Prepare your
  • business
  • career
  • 1 on 1
  • project
  • recurring
discussions
for better results.

OurSails is the collaborative writing app that organizes discussion notes and improves meeting habits.

For high-performers, professionals, managers, coaches and mentors. For you. Create engaging discussions, insightful topics and great habits.

The Problem

Losing Focus and Missing What Matters

In 2020, I was leading a team of 50 talented individuals spread across four time zones from New York to Tokyo. We were just beginning a 5 billion dollar post-acquisition integration that was changing how we worked, in the middle of a pandemic which changed where we worked, with no in-person interactions to help me or my leadership team communicate why we were doing any of it.

“OurSails takes a meaningful topic-first approach to discussions, rather than a shallow agenda-first approach to meetings.”

Charles Abbott
OurSails Founder

Gone were the lunchtime discussions, whiteboard activities, and hallway conversations that helped me understand what motivated and inspired the people around me. So I found myself working double-time to save our team's great culture. I used video calls with one-on-one agendas in Google docs to spark and track discussions about the individual challenges and aspirations of my teammates, but this system was painful for three big reasons:

  • Copy / Paste / Miss. When I wanted to ask each person about their private opinion on a topic, I had to remember to copy it into each one-on-one document. I dreaded pasting a bullet into 20+ documents, so I usually kept an extra doc with my agenda, but I always missed asking some people.
  • Nothing Was in Focus. With dozens of separate documents continuously scrolling with all sorts of discussion history - it was too easy to forget where I had written down a note about a
  • Copy / Paste / Miss. When I wanted to ask each person about their private opinion on a topic, I had to remember to copy it into each one-on-one document. I dreaded pasting a bullet into 20+ documents, so I usually kept an extra doc with my agenda, but I always missed asking some people.
  • Nothing Was in Focus. With dozens of separate documents continuously scrolling with all sorts of discussion history - it was too easy to forget where I had written down a note about a topic. On top of that, it was painful to find patterns across these discussion notes. And what happened if my teammate updated some of the notes in between our 1:1s? Unless they tagged me, I'd rarely see it in time to prepare adequately to focus on what mattered to them. With dozens of documents mixed with dozens of ideas, nothing was in focus and everything was too easily forgotten.
  • Forgetting What Matters. Any long-running, deep discussions we had felt out of place in these Google documents. The topics on individual growth were hard to revive from a bullet point in an agenda. When stored in other documents, the documents were hard to find. I often failed to recall key details that mattered about my teammate's goals and personal objectives. And when I said I'd follow up in the next month, I needed reminders that wouldn't get lost in old agendas or random docs.

From 2020 to 2023 my team excelled and grew rapidly. We delivered, and we did it better than ever before - but it wasn't easy, and I made a lot of mistakes along the way. I tried dozens of tools and systems, but none of them fit just right. OurSails was created out of my frustration at organizing discussions on the topics that matter with the people that mattered to me.

OurSails Solves Those Problems Today.

OurSails takes a meaningful topic-first approach to discussions, rather than a shallow agenda-first approach to meetings. Our features include smart agendas, but also a single-pane view for all of your reminders and notes on any topic, and personal insights that will encourage discussions on all the topics that matter with the people that matter to you.

More Time Saving Than Google Docs

More collaborative than OneNote. Quickly capture, access and share the meaningful material that matters.

All of your meeting agendas, discussion notes, and follow-up reminders are just a click away. Never waste time looking for the meeting agenda again.

No more copy/pasting bullets between agenda documents. Schedule topics onto multiple agendas with a mouse click. During meetings quickly search and add any existing topics without leaving the meeting page. Access and evolve your talking points, shared notes and private notes anytime.

Each topic has its own dedicated, collaborative rich-text document that lets you and your meeting counterpart collaborate immediately. Easily facilitate an evolving, meaningful discussion and capture key context, details and reminders with ease. Discuss this topic again 2 days, 2 weeks or 2 months later without forgetting the details that matter.

More Reliable Than Emailing Yourself

More contextual than your todo list. Easily recall what to talk about, why it matters, and how you'll follow-up.

Repeat Topics

Never forget important topics from the agenda with auto-repeat

  • Sometimes you need to discuss a topic repeatedly, and consistently until it's no longer a priority.
  • Any topic you add to an agenda can be automatically added to future agendas with the simple click of a toggle.

No more copy-and-pasting topics in a document, topics can repeat automatically on agendas.

Private Talking Points

Recall crucial details or questions with private talking points

  • Draft key talking points that you can always reference privately while discussing the topic.
  • Talking points travel with you between meetings with different people, wherever you discuss this topic. So you can improve your topic talking points as you gain experience discussing it.

