Speaker 1: Most AI meeting recorders have a problem. There is a
Speaker 1: bot joining your call before your guest even arrives, a
Speaker 1: pause mid conversation to ask is it okay if I
Speaker 1: record this, or a notification to everyone that their words
Speaker 1: are being captured on video and audio. It is awkward,
Speaker 1: and it also means that most people just don't bother.
Speaker 1: So today Neo and I get into why the default
Speaker 1: way most tools handle meeting recording creates more friction than
Speaker 1: it solves, and how Granola does things differently. We cover
Speaker 1: how it transcribes everything in the background without joining your
Speaker 1: meeting as a participant, how it combines your own notes
Speaker 1: with the transcript to surface what actually mattered, and the
Speaker 1: simple way we brief external meeting guests at Invandium so
Speaker 1: there's no weirdness at all. And by the end of
Speaker 1: this show you will have a much better sense of
Speaker 1: why Granola has become the non negotiable meeting tool for
Speaker 1: both Neo and I and how to make it work
Speaker 1: in a way that feels natural for everyone in the room.
Speaker 1: And know this episode was not sponsored by Granola. It
Speaker 1: is just a tool that we genuinely love.
Speaker 2: Welcome to how IAI with me doctor Amantha Imba, and
Speaker 2: Neo Applin, head of Inventium AI. Each episode we share
Speaker 2: one practical way to use AI better at.
Speaker 1: Work and in life. No fluff, no dech jargon, just
Speaker 1: things you can use straight away. So, Neo, there are
Speaker 1: so many ways that we can use AI to record
Speaker 1: our meetings now, And interestingly enough, like I'm in so
Speaker 1: many meetings during the week, a lot of them, and
Speaker 1: meetings with clients or sales calls, and most of those
Speaker 1: meetings are not being recorded with AI. So I'm still
Speaker 1: finding that even though there's lots of ways that people
Speaker 1: can record meetings using AI, it's generally not happening. Are
Speaker 1: you finding the same thing.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think a lot of people see the AI
Speaker 3: is oh yeah, we probably should have recorded that after
Speaker 3: the fact, right, It's not the default just yet. And
Speaker 3: in a lot of ways, I kind of like this
Speaker 3: because as you know, your teams meetings and Zoom meetings
Speaker 3: and things like that, you can say every time you
Speaker 3: set the meeting, make sure you record it. Now, there
Speaker 3: are security privacy issues with that, like maybe this you
Speaker 3: don't want every meeting to be recorded, and so I
Speaker 3: get not having a default, but that's great, But it
Speaker 3: also means without having the default of recording, do people
Speaker 3: actually record it to people get the notes? And I
Speaker 3: think people are missing out on some really goodness, some
Speaker 3: great goodness are getting AI to be able to transcribe
Speaker 3: things for them.
Speaker 1: So we're probably a little bit different at inventing them
Speaker 1: because we have very much doubled down on a tool
Speaker 1: for bringing AI into all our meetings, but doing so unobtrusively,
Speaker 1: because one of the things I hate about AI meeting recorders,
Speaker 1: particularly ones that are not in built to the platform
Speaker 1: that you're having meetings within, like whether that be Zoom
Speaker 1: or teams, you know, where it is fairly unobtrusive in
Speaker 1: that it's not a separate meeting participant, but you do
Speaker 1: obviously have to pause the meeting and go, hey, do
Speaker 1: you mind if we record this, and then you know,
Speaker 1: find the record button and so on. And I find
Speaker 1: it very disconcerting when there's an AI meeting note taker
Speaker 1: arriving before the actual person arrives. That is a little
Speaker 1: bit of a pet peeve. But ad Inventium our number one,
Speaker 1: absolute favorite AI meeting note taker is Granola, So I
Speaker 1: have been a hardcore user of Granola for about a
Speaker 1: year now, and there's plenty of things I love about Granola.
Speaker 1: So shall we go there into perhaps what Granola is
Speaker 1: because it's a little bit different to other AI meeting
Speaker 1: software out there?
Speaker 3: All right, do you want to give it a granola introduction?
Speaker 3: I'm going to interview you about your granola use because
Speaker 3: you're much more hard care with granola than I am.
Speaker 3: I kind of flit around and try different tools. So
Speaker 3: what is it? First off? How does it work differently
Speaker 3: to Zoom and teams doing the recording?
