Personally, I would never consent to be recorded at every meeting. Further, I would be mortified asking others for their consent. And how could I, as CTO, ask without coercion?
Once in a meeting I brought up an idea. A coworker said we could have a different meeting to discuss it but the decision was going to be no. And then I said that we should not have the meeting since the decision was taken.
Said coworker went to the CTO and reported me for refusing to have meetings.
Then I thought I should record the meetings. But I decided that quitting was a much better idea.
I ended up having 2 weeks being paid for not working, so that was a nice extra.
Agreed. I would probably consent now and then but largely I find it a bit inappropriate to be recorded, especially when it's a collaborative and group think meeting.
In order to get a text-only transcription you need to record it somehow. I can't be sure that a backup audio file isn't stored anywhere, so I believe the same applies. It means that in theory, your conversation with someone else may be shared. I don't consent to that, normally. For presentations, talks etc it's a different matter.
If you store captions produced by a party you trust (e.g., Google Meet), it could be accomplished w/o accessing audio at all. If I get it right, your concern is more about what's in the pipeline than what comes out.
It's a policy for us, and therefore an expectation, not a request. We also make sure that this isn't a surprise: everyone comes in knowing that we do this (and indeed, many new additions to the team have taken advantage of this by listening to past meetings to come up to speed).
Know that this policy would be illegal in many jurisdictions, especially in the one I live in. Setting it up disqualifies you from being a global employer - at least in theory -, and it's also really unethical. Also workers have a right to their voice and can't be recorded by default.
Have a written record of the meetings outcomes, that's what is actually useful.
I emphatically disagree about it being "unethical" -- we view being recorded as a part of job function. I am also curious (and, frankly, skeptical) about the supposed illegality in your jurisdiction; where do you live?
Yes! Anything that required recording as part of job function would be illegal, which I highly doubt is the case -- part of why I'm interested to get to specifics here...
Some specifics are in https://www.anwalt.de/rechtstipps/was-muessen-arbeitgeber-be.... This assumes you make video recordings of the meetings, then we are not only talking about the personal rights to the voice, but also to the picture. But similar rules would apply if you only take voice recordings, to my knowledge, it's just less documented.
Of course you can have jobs where the voice recording is absolutely necessary, then it can be allowed by default. Or similarly, of course an actor will be recorded in sound and picture. But that's not the case when doing a regular office job. Specifically your "it's expected from the employers" is what would absolutely make it illegal.
Doing it without consent would probably be the only illegal issue you'd run into in virtually every jurisdiction on earth. Otherwise, how would movies, TV shows, or the news get filmed in your country?
We are obviously not talking about positions where recordings are normal and obviously necessary. And parent also specifically did mention that consent is required, thus not freely given, and thus not legal.
Hey, spare me the bullshit. You know fully well that we are not on the same page. Recording all meetings at work by default for a regular office job is illegal and you have no chance to win the process if any employee sues in Germany. And that would be a costly loss, by the way. You might actually go to jail.
This is video calls. Maybe we are talking about different things? I was thinking an audio recording of a real life meeting in a real life office. In that case, I’d expect it to be clear meetings were being recorded and well known. If you don’t want to be recorded, register issues you want brought up in the meeting with someone else in the meeting and just don’t speak or don’t go.
In your article (English translation):
> Documentation by recording is only permissible without voluntarily declared consent if the interest in the recording outweighs the interest in the data protection of the recorded persons
This is a high bar in Germany, but certainly attainable in some situations. I suspect it is highly contextual.
Fair enough :) My work reality did not factor that possibility in.
I don't think it would change all that much. It might make it easier to justify the measure, but you would still have high bars to claim. In the end it would still be an unusual recording, which might negatively impact employees privacy and in a work context lead to conflict. As it is completely possible and way more common to just have text documentation, logs and meeting outcomes, I really am quite confident that even just a regular voice recording of meetings in a real office would not stand in court.
Also, "it's part of our process and employees have no say in it" as in parent's comment would be without any doubt not legal. Given the requirements you now saw I think we can agree on that now :)