Draft topic talking points at anytime before or after you add the topic to an agenda.

Discussion Reminders

Remember to follow-up on key discussion points with reminders

  • Clearly commit to following-up by leaving a reminder on a topic for your meeting counterpart to see.
  • Find all of your reminders in one view, and quickly drill into the topic to get the full context.
  • Prioritize reminders by date, and celebrate as you mark them complete with a click of a button.

Create reminders visibly on shared topics or privately for behind-the-scenes follow-up.

Shared Notes

Quickly recall conversations and context with shared notes

  • Every topic has its own rich-text, collaborative document for building shared context.
  • Shared note-taking helps engage attendees during meetings and gives them something to review at their leisure afterwards.
  • Revisit the topic 2 days, 2 weeks, or 2 months later and your shared notes are still there - one document, fully focused on this topic.

Notes have audits to remind you of who and when, not just what.

Data Driven Insights

Data insights let you objectively judge your past consistency

  • How consistently did you meet with your manager, peers, reports, mentor or mentees?
  • How often did you collaborate on topics that matter most in the long-run?
  • Are you collaborating more or less frequently than in previous quarters?

Your insights are summarized by relationships and individuals and across different time frames.

Side-by-side Discussion Notes

Review discussion notes with a side-by-side view for each topic

  • You discuss the same topic with 10 people, take notes, and later find all those notes side-by-side for easy review.
  • Discover patterns across conversations, consolidate lessons or action items, or improve your talking points all from a single topic page.

Discussion notes let you capture the unique conversation highlights, and later distill insights with ease into topic notes.

More Prepared To Build Trust

Inject your authentic style and securely collaborate to take meeting notes with anyone, anytime.

Discussion Templates

Prepare your own discussion topics, or use our templates

  • Start drafting a template for your discussions, evolve it over time as you gain experience using it.
  • Or select one of our curated templates for discussions - from getting started as a new manager to delivering tough feedback, our library can set your discussion in the right direction.

Drafting templates gives you time to frame a discussion long before you have it.

Data Encryption

Peace of mind with at rest, at work and in transit encryption

  • All of your private notes, talking points, shared notes, and reminders are protected with best-in-class encryption at all times
  • Most products claim they provide Encryption at Rest, but we go the extra mile and ensure your data is encrypted in use / at work, too
  • Our application-level encryption makes direct querying and reading of your notes impossible.

Your data is always safe, secure and available for your eyes only. We take privacy seriously.

Group Discussions

One place for all of your meeting agendas

  • OurSails is designed to empower great one-on-ones, but group discussions and agendas fit, too.
  • Anyone invited to the group can add topics to group agendas, and each topic boasts its own rich-text shared document for collaborative note taking.

Try it in your one-on-ones or use it for your team meeting minutes.

For your laptop and mobile

Access your meeting agendas, reminders and notes from anywhere.

Great DiscussionsConsistently

share updates  align plans  discuss growth  
while building trust through the reassuring evidence of consistency.

OurSails has helped me transform the way I go about my day-to-day work from one filled with post-it's, scribbled notes and various e-documents to an efficient, centralised record of the conversations I have with colleagues, and the reminders of what I need to do next to move my projects along.

Pricing

Meeting Participants

Free

Free

Join discussions you are invited to.

  • Collaborate on meeting agendas
  • Review past agendas and topics
  • Take private discussion notes

Paying users can invite you to participate in discussions.

For Leaders & Coaches

Individuals

$240 /year

Lead collaborative discussions.

  • Create 1:1 and group meeting spaces
  • Invite anyone to meetings you create
  • Craft templates and talking points
  • Curated library of one-on-one activities
  • Personalized collaboration insights

You may cancel at any time. Downgrading to a free plan removes your ability to create or start meetings, but the notes, topics, and meetings you've already created remain accessible to you. Terms and Privacy Policy.

Purchase Subscription

For Businesses

Teams

Contact Us

Cultivate alignment in your organization.

  • Your team can create meeting spaces
  • Configure allowed domains
  • Craft templates and talking points
  • Curated library of one-on-one activities
  • Personalized collaboration insights
  • Manage access and team roster
  • Organizational insights
  • Simple, predictable, bulk pricing
Contact Us

Frequently asked questions

General Questions

Features and Functionality

Account and Data Management

Technical Support

Privacy and Security

Usage Scenarios

Quality of Life Tips and Tricks

In this section of the FAQs we will share ongoing insights into how to use OurSails effectively and efficiently.

Other