Publish the Materials

Third of seven walkthroughs. The agenda and documents are done; now the board needs them. Publishing is the moment the meeting becomes visible in full, so this walkthrough is short and deliberate.

Before you publish

Run through the meeting page one more time:

1. RSVP tracking: Confirmed, Pending, and Declined. This replaced the draft readiness panel when you sent the date hold. You are looking for enough confirmations to make quorum, and for anyone who has gone quiet.
2. Agenda and documents: every item has the documents it needs, and in-camera items are marked.
3. Preview as attendee: open it and read the agenda the way a director will.
4. Meeting book preflight: if any document cannot be included in the meeting book (a locked or unusual PDF), the page says so. Replace or unlock the file if the board will need to read it during the meeting.

Publish

1. At the top of the meeting page, click Publish materials.
2. Your browser asks you to confirm. The confirmation explains that attendees will now see the agenda, details, and documents, and will receive an updated event email. Confirm.

The badge changes to Materials Ready, and the primary button becomes Prepare Minutes — the next thing you will do. Every attendee receives a "materials ready" notice. Because this notice is about content, not scheduling, their calendar entry is left alone.

If you need to publish quietly (for example, you are re-publishing after a small correction and have already told the board), use More actions, then Publish without notifying.

The meeting book

Once published, Download meeting book (under More actions) assembles the agenda and every attached document into a single PDF in agenda order, with a cover and table of contents. Only administrators and the board's or committee's chairs, vice chairs, and secretary can download it; directors read each document in the viewer, or save the meeting for offline reading.

Changes after publishing

You can keep editing. Boardwise tracks two kinds of change separately:

• If you change the date, time, location, or joining details, a banner offers Send Calendar Update. Attendees' calendar entries update automatically.
• If you change the agenda or materials, a banner offers Notify Attendees. This sends an email describing what changed and leaves their calendars alone.

Nothing is sent until you click. If you make several edits in a row, the banner waits and you send one update at the end.

Following up before the meeting

• RSVP tracking on the meeting page shows who has confirmed, who has declined, and who has not answered. If RSVP reminders are enabled in Configuration, non-responders receive a daily reminder starting the number of days before the meeting you chose.
• Prep reminders, if enabled, go out automatically the configured number of days before the meeting, once materials are published.
• Notification history at the bottom of the meeting page lists every email the meeting has sent, when, and to how many people, so you can answer "did the board get the materials?" with a date and time.
• Analytics (under More actions) shows which attendees have opened the meeting and its documents. Use it to decide who needs a phone call.

Next

4. Run the Meeting: take attendance, move through the agenda, record decisions and action items.

Related reference: Downloading the Meeting Book, Understanding Notifications, Understanding Meeting Analytics.