Be wary when using AI for taking board minutes

AI (artificial intelligence) is the big business buzzword as companies explore ways to best utilise this rapidly evolving technology in the workplace.

Its potential to improve efficiency makes it a highly appealing tool and every day businesses are making decisions on when to utilise it, when to seek its assistance while retaining a human touch, and when to avoid it.

One area where businesses are exercising caution, and rightfully so, is minute-taking, and more specifically, board meeting minute-taking.

Catherine Feechan is an expert in business law

UK companies have a legal obligation to keep accurate board minutes recording decisions of directors, so it’s easy to see why there would be a temptation to use AI - to simplify the process and help keep a comprehensive record of proceedings. What’s not to like?

But while AI can be a useful tool to help speed up the process of producing minutes, there are some key issues to consider carefully before making use of generative AI for this purpose.

Despite its convenience, it comes with risks. Much of what’s discussed at board meetings is highly confidential so it’s important to be aware some AI tools use the information they collect to improve their own performance. That can lead to confidentiality breaches, either by the use of company information in AI responses to questions from third parties, or more indirectly by the AI being trained using confidential information.

There are also data protection issues to consider. Personal data may be disclosed during a meeting and minuted.

In addition, transcribing every word of a meeting may also constitute the processing of personal data of those present. For that reason, consent should always be obtained from those attending if it’s being recorded or transcribed.

Then there’s accuracy, which can also be a big issue. Sometimes AI doesn’t get things quite right – it might mishear comments or misattribute them – so a human review of anything that’s produced is still essential.

When it comes to minute-taking, hopefully this issue is one that can be easily resolved by circulating draft minutes to all attendees for approval before they are finalised.

Bear in mind that directors may need to rely on minutes at some point for evidential use or in an insolvency situation, so the penalties for getting minutes wrong can be severe.

Last, but by no means least, another key consideration should be cyber security. Using AI can, in some cases, leave a company more open to cyber attacks - so its boards need to seriously consider that risk and how best to mitigate it.

So, is AI dangerous, or a long-awaited solution for improving efficiency in the workplace? I’d say it’s a bit of both.

Many people believe the automation of certain tasks is long overdue and want to take advantage of technology in day-to-day business. That’s why businesses up and down the country use it for a range of tasks, from data entry and email drafting to report generation.

However, I’d recommend treading very carefully before using AI for sensitive tasks like creating board minutes, for all the reasons above.

If you’ve weighed up the risks and you still want to use AI for this purpose, it’s essential to put the right safeguards in place. Make sure you have seriously considered and mitigated risks when it comes to key issues like data protection, confidentiality and cyber security.

Otherwise this apparent quick-fix to streamline the production of your minutes might bring some big problems further down the line.

Catherine Feechan is a Senior Director, Davidson Chalmers Stewart