I’ve no particular objection, but I can’t see many ways it would be useful.
Maybe if there was some complex detail being discussed that was resolved in a difficult-to-minute way, it could help to be able to play back the conversation.
But if you get in a dispute with your superior, it generally goes one of two ways:
[ul]
[li]Everyone is adult enough to see sense and come to a reasonable resolution, regardless who is remembering it correctly.[/li][/ul]
or
[ul]
[li]One or more parties is batshit insane and, although replaying the conversation, although it proves a point, just introduces a new facet of sulky aggression into the relationship.[/li][/ul]
Skald, does your peer provide copies of the recordings to each employee at the end of the conversation? Because if only one person has access to them, that’s a huge imbalance of power. If my manager required recording conversations, I’d require him to state, both in writing, and in person at the beginning of the recording, that I would be provided with a copy of the recording, and if I was not, that the recording could in no way be used against me in any way at any future time. And I’d require this for each and every recording, and cc: HR as well. And I’d start looking for another job, because this is unbelievably inappropriate.
Subordinate here. I’d be fine with it. I’m too forgetful to keep up with lies, thus I stay honest, so I wouldn’t be worried about from a record keeping standpoint. Like most things along those lines (meeting minutes, flow charts, etc.), I would assume these videos would never be consulted again.
Probably not.
It’s what I always expected them to do and not bother telling me.
Companies monitor email, install video cameras, monitor phone calls. When I was in the corporate world I had no expectations of privacy, I was in their space, using their equipment. Nothing they did would have surprised me.
I also kept all correspondence on the projects I was working on.
One reason was a boss who would tell me to do project ‘A’ a certain way one day and the next day scream at me in front of the entire office for doing it that way and tell me to do it a different way. My father told me get a little black notebook and whenever that boss told me to do something, write it in my book, date it and get him to initial it. The next time my boss did that, pull out the book and show him his previously initialed instructions. My father said I’d never have to do it more than once and he was right. As soon as my boss saw me reaching for the book he’d back off.
Funny, we had a great working relationship after that. I actually started liking the guy.
In another case I was doing a special project for a Senior VP who was (I found out later) a rip roaring drunk. I kept copies of every memo, and I documented every phone call and sent a copy to him with a request that he initial and return.
One day in a conference call, which included all my bosses all the way up to the Senior VP as well as a number of other higher ups in other branches, he started berating me for something I had done and how stupid I was to do it that way. I very calmly flipped through my memos and said if you look back on memo dated such and such you will see that it was *your *idea for me to do it that way even after I pointed out to you that wasn’t how it should be done.
OMG, the meeting had to be paused and the speaker turned down until everybody could get themselves under control. You could hear the stifled laughter from the other locations. My boss was choking and gave me a big thumbs up, the director was choking, everybody who ever had to deal with that asshole was choking.
I never meant to embarrass the guy, I was protecting myself. I expected to be called on the carpet for it, but instead the Senior VP came over and put his hand on my back and commended me on my patience and diplomacy.
That is why you keep copies of emails and memos and document every conversation.
I’m middle management, so I’m looking at this from both viewpoints.
As a boss - it would feel very… formal. I would want my staff to know ahead of time that we were recording, and that it would be part of either their record or the branch staff general record. Everyone would be much more likely to either stay entirely silent, or to prepare notes and comments ahead of time, and stick with them. I really can’t think of any situation right now that would be improved by that tone. If I HAD to do it for employee reviews or training updates, sure - I wouldn’t be happy about it, but that’s in a specific situation that’s already a little formalized and structured. For every conversation we had that wasn’t involving more than two people? Very restricting to the sense of camaraderie and cooperation that I really try for in my immediate workplace.
As an underling - it would feel threatening and punitive, to be honest. Given the current office politics, I would constantly be on pins and needles trying to keep myself clear of the undercurrents and keep myself from offering unintended support or “points” to one side or the other. I would be frustrated at this, because if all of my attention is spent trying to protect myself from my words being mis-used or attributed further than my intent, I wouldn’t be focusing on the performance of my job. I LIKE doing my job well, and try very hard to be attentive to that, and to ignore the politics (other than being aware enough of them to stay clear). Having a permanent video record of every conversation with my superiors would seriously hinder my ability to simply do my job.
Final point. As a personal thing, I HATE being video-taped. I don’t like the sound of my voice, I hate the way I look, and I am extremely self-conscious and self-critical. If I knew that my job was going to involve regular filming, I don’t think I’d be able to keep working - the stress would do me in.
Perhaps you missed the part of the OP where I wrote that my peer’s idea was a bad one. Easy to understand, given that the OP was all off a hundred twelve words long.
Totally opposed to it. Videos can be edited to show almost anything if a jerk is motivated enough, and are awful hard to walk back if released. See, James O’Keefe. I have no confidence that video recordings of routine meetings would be stored securely nor protected from malicious use.
I agree. If done without my knowledge, I’d be livid. If you told me about it, I’d certainly take it as a sign you don’t trust me, and don’t plan on treating me like a competent adult. In a good economy, it would probably be enough for me to brush off my resume. (In a bad one, I’d float it out there, but would probably expect to be stuck.) I’d also insist that I get a copy of every video before I left the room. God knows what a little creative editing would do to my job, y’know?
I’ve been stuck working at places (pretty much exclusively in corporate environments, for what that’s worth) where I’m treated as though they assume I’m an untrustworthy child – not that I did something to deserve that assessment, but that was the default assumption. I didn’t like it. If you don’t trust me, why the F did you hire me? Or perhaps trust me until I prove that I don’t deserve it, instead of the other way around? When stuff like that happens, it means the environment is, or is about to become, someplace impossible to be productive in and pretty close to, if not actually meeting, the legal definition of “hostile work environment”. It’s generally a pre-cursor to me losing my job for some specious reason, too.
I’m a grown up, so are you, so let’s act like it, hmm?
As an aside, you’d probably want to check if it’s even legal for you to record those meetings.
This is 0.5% good idea and 99.5% bad idea/lawsuit worthy. Yes, you might catch a ‘capture lightning in a bottle’ moment that comes along during a brainstorming session once in a blue moon that would have otherwise gone unnoticed using this videotaping idea. That said, as was already mentioned, this tool will be wildly abused 99.5% of the time by managers and/or the hit squad in your HR department. Once a layoff or firing is going to occur, the video records are going to be the first thing that gets pulled up and possibly doctored to ‘justify’ their actions. Hell, all you have to do is compile a ‘best of’ video of every time the employee looked at a joke e-mail, bought something personal on the Web, or checked Facebook. They may only do this 1% of their day, but when you splice all that footage together of just their ‘crimes’ it can make the most productive member of your workforce look like they spend all day staging Klan rallies. I am middle management and I would refuse to do this to my employees, and if forced, I would likely start the look for a new job. I have worked for people who would think this was a ‘good idea’, and well, quite frankly I don’t work for those people any longer.
I would not like it I don’t think. It would make things extremely formal and hard to see how the time would be that productive with everyone thinking that it could bite them in the ass one way or another.
I wouldn’t care for it either. I’ve had bosses in the past who would still behave like total jackasses and excuse it as their right as “management”, but use the slightest inflection, the slightest disagreement or hesitation on the part of others as “insubordination” or “disrespect”.
And sit in their offices watching it over and over until they saw something to use as disciplinary fodder, no matter how inconsequential.
Work Skald shares very little with Board Skald; mostly just a love of his wife, kid, and books. (I don’t even talk about Lord of the Rings at work.) I responded as I did because I interpreted your question as suggesting that I thought surreptitiously recording all my meetings with my employees would be a good idea, which frankly I found a insulting.