How AI is Transforming Meetings & How to Capture Its Potential

In a meeting I recently facilitated, it felt like twice as many people were present.  Not because the team had grown, but because AI was everywhere. My Zoom account had its own AI assistant. One participant brought Otter to transcribe. Another had Calendly quietly taking notes. It was like being surrounded by digital stenographers, advisors, and analysts — all working silently in the background.

With all this invisible help, are meetings becoming more effective?  Or less human?

Here’s how I see AI is transforming meetings:

Minute-Taking.  This is perhaps AI’s strongest suit in meetings right now. Tools like Otter.ai, Fireflies, and ChatGPT – enabled integrations provide specific types of meeting deliverables:

• Transcriptions of conversations in real-time
• A list of action items, decisions, and key themes
• A summary of the meeting in digestible formats tailored for executives, team members, or project managers.

AI still makes mistakes — confusing speakers, missing context, or misinterpreting sarcasm or nuanced tone. Moreover, not every spoken word is worthy of capture. Consider the meeting deliverable to be half-baked.  It still takes a human to quickly refine for clarity and nuance.

Brainstorming.  Imagine entering a brainstorming session and asking ChatGPT, “Give me 10 wild ideas for re-engaging remote workers.” In seconds, the team is no longer starting from scratch but building and refining.  AI can serve as a creative springboard by:

• Generating initial ideas to overcome blank-page syndrome
• Expanding on ideas with alternate angles or examples
• Cross-referencing unrelated fields to spark lateral thinking

While AI is great at remixing existing content, it can’t serve up original insight, emotional resonance, and group synergy. That’s the human, messy side of brainstorming where people challenge, provoke, and connect on a visceral level.

Facilitation. AI tools are becoming co-pilots for leaders and facilitators (pun intended. get it, Microsofties?).  AI tools can:

• Recommend agenda structures based on past meetings or goals
• Suggest group activities to spark engagement
• Monitor real-time participation metrics (e.g., airtime equity)
• Auto-generate follow-up questions or reframe ideas neutrally to reduce bias
• Synthesize the conversation (based on real-time inputs)
• Suggest paths forward for the team to consider

For example, during a hybrid meeting, you can quietly prompt your AI Tool in a second window with something like:

“The team seems stuck on this topic. What’s a provocative question I could ask to shake things up?”  Or “Summarize this 10-minute discussion into 3 bullet points for next steps.”

Keep in mind, your AI facilitation buddy lacks emotional intelligence to sense when a group is drifting, frustrated, or disengaged.  AI might assist with facilitation, but it won’t replace the trust, charisma, and credibility a strong facilitator brings to the table.

AI is a phenomenal ally in meetings, but it is not a substitute for human connection, judgment, or emotional resonance.  In high-performance teams, meetings aren’t just about logistics. They’re about building alignment, fostering trust, and making shared decisions. These are uniquely human domains.

Try This With Your Team

Here’s a quick tip to explore AI’s potential:

1. At your next meeting, assign your AI tool to be the “virtual observer.”
2. At the end of your meeting, ask the team for:
   • Top 3 takeaways
   • All action items and who owns them
   • Any insights, potential misalignments or conflicting views
3. Ask your AI tool to listen (or review a transcript) and summarize the same items as above.
4. Then compare its summary to your team’s output. Use the contrast to spark a conversation about how AI can support the team’s shared understanding.

So, what do you think? Is your AI teammate helping or hindering your team’s progress? Where have you seen it shine or stumble? I’d love to hear your experiences.

Related Articles:

The AI Oreo Cookie Philosophy: How to Use AI Like a Pro (Without Losing the Human Touch)

5 Strategies to Have More Productive Meetings

11 Steps to Plan a Successful Meeting