Talking about a conversation without talking in it

An internal note keeps the context on the conversation instead of in a separate staff chat where the next person will never find it. It is the single most useful feature a shared inbox has after the inbox itself - and it should be written as if the customer might read it.

What it replaces

Without notes, the team discusses the customer somewhere else: a group chat, a corridor, a private message. Three consequences follow, all bad.

• The next person does not have it. The context exists and is unfindable.
• It is not part of the record. A dispute six months later has half the story.
• It is somewhere with no rules. A staff group chat has no retention policy, no access control and no audit.

What belongs in one

1. What was promised, and by when. The single most valuable note there is - see handovers.
2. What was checked and what it said. So the next person does not check it again.
3. Context the system does not hold. "Second delayed order this month."
4. A handoff. Who is taking it and why.

The mistake

Mentions, used sparingly

Naming a colleague on a note should mean "this is yours now", not "look at this". A mention that means nothing in particular trains people to ignore mentions, and then the one that mattered is missed.

Keep them with the conversation forever

Notes are part of the record. When a conversation is exported, archived or handed to a colleague, the notes go with it - and when it is deleted for a customer's data request, they go too. A note that survives the deletion of the conversation it describes is personal data you failed to delete.