TheCorporateCounsel.net

I recently saw a report quoting an OpenAI insider who estimates that there’s a 70% chance that artificial intelligence will destroy humanity. I guess that would worry me more if I didn’t put the odds of us doing that to ourselves without AI’s help at around 75% – and if the current iterations of AI didn’t have more in common with ’80s icon Max Headroom than with the HAL 9000 from “2001: A Space Odyssey.”

That being said, I’ve recently learned about one emerging use for AI that really does terrify me. Apparently, people are starting to use generative AI tools to prepare board minutes. A recent article in “The Boardroom Insider” flags this emerging practice, and this excerpt lays out some of the things that could go very wrong with relying on AI tools in this setting:

Potential downsides of this trend are apparent (and some are still to be realized). Recording of board meetings are always a legal bomb waiting to go off. The more it becomes a standard practice, the more likely someone will neglect to wipe all copies once minutes are finalized. While AI minuting apps note that their draft is only that — a draft for further human processing — what it retains and ignores can prove worrisome.

Further, once you get comfortable with letting AI do the minuting, you’re more likely to just send its digital take out for quick approval. AI “hallucinations” sneaking into the draft could be hard to spot. Finally, what if everyone on the board uses a recording to create their own AI summaries? This Tower of Babel approach could be a nightmare.

If you’re still willing to take the plunge, the article goes on to identify some AI tools that you might use to help generate board minutes. If you’re up for that, well, Godspeed! As for me, when it comes to the use of generative AI for board minutes, I’m firmly in Colonel Kurtz’s camp.

– John Jenkins