Speaker 1: So there's a few really key differences in terms of
Speaker 1: the interface. It's like I've got a normal blank notepad
Speaker 1: digital notepad in front of me, where I can still
Speaker 1: take notes as I normally would in a meeting, But
Speaker 1: what is going on in the background is that Granola
Speaker 1: is taking a transcript, a word for word transcript of
Speaker 1: the meeting, but it's not actually recording any audio or video,
Speaker 1: which means it's very unobtrusive, and it's kind of like
Speaker 1: there's just a really fast note taker listening to the
Speaker 1: conversation and typing that all up. But what it's doing,
Speaker 1: because I'm also taking real notes in real time during
Speaker 1: the meeting, is it's noting what I'm doing, and it's
Speaker 1: thinking to itself, Ah, they must be the really important
Speaker 1: parts of the meeting, because Amantha is actually capturing those
Speaker 1: is herself. And so then at the end of the meeting,
Speaker 1: when it augments my notes through its transcription, it will
Speaker 1: provide a really accurate and good summary, but it will
Speaker 1: build that summary based on what it knows I think
Speaker 1: was important about the meeting. And then it acts like
Speaker 1: other AI meeting software out there, where I can have
Speaker 1: a chat with the transcript, or I can ask for
Speaker 1: the action items, or I can prompt it to give
Speaker 1: me a follow up email that captures the key decisions
Speaker 1: and actions and all those sorts of things. So that
Speaker 1: is essentially how Granola works.
Speaker 3: So in summary, it's not integrated with Teams or Zoom.
Speaker 3: It's a separate application, right.
Speaker 1: That's right. So it plugs into either the Google or
Speaker 1: the Microsoft ecosystem if you're not on I mean, I
Speaker 1: guess everyone's on one of those ecosystems, I think, or
Speaker 1: certainly the majority of listeners, So it plugs in. It
Speaker 1: plugs in, therefore to my calendar, assuming that your calendar
Speaker 1: is in the Google ecosystem or the Microsoft ecosystem, and
Speaker 1: it will automatically launch like when your meetings like, well,
Speaker 1: it will prompt you to launch. Sorry, it won't automatically launch.
Speaker 1: It still manually you still have to click a button
Speaker 1: to accept that it is going to launch and transcribe
Speaker 1: this meeting.
Speaker 3: But it gives you a notification saying, hey, you've got
Speaker 3: a meeting on now, do you want to open up
Speaker 3: teams and granola? That kind of thing.
Speaker 1: That's exactly right, which I also do find quite useful
Speaker 1: because it will open up both applications at the same time,
Speaker 1: so just you know, a little bit less friction when
Speaker 1: you've got a meeting about to start.
Speaker 3: But when you're in the team's meeting, you don't see
Speaker 3: it and no one sees it. It's just it's not
Speaker 3: like Granola's in the meeting. It's just part of your
Speaker 3: application background, not in teams or Zoom, which I really
Speaker 3: like about it as well.
Speaker 1: Yes, and something so ad inventim. For our internal meetings,
Speaker 1: there is implicit but also explicit knowledge that if you
Speaker 1: are having an internal meeting with someone else at Bentium,
Speaker 1: at least one probably all meeting participants will have granola
Speaker 1: going on in the background, which which I love so
Speaker 1: pretty much every single meeting, including you know, from one
Speaker 1: on ones to team meeting is just captured within Granola,
Speaker 1: which is really awesome because you can do things within Granola, like,
Speaker 1: you know, analyze all of my internal meetings and tell
Speaker 1: me what this says about you know, the team culture
Speaker 1: or how we make decisions, or you know, interesting prompts
Speaker 1: like that give you insight that you might not have
Speaker 1: otherwise had. But to me also, I think it's a
Speaker 1: really healthy sign of psychological safety. Like a lot of
Speaker 1: people gasp at the idea of your one on ones
Speaker 1: being recorded, like you know, the manageres one on ones
Speaker 1: with all their direct reports, but an amantium that's just
Speaker 1: a given, And I just think that is such rich
Speaker 1: data where you know, I can look back on themes
Speaker 1: or areas for development that I've chatted about with the
Speaker 1: people that I manage, and you know, and it means
Speaker 1: that I can be a a more useful and insightful leader,
Speaker 1: which I love. Now what I've started doing for external
Speaker 1: meetings is as a default jam My Ea, what she
Speaker 1: puts in the calendar invite is she just puts a
Speaker 1: little note saying that I use Granola to transcribe my meetings.
