For Operations Managers ·
What you'll accomplish
Lead the meeting instead of taking notes, and still walk out with a complete transcript, a summary, and a clear action item list. Otter.ai handles all of that automatically. This guide gets it set up for your operations meetings in 15 minutes.
What you'll need
Go to otter.ai. Click Sign Up and create an account with your work or personal email.
What you should see: The Otter.ai home screen with a large record button and a list of past recordings (empty for now).
For in-person ops reviews, floor meetings, or vendor visits, download the Otter.ai app on your smartphone:
For virtual meetings, connect Otter as an automatic notetaker:
What you should see: A "Notetaker" option that lets you add Otter to scheduled meetings automatically.
Alternatively: During any Zoom meeting, share your screen and run Otter.ai recording on your laptop so that it captures the audio from the meeting.
For in-person: Open the Otter.ai app and tap the large record button. Otter starts transcribing immediately. Place your phone in the center of the table or near the primary speaker.
For Zoom: Start the meeting. If auto-join is enabled, Otter joins as a bot. Otherwise, open Otter in a browser tab and click Record.
Let the meeting run normally.
After ending the recording, Otter processes the audio (takes 1-3 minutes). Then review:
What you should see: A formatted transcript with sections labeled by time and a summary panel on the right.
Click on Action Items in the Otter summary. Review the list and confirm the owners and dates are correct based on what was actually said. Copy and paste into your follow-up email or Slack message.
For formal ops review meetings, export the full summary as a PDF (Share → Export → PDF) and attach to your meeting notes.