You are inches from your laptop’s microphone, articulating slowly “we. are. using. a. SaaS. solution.” The transcript still says “we are using sassy lotion.” Maybe that’s the case, but it’s certainly not what you want sent to your manager.
Voice dictation and AI transcription are supposed to save you time, but when they struggle with context or clarity, they can disrupt your workflow. Errors usually fall into distinct buckets, which according to Assembly AI include misheard words, omissions, incorrect spelling and formatting errors.
We’ve collected 10 phrases in these categories that voice dictation can often get wrong. How many have you experienced?
What’s said: “Update slides for tomorrow’s meeting.”
What’s transcribed: “Update slides for tomorrow’s eating.”
What’s said: “It will be a 15-minute interview.”
What’s transcribed: “It will be a 50-minute interview.”
What’s said: “We need to optimize our SaaS platform.”
What’s transcribed: “We need to optimize our sass platform.”
What’s said: “The company is focusing on niche markets.”
What’s transcribed: “The company is focusing on leash targets.”
What’s said: “Our team works in a hybrid environment.”
What’s transcribed: “Our team works in a high bird environment.”
What’s said: “Send out an invite to the forum.”
What’s transcribed: “Send out an invite for him.”
What’s said: “We need to schedule a sync tomorrow.”
What’s transcribed: “We need to schedule a sink tomorrow.”
What’s said: “Let’s review the core metrics.”
What’s transcribed: “Let’s review the corpse metrics.”
What’s said: “I can’t emphasize enough how important the client is.”
What’s transcribed: “I emphasize enough how important the client is.”
What’s said: “We need to focus on organic growth next quarter.”
What’s transcribed: “We need to focus on panic growth next quarter.”
These examples may be comedic until you have to explain “sassy lotion” to your CEO.
While voice dictation has significantly advanced, not having the right setup forces software to play a guessing game. Clear speech is important, but so is clear audio. When your laptop microphone captures the hum of an air conditioner or side conversations in a meeting room, mistakes happen.
A dedicated audio setup reduces the guesswork. Look for a great headset or microphone that builds noise isolation into the hardware to suppress background noise and ensure only your voice is captured.
Technology that is intended to speed up your workflow shouldn’t cause you to slow down. With a few tweaks to your setup, you can overcome transcription errors. And remember, the robot doesn’t hate you, it just can’t properly hear you.
About the author: Gurpreet works in communications at Logitech, curious about how personal accessories help people access the digital world.