Speaker 1: We describe it as just having a really fast typist
Speaker 1: in the background, which is essentially what it is. I
Speaker 1: feel like psychologically that's a lot less you know, I
Speaker 1: don't know, scary or confronting than going Everything I say
Speaker 1: is being recorded and there is video and audio evidence.
Speaker 1: So it literally is like I'm just typing really fast
Speaker 1: and capturing everything, which I feel is far less intimidating.
Speaker 1: But you know, I think, you know, it's also just
Speaker 1: nice to pop that in the meeting invite, as I'm
Speaker 1: now doing with all my meetings.
Speaker 3: A couple of things I really like about granola is
Speaker 3: it's closer to being one note for those who know
Speaker 3: one note where you've got the folders and notes and things.
Speaker 3: It's closer to being than it is teams or zoom
Speaker 3: because you can create notes by creating just a granola.
Speaker 3: Whenever you want to create a granola, you can also
Speaker 3: create a note around a meeting. And it actually because
Speaker 3: as a meantas said, it hooks in with your diary
Speaker 3: and so you can actually get the meeting title and
Speaker 3: all those kinds of things to put on your notes.
Speaker 3: It also has like a calendar type thing, so you
Speaker 3: can see what meetings that I have two days ago,
Speaker 3: to be able to find the notes from your meetings
Speaker 3: a couple of days ago. There's even different spaces. They're
Speaker 3: kind of like folders in one note, because you might
Speaker 3: have a Granola you want to have for personal things
Speaker 3: separate to work things, and so you may want to
Speaker 3: keep your personal stuff separate from your work stuff. So
Speaker 3: the way that they've also structured on the inside is
Speaker 3: actually really quite clever, and I think it's a really
Speaker 3: handy tool. So when you think of Granola, think of
Speaker 3: one note in that it starts off with you just
Speaker 3: typing stuff in, but it then fills in some gaps
Speaker 3: using AI because of the transcript. Is that a good
Speaker 3: way to describe it?
Speaker 1: I like that for one note, users of which I
Speaker 1: am not.
Speaker 3: Well if not think of it as notion. It's like notion,
Speaker 3: except for AIS listening to everything that's being said, and
Speaker 3: then it will fill in the gaps of your notes
Speaker 3: on notion.
Speaker 1: Awesome. I love that now you're speaking my language. So
Speaker 1: that is Granola. This is not a sponsored episode or
Speaker 1: although if Granola wants to reach out to us and
Speaker 1: pay us money, we will happily accept. But always check
Speaker 1: with your IT department before installing software. That's right Neo,
Speaker 1: isn't it?
Speaker 3: Yes?
Speaker 1: Yes, But anyway, we love it at Inventium and highly
Speaker 1: recommend if you have permission to play with it, that
Speaker 1: you get into it. It's certainly saved me a lot
Speaker 1: of time and has given me so much data that
Speaker 1: has really helped improve my thinking and output.
Speaker 3: Now, for those who may be a little bit geeky
Speaker 3: and want to go and do something that, or maybe
Speaker 3: you're a little bit budget constrained. If you can't or
Speaker 3: don't want to get Granola, check out hyper Note, Hyprnote,
Speaker 3: hypernote dot app. There is an open source equivalent of Granola,
Speaker 3: not as good as granola, but I got to say
Speaker 3: they're improving this at a rate of knots. You may
Speaker 3: need a beefy laptop, but you can use that on
Speaker 3: Mac and Windows as well, so don't feel like you're
Speaker 3: left out if you can't get Granola.
Speaker 1: Amazing. Now, if you do track Granola, just send us
Speaker 1: a note let us know what you think. How you go,
Speaker 1: or if you have got favorite AI software that you
Speaker 1: think we should deep dive into in one of our
Speaker 1: how IAI episodes, Please drop us a note there are
Speaker 1: contact details in the show notes and we will see
Speaker 1: you next time. How i AI was hosted by me
Speaker 1: Amantha Imber and Neo Applan. A big thank you to
Speaker 1: Martin Imber who does our sound editing, and Jim Rubio
Speaker 1: for production support, and thank you to John Kilby who
Speaker 1: composed the theme music.