For Project Managers ·
What you'll accomplish
You'll connect Fireflies.ai to your calendar so it automatically joins every meeting, records, transcribes, and delivers a structured summary with action items and owners within minutes of the call ending. No more scrambling to write notes during a steering committee, and no more chasing people the next day to remind them what they agreed to.
What you'll need
Go to fireflies.ai and click Get started for free in the top-right corner. Sign up with your work Google or Microsoft account — this is the fastest path because it automatically surfaces your calendar.
What you should see: A brief onboarding flow asking about your team size and how you use meetings.
Troubleshooting: If you sign up with email instead of Google/Microsoft, you'll need to connect your calendar manually in a later step.
After signup, Fireflies prompts you to connect your calendar. Click Connect Google Calendar or Connect Outlook Calendar.
Grant the permissions requested — Fireflies needs read access to see your upcoming meetings so it knows when to send the recording bot (called "Fred").
What you should see: Your upcoming meetings appear in the Fireflies dashboard under Upcoming on the left sidebar.
Troubleshooting: If your calendar doesn't appear, go to Settings → Integrations → Calendar and manually connect from there.
In the left sidebar, click Settings, then AskFred / Notetaker.
Set these options:
What you should see: A confirmation that Fred will auto-join your next scheduled meeting.
Troubleshooting: If you only want Fred to join some meetings, leave auto-join off and instead go to each meeting in the Upcoming tab and click Invite Fred.
Go to Settings → Integrations. Connect the channel where you want meeting summaries delivered:
#project-updates or your project's dedicated channel)For project managers running multiple workstreams, set up a dedicated Slack channel per project and configure Fireflies to route that project's meeting summaries there.
What you should see: A green checkmark next to the Slack or email integration.
Join your next scheduled meeting as normal. Fred (the Fireflies bot) will join automatically 1–2 minutes after the meeting starts. You'll see "Fireflies.ai Notetaker" appear as a participant in the meeting.
Conduct the meeting as usual. You do not need to do anything special — just talk.
What you should see: Fred listed in the participant panel. In the meeting chat, a message will appear saying notes are being recorded.
Troubleshooting: If Fred doesn't join, check that (a) auto-join is enabled, (b) the meeting was created after you connected your calendar, and (c) the meeting link type is supported (Zoom, Teams, and Google Meet are all supported natively).
Within 5 minutes of the meeting ending, you'll receive an email and/or Slack message with:
Open the summary and review it before distributing. Look for:
What you should see: A structured document with distinct sections: Overview, Key Topics, Action Items, and a Transcript link.
Click Edit Summary in the Fireflies dashboard or directly in the email/Slack message to make corrections.
When satisfied, click Share and choose:
For client-facing projects, copy the action items section into your own email template before sending. This lets you add context, adjust tone, and remove any internal notes not meant for the client.
What you should see: Confirmation that the summary was sent, and the meeting appearing in your Fireflies library under Meetings.
One of Fireflies' best features for PMs: you can search across all past meeting transcripts by keyword. In the left sidebar, click Search, type a topic (e.g., "budget approval" or "data migration timeline"), and Fireflies returns every moment it was discussed across all your recorded meetings.
This is invaluable when a stakeholder disputes what was agreed three weeks ago.
What you should see: A list of matching transcript clips with timestamps, organized by meeting.
Use these in Fireflies' Ask Fred chat box, which lets you query any meeting transcript in plain language:
Get a tighter action item list:
Extract only the confirmed action items from this meeting — skip anything that was discussed but not committed to. Format as: Task | Owner | Due Date.
Summarize for a stakeholder who missed the meeting:
Write a 3-paragraph summary of this meeting for someone who wasn't there. Include: what was decided, what the main risks or issues discussed were, and what happens next.
Surface decisions made:
List every decision that was made in this meeting — not action items, just decisions. Include who made each decision and any conditions attached.
Prepare a client-facing recap:
Write a professional client-facing meeting recap from this transcript. Use a formal but warm tone. Include: meeting purpose, key discussion points, decisions made, and action items with owners.
Identify open questions:
List every question that was raised in this meeting that was NOT answered or resolved during the call. These are open items that need follow-up.