> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://help.gowindmill.com/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.
# Private Notes
> Capture private observations about yourself and your team in Windmill so Windy can resurface them during 1:1 prep, performance reviews, and team questions.
Private notes help you remember important moments, observations, and context about yourself and your team members. When you tell Windy something you don't want to forget, they'll remember it and bring it up at exactly the right time—during 1:1 prep, performance reviews, self-reviews, or when you ask questions about team members.
Think of private notes as your personal memory system. You capture insights when they happen, and Windy ensures they surface when they matter most.
## Why use private notes
**Remember what matters**
Great management requires remembering countless details across many people and situations. Private notes let you capture those details in the moment, so you never lose track of important context.
**Write reviews faster**
When it's time to write a performance review or prepare for a 1:1, Windy automatically pulls relevant notes into context. No more scrambling to remember what happened six months ago.
**Better conversations**
Whether you're preparing for a 1:1 or responding to a question about a team member, Windy brings forward the notes that matter, helping you have more informed and meaningful conversations.
## When to create private notes
### About your team members
**Document key moments**
When someone handles a difficult situation well, takes initiative, or demonstrates growth, capture it immediately.
**Track patterns over time**
Notice someone consistently stepping up to help others? Document it. See areas where someone needs support? Record that too.
**Remember context for later**
Capture information that will help you write better reviews, prepare for 1:1s, or answer questions about team development.
### About yourself
**Track your own wins**
Document your accomplishments, successful projects, and positive feedback so you have material ready for self-reviews.
**Note your growth**
Record skills you're developing, challenges you've overcome, and areas where you've improved.
**Remember lessons learned**
Capture insights from mistakes or difficult situations while they're fresh.
## How to create private notes
You can create a private note from wherever you're already working — Slack or the Windmill Dashboard. Pick whichever is fastest in the moment.
**From Slack**
* **Message Windy** — DM Windy or @mention them and describe the note ("private note about Sarah: …"). Good for capturing thoughts in your own words.
* **Slash command** — Run `/private-note` in any channel to open a quick-capture form. See the [Slack shortcuts reference](/integrations/slack#slack-shortcuts) for the full list.
* **Message shortcut** — Right-click any Slack message (or use the ⚡ menu) and choose **Create a private note** to save that message as a note.
**From the Windmill Dashboard**
* **Universal Search (⌘K)** — Open the command palette and pick **Create a private note**. If you run it from someone's profile, the note is automatically associated with that person.
* **Employee profile** — On any employee's page, use the **Actions** menu to add a private note about them.
### Examples for managers
**Capturing a team member's achievement**
"Hey Windy, private note about Sarah: She handled the client escalation
yesterday really well. Stayed calm under pressure, asked good clarifying
questions, and found a solution the client was happy with. This is exactly the
kind of ownership we need."
"@Windy note for myself about James: He's been going out of his way to help
onboard the new engineers. Saw him spend 2 hours yesterday walking Maya
through our deployment process even though it wasn't assigned to him. Great
team player."
"Windy, remember this about Alex: In today's design review he struggled to
explain the technical tradeoffs to the product team. Need to work with him on
communicating complex ideas to non-technical stakeholders."
**Preparing for conversations**
"@Windy private note: I need to talk to Jordan about meeting deadlines. This
is the third sprint where they've asked for extensions. Want to understand
what's blocking them and figure out how to help."
"Hey Windy, note about Maria: She mentioned in our 1:1 that she wants to move
into management eventually. Let's revisit this in 6 months and see if there
are opportunities to give her some mentorship experience."
### Examples for individual contributors
**Tracking your own accomplishments**
"@Windy note for me: Just finished the authentication refactor—reduced login
time by 40% and eliminated the race condition that was causing intermittent
failures. Took 3 weeks but the system is way more reliable now."
"Hey Windy, remember this: Lisa from product said my work on the dashboard
redesign really improved the user experience. She specifically called out how
I incorporated all the customer feedback from the research sessions."
