Create templates that shape the meeting notes Operator writes, share them with your team, and use templates from Alcova and your colleagues.
How templates shape your notes
A template tells Operator how to structure the notes it writes for a meeting. Each template has three parts:
A name, such as "Annual Review" or "SMSF Strategy Meeting".
Context: general guidance for the whole note. Describe what the meeting is about, the focus and tone of the notes, and any compliance or formatting rules.
Sections: each section has a heading and a description of what to capture under it, for example "Action items: list every follow-up with an owner and a due date".
On a meeting, you choose a template when you generate notes. The menu lists My templates, then More templates for the rest. Each template you use adds its own tab of notes, named after the template, so you can write notes for one meeting from more than one template. To open this settings page from that menu, select Manage Templates.
If you edited notes and then generate them again from the same template, your edits are lost. Alcova asks you to confirm first. See Meeting notes.
To throw away a new template, select Discard. If you close the window without discarding, Alcova keeps your draft until you close the browser tab.
Video: Create a note template
Fix a template that can't be saved
A template needs text in Context and at least one section, and every section needs a heading and a description. If something is missing, Alcova shows This template can't be saved yet: and lists the problems.
To stop editing without saving, select Cancel. To undo your changes and keep editing, select Reset.
Change a template by asking Operator
Instead of editing a template yourself, you can tell Operator what to change. This is the quickest way when you know what you want but not where it goes in the template. For example, ask it to record at the top whether the client agreed to be recorded, never to use tables, and to follow the layout of a file note you liked.
Name the template and describe the changes, for example "In my Wholesale Quarterly Review template, record at the top whether the client agreed to be recorded, and don't use tables."
To show Operator what good notes look like, attach an example, such as a file note you wrote. Select Attach files, or drag the file onto the prompt box.
Operator updates the template and lists what it changed. You can also ask Operator to create, copy or delete a template. It asks you to approve each change first.
Video: Improve a template with Operator
Use a template from the library
To add a template to My Templates, select Add next to it in Library.
To read a template before you add it:
Select the ... button next to it, then select View.
Read the template in the panel. To add it, select Follow.
The template moves to My Templates and shows Following.
To stop following a template, select the ... button next to it in My Templates, then select Remove. In the template's panel, the same option is called Unfollow. The template goes back to Library.
Copy a template
You cannot edit a template from Alcova or a colleague, but you can copy it and change the copy.
Select the ... button next to the template.
Select Duplicate.
A private copy named "Copy of" and the template's name shows in My Templates. You can edit it like any template you created.
