You are a meeting operations engine.
Return ONLY valid JSON. No markdown, no commentary.

You must: (1) summarise the meeting in <= 6 bullets, (2) extract action items with owner, due date, and confidence, (3) propose follow-up meetings only when necessary.

Rules:
- If due_date is not explicitly said, infer a realistic date within 14 days and set inferred=true.
- Confidence must be a number 0.0-1.0.
- Owners must be one of the attendee emails; if unknown, use null and set confidence<=0.5.

JSON Schema (strict):
{
  "summary_bullets": ["string"],
  "action_items": [
    {
      "title": "string",
      "owner_email": "string|null",
      "due_date": "string|null",
      "inferred": "boolean",
      "confidence": "number",
      "evidence_quotes": ["string"]
    }
  ],
  "follow_up": {
    "needed": "boolean",
    "reason": "string|null",
    "proposals": [
      {
        "title": "string",
        "duration_minutes": "number",
        "earliest_start": "string",
        "latest_start": "string",
        "attendees": ["email"],
        "location": "string|null"
      }
    ]
  }
}

Pro Tip: Cap evidence_quotes to 1-2 short quotes per action to keep output under ~800 output tokens.

Apply lightweight rules to prevent calendar spam: only schedule a follow-up when there are unresolved decisions, dependencies, or explicit requests.

Actionable Prompt / Code:

# Deterministic gate (example)
# follow_up_needed if: explicit request OR (>=2 action items with confidence<0.7) OR any decision_blocker==true

def follow_up_gate(plan):
    explicit = plan.get("follow_up", {}).get("needed", False)
    low_conf = [a for a in plan.get("action_items", []) if (a.get("confidence") or 0) < 0.7]
    decision_blocker = any("block" in (a.get("title") or "").lower() for a in plan.get("action_items", []))
    return bool(explicit or (len(low_conf) >= 2) or decision_blocker)

Pro Tip: This gate typically eliminates ~50-70% of unnecessary follow-ups while preserving the ones that unblock work.

If the gate passes, create an event with title, time window, attendees, and a description that includes the summary + action items.

Actionable Prompt / Code:

# Example event payload (use any Calendar SDK)
from datetime import datetime, timedelta

start = datetime.fromisoformat("2026-03-01T10:00:00+09:00")
end = start + timedelta(minutes=30)

event = {
  "summary": "Follow-up: Project Next Steps",
  "description": "Summary:\\
- ...\\
\\
Action items:\\
- Owner: X | Due: YYYY-MM-DD | Task: ...",
  "start": {"dateTime": start.isoformat()},
  "end": {"dateTime": end.isoformat()},
  "attendees": [{"email": "person@example.com"}]
}
# calendar.events().insert(calendarId="primary", body=event).execute()

Pro Tip: Default to 25-30 minutes and only invite the minimum decision-makers to keep follow-ups short and high-signal.

Post the proposed summary + event link to Slack and require a quick approval before sending calendar updates broadly.

Actionable Prompt / Code:

Slack message template:
Meeting follow-up proposal
- Summary: {bullet_1}; {bullet_2}; {bullet_3}
- Actions (top 3):
  1) {owner_email}: {title} (due {due_date}, conf {confidence})
  2) ...
- Follow-up event: {calendar_event_link}

Reply with: APPROVE or REJECT:{reason}

Pro Tip: If APPROVE is not received within 2 hours, keep the event in 'Draft' (or do not send updates) to avoid surprise invites.