"Windy, note for myself: Figured out why the nightly builds were failing.
Turned out to be a timezone issue in the test data. Took me two days to track
down but learned a lot about our testing infrastructure in the process."
**Documenting growth and learning**
"@Windy private note: Started leading the weekly tech talks this month. First
one was rough—I was nervous and rushed through it. By the third one I felt way
more comfortable and got great questions from the team."
"Hey Windy, remember: I was really struggling with the microservices migration
earlier this quarter. Spent time pair programming with senior engineers and
now I'm comfortable owning services end-to-end. Big growth area for me."
### Examples for cross-functional leads
**Tracking team dynamics**
"@Windy note: The partnership between design and engineering has really
improved this quarter. The weekly sync we started is helping both teams stay
aligned. Emma and Chris have been doing a great job co-leading those
sessions."
"Windy, remember this about Priya: She's been stepping up to coordinate
between product, design, and engineering on the mobile project. Not officially
her role but she's naturally filling that gap and doing it well."
## How Windy uses your notes
### During 1:1 preparation
When you're preparing for a 1:1, Windy automatically pulls in relevant notes about that person. This gives you context about recent observations, areas to celebrate, and topics to discuss.
### When generating review content
Private notes are a **writing aid only** — visible to you while you draft, never published into a review or shared with anyone else. Specifically:
* **Notes you wrote tagged to another employee** surface as writing-aid context in *your own* draft of any review you write about that person — your manager review of them (if they report to you), your peer review of them, or your upward review of them. Observations you can choose to include, edit, or ignore.
* **Notes you wrote about yourself** surface as writing-aid context in *your own* self-review draft.
* **Notes never appear in another person's packet, in calibration, or in any shared review artifact** — even if they're about the same employee being reviewed by someone else.
Nothing from a private note reaches a shared review unless you explicitly select or copy it into an answer. For the full input-to-surface mapping across all review inputs, see [How inputs surface in a review](/features/performance-reviews/manager-reviews#how-inputs-surface-in-a-review).
### When you ask questions
If you ask Windy a question about a team member—like "What has Sarah been working on?" or "How has James been doing with the new role?"—Windy includes relevant notes in their response.
### When making decisions
If you're considering someone for a promotion, new project, or development opportunity, your notes provide valuable context for those decisions.
## Privacy and access
**Your notes are truly private**
Private notes are only visible to you. They never appear in shared spaces like 1:1 agendas or performance review documents unless you explicitly copy content from them.
**Not visible to the subject**
Notes you write about team members are not visible to those team members. They're for your reference only.
**Separate from shared information**
Anything you want to share with someone should go in the shared 1:1 space, feedback, or other collaborative features. Private notes are strictly for your own memory and preparation.
## FAQs
No. Private notes are only visible to you. They're designed to be a personal memory system and are never shared with others, including the people you write notes about.
{" "}
1:1 notes are shared between both participants and appear in the 1:1
agenda/notes space. Private notes are only visible to you and don't appear in
any shared spaces. Use private notes for your own reflections and
observations, and 1:1 notes for information you want to share with the other
person.
{" "}
Yes. You can always ask Windy to update or remove a private note. Just message
Windy with the details of what you want to change or delete.
{" "}
Windy retains your private notes indefinitely until you delete them. This
means context from months or even years ago can surface when it's
relevant—perfect for annual reviews or long-term development conversations.
{" "}
Private notes are great for documenting performance concerns or areas for
improvement that you want to remember. However, actual feedback—both positive
and constructive—should be shared directly with the person through proper
feedback channels. Use private notes to track patterns and prepare for
conversations, not as a substitute for direct communication.
Currently, private notes surface automatically in context when they're relevant. If you want to review your notes about a specific person or topic, you can ask Windy directly—for example, "What notes do I have about Sarah?" or "Show me my notes from last quarter."