Meeting technologies and recordkeeping: a preliminary study

Abstract

Purpose The purpose of this study is to raise awareness of the benefits and drawbacks involved in using digital technologies for business meetings, and identify key concerns. The shift from in-person to virtual meetings has multiple consequences, some of which impact recordkeeping. Design/methodology/approach Drawing on research from records management, anthropology, organizational theory and computer science, this study establishes the norms of physical meeting spaces and recordkeeping and explores how these norms are challenged as meetings become virtual. Findings Virtual meetings allow for collaboration to work across time and space and offer multiple affordances that do not exist in on-site meetings; however, they also involve the additional barrier of technical access and reduction in user attention. Virtual meetings also enable the creation, capture and sharing of increased contextual data, and this increased documentation challenges traditional recordkeeping models. Meeting technologies are also worryingly invasive. This study shows that concerns over privacy have been dismissed in the design of virtual meeting spaces, and therefore the authors recommend their more thorough consideration. Originality/value Meetings are a pervasive feature of organizational life whose significance has been overlooked in the recordkeeping literature. By bringing together research about in-person and virtual meetings in a novel and necessary way, the authors started to fill a gap and hope to inspire further studies.