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Should marketing agencies make recording client meetings the default? AI meeting assistants can capture transcripts, summaries and actions from every conversation. But does recording everything change the quality of the conversation itself?
Honest, open conversations happen in person. Or on the phone.
Forget email.
With Teams, Zoom and AI meeting assistants, the line has blurred.
For those in highly sensitive or regulated industries, it makes sense that strict rules and policies are in place.
At board meetings only the company secretary can take the minutes, for example.
But for many of us, off-the-record conversations are still needed. That’s where you can get to the truth.
We see from other agencies, in particular media, that argue recording client meetings by default makes them more accountable, efficient, more professional.
What is there to hide?
But that misses the sensitivities you may have the privilege of being aware of.
It’s unrealistic to think we work in a vacuum.
Personalities matter within an organisation.
Culture matters.
And so does where a business is sitting at that moment.
What else is going on?
A new Head of Marketing finding their feet and pushing for a different direction.
Maybe a change at board or partner level that’s shifted alignment on what the business should stand for.
Or a merger or acquisition on the horizon, bringing new cost pressures with it.
Some of it may seem completely unrelated to marketing.
But indirectly, it can shape everything, including how we work together.
The decisions being made.
The appetite for risk.
The ambition.
And ultimately, the goal and end result.
Where the real insights happen
In our years working with different clients, some of the best insights have come from the off-the-record chats.
That’s where you find out who’s really making the decision.
Whose job is on the line.
How brave they can afford to be.
What pressures are really sitting behind the brief.
The things that don’t necessarily get said in the meeting.
In a dream world, these conversations would happen over a cup of coffee.
But in reality, we work faster and across different locations. The old-fashioned desk phone has become less common, while Teams and Zoom calls are here to stay.
And AI meeting technology is changing things again. Transcripts, summaries and actions can be pulled out automatically.
In our experience, that’s usually all anyone wants. Given the choice, people are far more relaxed with a transcript running than a camera. And if we’re honest, how often does anyone go back and watch a recording of a meeting? A transcript gives you everything you need, without the discomfort of being on camera.
We’ve embraced AI at Find Your Angle.
We continue to be amazed by how quickly things are changing, and by what technology can now do to support our work and our clients.
But we’ve also stopped to consider what it costs the client relationship.
Does everyone want every word they say recorded?
Do clients want an AI meeting assistant transcribing the conversation when they’re chatting among themselves before we dial in?
Because often, those few minutes before a meeting starts are where a lot of the real work happens.
And sometimes, it’s what gets said after we leave that matters most.
What to ask before your next call
If you’re the one being asked to join a call with an AI assistant in the room, it’s worth knowing what you’re agreeing to.
A few questions are worth asking any agency or supplier before you say yes by default.
Who can access the recording once the call ends? Is it stored and if so, for how long? Is it being used to train anyone’s AI model beyond that one summary? And critically, can you ask for it to be switched off.
You shouldn’t feel awkward asking. If you do, perhaps that’s telling you something.
In the UK, recording a meeting means processing personal data. People should know it’s happening and why.
It’s the same principle running through everything above, we believe the conversation changes the moment someone isn’t sure who’s really listening, or where their words might end up. This is important to the client relationship.
We’d rather you ask us these questions than assume the answer.
Recording client meetings by default?
For now, at Find Your Angle, recording client meetings isn’t something we do automatically.
We don’t have a bot follow us into every meeting, not because we don’t find these tools useful or efficient. We do.
But above everything, we value the client relationship and the trust that comes with knowing a conversation is confidential.
We think it takes experience to know when recording client meetings is appropriate.
It’s over twenty years of listening to clients in meetings has taught us.
For us, it isn’t a blanket policy.
It depends on the conversation.
It depends on the people involved.
And it depends on what we’re trying to achieve.
Part of our FIND process to get to your brand proposition can involve talking to a client’s customers or stakeholders.
These are typically off-the-record conversations.
That creates the space for people to be honest.
To tell us what they really think.
Especially in internal stakeholder work, we’ve found it makes people franker. When there’s no recording running, people stop rehearsing the safe version of an answer. They say what’s going on, not the version that can’t be quoted back at them later.
And that’s often where the most valuable insight comes from.
It works differently when we’re gathering feedback for a client from their own customers or wider stakeholder group. There, we tell everyone upfront that what they say will be anonymised and reported back as group findings, never attributed to them by name. Knowing that seems to make people more open, not less. And because it isn’t a one-to-one, commercially sensitive conversation, a transcript earns its place there: something to check back against if a finding gets questioned, tangible evidence of the work you’ve commissioned, and it cuts the time it takes us to turn interviews into a summary you can act on.
Are we really listening?
There’s a question we ask ourselves too. Are we really listening if we know we’re being recorded?
Do we lose some of our edge and our instinct to dig a little deeper when something said didn’t fully make sense, to challenge what we’ve heard and to make sure we’ve really understood?
Meeting transcription can capture every word or hallucinate the words, in any case!
But that doesn’t necessarily mean we’re capturing the conversation.
Good consultancy relies on understanding what people say, what they don’t say and why. And sometimes you need the conditions for people to speak freely.
What do you think?
Should online meetings be recorded by default?
Or are there still conversations that are better left off the record?
We’d love to hear your view.
If you’re weighing up recording client meetings yourself, or just looking for a clearer view of where your business sits and how to make your brand more memorable, we’d be happy to talk.
And yes, recording this conversation is optional.